International News: What Is It, Who Produces It and How?

The University of Hong Kong, Summer Institute 2018

Lecturer: Peter Eng

General Description

It is principally through reading and watching international news that we know about the world and our place and role in it. This news impacts our lives more than ever now that global communication that is borderless, real-time, 24-hour and virtually unlimited in content – and for these same reasons it is more essential than ever that we be able to understand this massive news flow and to distinguish good from bad, lies and distortions from truth. Who are the people and organizations producing these stories? How do they select, cover and write them?

This course familiarizes students with: 1. the structure and processes of international news organizations; 2. the content and distinguishing features of international news; and 3. how correspondents select, report and write the news, and the principles and values that guide them in doing this. We will focus on traditional rather than new media, and on print rather than broadcast, though the general principles apply across all media. We will learn through readings and assignments, classroom discussions and activities, dialogues with international correspondents, and field visits to news organization offices in Hong Kong. We will also step into the shoes of foreign correspondents by going to news events and reporting and writing our own stories.

Objectives

By the end of the course, you should be able to:

  • Much better appreciate the content of international stories you read every day, and critically evaluate these stories
  • Understand how international correspondents and news agencies work, and how they select, report and write the news
  • Understand the basic principles and practices of journalism in general, and the differences between local news and international news,
  • Make a start in reporting and writing news stories yourself, and
  • Observe and think about everything more widely and intelligently the next time you pick up the paper, visit an online news site, listen to the radio or watch TV news.

Topics

  1. Reading, understanding and evaluating international news
  2. Foreign correspondents: who they are and what they do
  3. International news organizations: who are they and how do they operate
  4. The world news system
  5. Core values of international news organizations: accuracy, objectivity, balance and fairness, independence, transparency
  6. What is “news”?
  7. How news stories are structured
  8. What information news stories contain
  9. How international reporting differs from local reporting
  10. Case studies of international reporting: Hong Kong, Cambodia, Thailand, etc.
  11. Case study of an international news organization: The Associated Press (AP)
  12. Sensitivities that international correspondents must be aware of: ethnic, social, cultural, religious.

About the instructor

Peter Eng, an Asian-American, is an independent journalism trainer, editor and writer. He has trained numerous journalists in seven Asian countries, teaching in universities, in newsrooms, and in workshops funded by international organizations, governments and NGOs. He has written extensively on the media in Asia and co-authored a widely used manual for Southeast Asian journalists that has been translated into several local languages. He has reported extensively in 13 Asian countries as a freelance journalist for prominent international media and before that, as the news editor in the Bangkok bureau of the Associated Press. Eng has an MA in political science from the University of Chicago and Stanford University and was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University.