TIP Some very good advice here…
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Category Archives: skills and technique
TIP ~ INKAS ~ #5
Moving on with INKAS… Something perhaps pertinent to our times, NEWS FEATURE & NEWS EDITORIAL.
4–6 minutes
We hear a lot today about “fake news”. While historically there have been plenty of news articles containing errors or even purposefully misdirecting information, the abundance of disinformation and accusations that accurately written objective articles are the phony ones is a relatively recent phenomenon.
It was in 2014 that Craig Silverman coined the term “fake news” when studying and blogging about misinformation as it appears online. As his study dug deeper and deeper into the Internet, he discovered web sites that looked authentic and wrote articles in the style of news features, but their content was totally false. Many of these purported to be based in the US but in fact were the products of foreign actors with an interest in interfering in the lives of Americans by influencing our beliefs about the world. At worst, they led people to believe things that completely untrue; at the least, they confused us.
In addition to publishing incorrect information for us to read and accept as fact, these sites muddy the waters in a more insidious fashion. Once sites are exposed as “fake news” as Silverman dubbed it, their existence calls into question any/all news media and their sources. Without the savvy necessary to suss out what is fake and what is not, people tend to accept stories that align with their own beliefs and biases.
People who do not trust the government are ready to believe the worst about it; false stories about government wrongdoing simply serve to reinforce what they suspect and strengthen their resolve to hold that position.
Critical thinking skills allow us to tell fact from fiction, truth from lie. These skills–learned when we are of school age–are essential to living a responsible life and essential to protecting our democracy and our way of living.
So what can a writer do?
When I created INKAS for my Writing Club kids, the situation was much different. Occurrences of fake news were far fewer and far less likely to have effects the level of today’s turmoil.
The characteristics of News Features are simple: they report on events or situations that are of current interest to the general population. Things that are happening that you want to read about.
News Features are factual and objective; there is no place for an opinion in a News Feature, at least not the opinion of the writer. Reporting must often include quotes from the people written about. However, that is part of the story, and the opinions should be clearly attributed to the people who hold them.
Finally, there is a structure used in writing News Features. You provide the most important information first, then support it with details and more facts. This style of structure is referred to as the inverted pyramid.
News Features are generally written by reporters. In contrast,News Editorials may be written by actual editors or sometimes other news writers or publishers. Pieces written by members of the reading public are published under the category Op Ed or Letters to the Editor. Some publications will print a guest editorial written by an expert or a person prominently in the news.
News Editorials are specifically written to express the writer’s opinion. In this case, the reader knows from the beginning that it is opinion, and not necessarily fact. However, well-written editorials are often supported by details and factual references. These pieces are commentary on current events and are usually written to try and persuade others to agree with the writer’s point of view.
News Editorials will often deal with politics, local events, global issues–such as climate change or how a disaster has been handled or how societies change. Their scope may be anything from global to local. Their intent may be heartfelt, or calculated.
Suggestion
Challenge yourself to read some news articles carefully. Do this with articles you expect will be features and ones you expect to be editorials.
Now for a News Feature, ask yourself:
- Has the writer chosen the right information to put first?
- Is their opening information clearly explained with supporting facts and details?
- Do their itemized facts check out with other sources?
- Is there an opinion hidden in the piece, maybe by how words are ordered or what words are used?
For a News Editorial, ask:
- Was this article either presented or identified as a News Editorial?
- Is there a clear explanation of the writer’s opinion?
- Is it clear when the writer is offering opinion versus any facts they may use to support their ideas?
- Do you feel the writer is trying to persuade you to join them in their beliefs?
- If you are feeling persuaded, is it because of facts you can identify in the piece or is it an emotional response to the feelings and beliefs contained in the piece?
Congratulate yourself! You have just applied critical thinking to the news articles you read. I hope you found that enlightening. If you think anything you read in those articles was questionable, I hope you will try to check the facts with other sources and think about what you learn.
… and the next step is to try your own hand at this type of writing!
Smuggle and Stitch
I am mostly through a major revision to one work-in-progress (wip), and facing something similar in another. I’ve been talking about this revision for – like, I don’t know, five years now. I have probably gone over and revised the same material the standard dozen times, and I still don’t have it quite right.
Problem – in part – is that I’m having to add new material. What that means is that I have to create the new character/storyline/words to add this to the story, THEN I have to figure out where to fit it in, including bits and pieces scattered throughout the existing writing. It’s HARD!
I don’t care how much better it will make the story (well, yes I do) but IT IS HARD!
The other aspect of this is that I have to go back and cut as many words as I can. This consists of eliminating unnecessary words as well as getting rid of any information dumps (okay, exposition) that is unattractive and uninspiring for the reader. They want the story, but they want to be entertained while learning about the character’s past love affair or the minor childhood incident that changed a lifetime.
There are only two ways I know to go about this revision, and it still is tedious, time-consuming, and , well, HARD. I’m referring to Smuggle and Stitch.
Smuggle
Smuggle is a term some writers use to explain how to present certain information about the story, especially the characters, to the reader. The idea is that rather than dump a whole pile of information in straight exposition (even if it comes via a character’s dialogue), bits and pieces of information should be dropped simply into the narrative along the way. This builds the reader’s knowledge of the character gradually and allows them to draw on it in an organic way when things come to a head.
My cardinal rule of thumb is that you don’t want anything to break the reader from the story. Jarring notes such as misinformation, eg, Alaska is located on the North American continent at a latitude lower than that of Hawaii; speech patterns inconsistent with the character’s previously demonstrated patterns; an off description, such as unexplained inconsistencies about the protagonist’s hair style and color.. Other ‘sins’ can include inconsistent or inaccurate locale description, historical gaffes, out-of-date slang, or even anachronisms such as a cell phone in the 1890s. (short of a time travel story). The point is, anything that even momentarily makes the reader stop reading and think “Hey wait, that can’t be right!” qualifies here.
“…you don’t want anything to break the reader from the story”
Also in the bucket are long paragraphs or scenes of exposition, description, or the phenomenon called ‘talking heads’: characters doing nothing but sitting around talking about what is happening, has happened, or will happen. These are absolute ‘no-nos’, because nothing will throw your reader out of a story faster than boring passages, even if the information conveyed is necessary to the story.
You, the writer, are here to entertain. Inform, too, but in an entertaining way. Allowing your story to feature passages that throw the writer unceremoniously out of their reverie, out of the world you have spent precious time creating is at least counterproductive to reaching this reader or getting them to read your work again.
Stitch
Writing is sometimes like a quilt, patches sewn together with tiny – preferably invisible – stitches to make a complete and cozy blanket to enshroud the reader in a new world. Adding new material to a blanket already completed is no small feat, but it must be done so as to be undetectable in order to make the quilt good as new.
So it is with new material being added to a story. Some patches, or scenes go in wholesale, between other rows of patches. To keep the pattern consistent, however, a writer must work in individual ones here and there, or adjust an existing patch with a stitch or two. Some quilts even require added stitching all over to unify the design properly. To make the story come out reading as if it were never any other way is artistry. Also, hard).
My next blogposts, published within a day or two, will have specific examples of the smuggling and stitching I practiced while revising my current wip.
‘ta
Finding Robin's Story 