Who is objective? Science reporting on the political frontlines
An online ABSW event with Jane Qiu and Angela Saini
An online ABSW event with Jane Qiu and Angela Saini
Objectivity has long been regarded as one of the sacred tenets of journalism, but how do we gauge who is objective and who isn’t? What does journalistic objectivity mean when facts are uncertain or undecided? Does it mean that newsrooms must operate in a value-free vacuum, treating both sides of a debate with equal weight? And who do we trust to handle stories in an objective way?
Jane Qiu is one of the world’s most respected science journalists, with a well-established record of reporting from China. Her narrative longform work on the origins of COVID-19 and the lab leak controversy (https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/02/09/1044985/shi-zhengli-covid-lab-leak-wuhan/) was a winner in the 2022 AAAS/Kavli Science Journalism Awards. But in this special online event, Qiu explains why the pandemic in fact proved to be one of the darkest moments in her career, including accusations from some quarters that as a Chinese journalist she couldn’t be objective in her reporting. The experience led her to write an essay asking “Could I be objective?” (https://sjawards.aaas.org/news/journalistic-objectivity-and-origins-covid-19-dispatch-front-lines).
Together with science journalist and ABSW board member Angela Saini – who has dealt with online abuse as a result of writing about race – this conversation will explore whether minority journalists are judged to be automatically less objective than others, and the pressures they face as a result. Qiu and Saini will share their perspectives on power dynamics in journalism, how they cover controversial— and sometimes emotive —scientific topics, and the online harassment they have to endure for writing stories that deviate from dominant narratives.
Further reading:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/23/opinion/objectivity-black-journalists-coronavirus.html
https://www.niemanlab.org/2020/01/the-neutrality-vs-objectivity-game-ends/
Details:
18:00 Thursday January 26, 2022
Online (Zoom)
Joining instructions have now been sent to all those registered. If you have not yet registered please get in contact with [email protected] and hopefully we can get the joining instructions to you in time for 18:00 tonight.
About Angela Saini
Angela Saini is British science journalist and author based in New York. She presents radio and television programmes, and her writing has appeared across the world, including in Financial Times, Wired, New Scientist, and National Geographic. Angela's latest book, Superior: The Return of Race Science, was published in May 2019 to enormous critical acclaim, and became a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize and the Foyles Book of the Year. Her previous book, Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong was published in 2017, and has been translated into fourteen languages. Her fourth book, The Patriarchs, will be published by 4th Estate and Beacon Press in the spring.
About Jane Qiu
Jane Qiu is an award-winning independent science writer in Beijing, contributing to publications such as Nature, Science, Scientific American, MIT Technology Review, National Geographic, and The Economist. She is a former Knight Science Journalism Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and has covered wide-ranging topics, from life sciences, conservation, and geoscience to anthropology, and her work has won awards from the ABSW, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the South Asian Journalists Association, and the Asia Environmental Journalism Awards.
