Complicating the Narratives: How we’re moving this work forward
Hélène Biandudi Hofer is the manager of SJN’s Complicating the Narratives Project. She’s also a broadcast journalist, documentary filmmaker, and media entrepreneur.
Catastrophic mass shootings. Vitriolic and never-ending debates on immigration policy. Fears of an impending recession. Ongoing campaign trail insults and attacks. The loss of a trailblazer. That’s just a taste of the head-shaking, mind-numbing events of the past few weeks in our nation.
Generally, when it’s time to flip the calendar to August, that’s my cue to take stock of what I’ve been able to accomplish so far during the summer. By accomplish, I mean eating lots and lots of gelato during spontaneous road trips, making time for outdoor festivals, and having dance parties with my bernedoodle, Russell, to my favorite summer jam…on repeat about two dozen times (cue DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince).
This August, I forgot all about my typical late-summer routine. I also lost my appetite for gelato. I’m guessing many others have, too.
The events of the past few weeks have refueled two of the most polarizing debates in America: gun control and immigration. As a broadcast journalist, I’m constantly consuming press coverage of these issues and others. Admittedly, I’m also eavesdropping on conversations about these divisive topics anytime I hear them mentioned in restaurants, coffee shops, and at sporting events.
Here’s what I’ve gathered from my observations: we’re not seeing or hearing anything new. It’s “he said, she said”-style news coverage and accusatory conversations that are disabling us from effectively questioning, analyzing, and processing these polarizing issues.
It seems time is of the essence for a new project being spearheaded this fall by the Solutions Journalism Network (SJN). In 2018, SJN commissioned groundbreaking research followed by a powerful essay by journalist Amanda Ripley titled “Complicating the Narratives.” The research and corresponding essay showed how journalists can learn from the strategies used by conflict mediators to better reveal the complexity of stories centered around contentious issues. “Complicating the narrative means finding and including the details that don’t fit the narrative — on purpose,” Ripley explains in her piece. “The idea is to revive complexity in a time of false simplicity.”
Just a few weeks ago in mid-July, members of the SJN team descended upon the incomparable West Creek Ranch in Emigrant, Montana (I’m talking Hollywood film backdrop-style ranch…pure beauty). We were joined by Amanda Ripley and renowned conflict mediators Gary Friedman and Catherine Conner of The Center for Understanding in Conflict, both of whom Ripley had reported on in her piece. Why were we there? To learn how journalists can blend the skills used by conflict mediators with one or more of the six strategies detailed in Ripley’s essay, in an effort to expand and enhance their reporting on conflict and polarizing issues.
Here’s a sample of what we did during that action-packed week: We were taught how to explore “the V.” It’s a mediation model that can also be utilized by journalists to dig beneath the surface of any given conflict in an effort to discover the motives of all the parties involved (or even interview subjects). We also practiced a technique called looping. Talk about a powerful tool for enabling reporters to listen better, fact check, find the truth, connect with an interview subject, and uncover their motivations — all at the same time, if done effectively. (Side note: This may be a fun experiment to try on that cousin you blocked on Facebook because you just couldn’t take one more day of their rage rants.) Role-playing and traveling down “the why trail” was an exercise that was focused on asking more revealing questions, questions that unearth one’s interests or values and help revive curiosity (examples: “If your position on this issue were adopted, what would that mean for you in your life right now?” “What do you wish the other side knew about you?”). We also brainstormed innovative and creative ideas that journalists and news outlets could potentially use to deepen their reporting on complex and challenging issues (a group fav: “Loop the Nation.” Watch out, Sunday morning television!).
Our enthusiasm, curiosity, and sponge-like mentality during our days in Montana shared the stage with a healthy dose of reality. We asked ourselves a lot of questions throughout the course of the week:
- How can we complicate the narrative on multiple platforms?
- Will these techniques lead to greater fairness and better judgment in reporting?
- In what ways can broadcast journalists, with their daunting deadlines and quick turnaround stories, find time to use some of these skills when reporting on divisive topics?
- Do any of these skills, like looping, work for breaking news?
- What does it look like when journalists dig deeper on polarizing issues
- How do these principles link to the sacred values of traditional journalists?
The experience in Montana was, without a doubt, transformative for all of us, and coupled with the questions raised (as well as many others), it has laid the groundwork for a new SJN project intended to help journalists find new ways to grapple with difficult societal issues in their reporting, at a time of great division in our nation. This exciting effort is in its infancy. It doesn’t even have a name yet, though we may aptly call it Complicating the Narratives.
Year one for this project includes a handful of key goals:
- We’ll offer three journalist trainings on strategies for covering conflict (including one training at our Solutions Journalism Summit in November).
- We plan to work with 20 newsrooms throughout the country that are committed to shifting their approach when reporting on polarizing issues, including stories leading up to the 2020 election.
- We’re also planning to launch two beacon community projects — think local journalists, civic organizations, and residents coming together to address a divisive issue in their community, and then beginning to seriously and effectively engage in problem-solving.
As the newly-hired manager for this project (yes, I’m still pinching myself), I want to hear your thoughts and ideas. As with so much that we do at SJN, we’re approaching this as a collaborative and transparent process, something deeply informed by the needs and expertise of our network. As we learn from our network members who are experimenting with the idea of complicating the narrative in practical form, we’ll share what we discover and create resources that allow others around the country and the world to learn from these emerging techniques, tools, and strategies that, let’s be honest, most of us [journalists] never learned in J-school.
In recent conversations with fellow journalists about this new project, there’s consensus on two things: we need to do something and we need to do something now. Please email me (helene@solutionsjournalism.org) with ideas, thoughts, and questions. While I’m at it, I am in the market for new chocolate chip cookie recipes. I may have lost my appetite for gelato, but nothing, I mean nothing, can keep me away from homemade chocolate chip cookies (recent try: marshmallow chocolate chip…oh yeah, as good as it sounds). Feel free to attach those recipes when you reach out.
The Solutions Journalism Network has developed a Complicating the Narratives (CTN) training program for journalists and newsrooms. The interactive training is built upon Amanda Ripley’s research and the experiences of experts in conflict. We’re holding virtual training sessions on techniques and strategies to help journalists produce stronger, more nuanced, inclusive reporting on divisive issues. If you or your newsroom is interested in learning more, please contact CTN Manager Hélène Biandudi Hofer: helene@solutionsjournalism.org
