Heuristic

Appreciate the nuance of language. Source

It’s easy to frown upon journalists and the media in general. They deliver reports that, on an intellectual level, pale in comparison to the insight of academic journals and book reviews. The mass flow of information, while speedy and responsive, can hardly give us any fine-point answers to the complex needs of our age.

But we have to remember that, without any common way to express ourselves as effectively and efficiently as possible, there would be no way for the things we say to develop into anything. And journalism, while still looking for the light at the end of the tunnel to keep thriving, is far from dead, yet in a state more surreal. Recently writers have described journalism in the context of getting sponsored advertising, newcomers from literary theory, and the nitty-gritty details on words you can use. 

What began as a place for introspection and self-fulfillment has turned into lending my voice to the world. The writing on my blog gave me an outlet for me to talk about whatever I wanted to talk about, but, as I recognized its limitations in what it had, I wanted to move my writing career forward. My blog has evolved in other ways, as well, as moving form a series of ramblings on philosophical words and scientific pictures to a place where I can truly make a statement about the world and convey a message in terms other people can understand. This year I began writing in my university newspaper, Indiana Daily Student, as an Opinion Columnist and subsequently as an Editor, or, more specifically, Co-editor for the Opinion Desk. Only recently I’ve come to call myself a journalist and, even on occasion, a reporter.

It’s been tiresome, stimulating, and controversial to say the least. My primary goal was to make the writing quality of the Opinion section, and the general newspaper, much better. As an Opinion team, we hire undergraduates from a diverse array of academic backgrounds from physics to international business, and it’s shown in the content. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed publishing content on individual consent on the internet and the butterfly effect, even if it meant laboring for hours in the newsroom uploading images onto a page or fact-checking a column.

What’s intrigued me the most, though, has been the staunch convictions in the history of what journalists do. I was always surprised at how With my philosophical background, I was able to pick up on these nuances of reasoning and justification behind the decisions of others in the newsroom. I have to give a lot of of appreciation to Mary Katherine Wildeman, Editor-in-Chief this past semester. She’s been incredibly amazing in giving me the opportunity to express myself, something that that makes us human beings. And she thoroughly understands the “why’s” and “how’s” of what goes on behind the ink on the daily paper.

And this nuance is makes the newspaper so interesting.

The eternal back-and-forth struggle of my writing career, between writing work that is both accessible to the general public while remaining intellectually stimulating and rigorous, continues. As I mentioned, my writing has shifted from archaic, esoteric ramblings about things I could hardly comprehend into something simple and easy to digest. There are moments when content and meaning is lost in translation when we write in layman’s terms and put it things in words anyone can understand.

Until then, keep on writing.