Kessler erwidert Laufer Journalisten sind Interviewten

Kessler erwidert Laufer: Journalisten sind Interviewten Autorisierunge...
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Kessler erwidert Laufer: Journalisten sind Interviewten Autorisierungen schuldig
BLOG | LAUREN KESSLER
8. Mai 2013, 15:46
Die Journalistin und Buchautorin argumentiert, warum sie kein
Problem mit "quote approval" hat und Journalisten von
Kulturanthropologen lernen könnten
foto: istockphoto.com/paulcalbar
Menschen erzählen Journalisten oft ihre Geschichte,
deshalb sollten Journalisten die Autorisierung von
Interviews nicht ablehnen, sagt Lauren Kessler.
Journalisten sollten von Kulturanthropologen lernen, meint Lauren
Kessler, Buchautorin und Leiterin des Studiengangs Multimedia
Storytelling in Oregon. Ihre Position in der Debatte um InterviewAutorisierungen ist die der narrativen Journalistin. Als solche
glaubt sie voll und ganz an die Autorisierung von Gesprächen.
Wer interviewt wird, gibt einen Teil seiner selbst preis, sagt
Kessler. Warum sollten diese Menschen nicht sehen, dass der
Journalist sie verstanden hat?
Sie gibt Peter Laufer aber in einem Recht: Journalisten sind nicht
das Sprachrohr der Mächtigen. Zuvor erklärte der Journalist,
Professor an der University of Oregon und fjum-Referent, in
Daniela Kraus' Journo-Blog, warum österreichische Journalisten
die Autorisierung von Interviews ablehnen sollten.
Im Wortlaut: Lauren Kessler über Interview-Autorisierung
As a narrative journalist who has practiced her craft for more than two decades, I feel strongly – more strongly than
ever – that journalists have the responsibility to help us understand the world in which we live. Some of that
understanding comes from interviewing those in power.
I don't diminish the importance of this. And I agree with my colleague, Peter Laufer, that allowing those in power to
have approval of their quotes prior to publication robs journalism of its integrity and lowers its position in a republic.
Journalists are not – and should not allow themselves to be – the mouthpieces of those in power. The job of
journalism, a famous American newspaper publisher once wrote, is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.
But helping people understand the society in which they live often has less to do with reporting on those in power than
it has to do with telling stories about the way people live day to day, how they act toward one another, their hopes and
fears. To get stories like this, the journalist does not interview "the comfortable".
Journalists say: "Tell me"
In fact, the journalist does not interview at all. She listens and watches. She stays in one place for long enough for the
life of that place, the lives and actions of the people in that place, the worries and doubts and dreams of the people in
that place to begin to make sense. She cocks her head and says, "Tell me." Or "help me understand this."
This is not an interview. This is the curiosity of the journalist as student learning from the experts who are living the
lives the journalist wants to understand. The journalist who does this kind of work – I am one of them – immerses
herself in communities. And this journalist owes something to those communities and to the people who generously
(most often honestly) share a part of themselves.
Why shouldn't those people see how the journalist has managed to understand them? Why shouldn't this journalist
share the story before publication? Isn't the journalist merely the conduit for that story? The person with the time and
talent (and privilege) to tell the stories of other people's lives? It is, after all, their lives. In this instance, I believe
wholeheartedly in what might be called "quote approval."
People own their Stories
But it is so much more than this, so much more important. It is the journalist's acknowledgement of the challenges of
fallibility interwoven with power. It is the acknowledgement that people own their stories, and the journalist owes them
a debt for sharing those stories. This is something our colleagues in cultural anthropology learned more than a
generation ago. They too go out into the world to discover how it works. They too observe, listen, prompt with queries,
take notes, craft reports. But they freely acknowledge the collaboration of their subjects. Which is to say, it is
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Kessler erwidert Laufer: Journalisten sind Interviewten Autorisierunge...
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commonly accepted, and very much encouraged, that they show their work to their subjects before publication.
Journalists should do the same when writing about the everyday lives of people, when telling "history in a hurry" (one
of the many definitions of what we do). It will help keep us humble, and help keep control in the hands of those who
truly own the stories we are privileged to tell. (Lauren Kessler, derStandard.at, 8.5.2013)
Lauren Kessler ist Journalistin, Autorin und Leiterin des Graduiertenprogramms Multimedia Storytelling in Oregon. Ihre Bücher über
Teenagerkultur, Alzheimerpatienten und Spioninnen waren auf den Bestsellerlisten von "Washington Post" und "Los Angeles Times".
Ihre journalistischen Beiträge erschienen u.a. in "New York Times Magazine", "Los Angeles Times Magazine", "O (Oprah) Magazine"
und "The Nation". Lauren bloggt unter www.counterclockwisebook.com und schreibt auf mom.me über Mutter-Tochter-Zeug und twittert
@laurenjkessler. laurenkessler.com
Zum Thema
Peter Laufer: Warum man Interview-Autorisierungen ablehnen sollte - eine US-Perspektive
Nachlese
Über Interview-Autorisierung sollte grundsätzlich diskutiert werden
Zwischen Freiheit und Verantwortung
Warum man Interview-Autorisierungen ablehnen
sollte - eine US-Perspektive
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27.11.2013 11:00