Negotiating inclusion: new 'alternative' media and the institutional journalistic practices of print journalists in Nigeria

Abstract

This study uses an ethnographic approach (in-depth interviews and newsrooms observations) combined with Critical Discourse Analysis to closely interrogate how journalists in four Nigerian print newsrooms; The Punch, Vanguard, Nigerian Tribune and Guardian, appropriate ‘alternative media’ content and new media technologies in their newsmaking practices. The choice of these four newsrooms enables a detailed reading of how the process of appropriating new media technologies and alternative media content takes place in Nigerian print newsrooms. The study explores how and whether (or not) these appropriations are impacting on institutional practices of Nigerian print journalists. It also sheds light on the spaces which new media technologies negotiate in these newsrooms and how these journalists negotiate the appropriation of alternative media content. Beyond the everyday newsmaking practices, the study uses the reporting of two key events; the Nigerian elections of 2011 and the Occupy Nigeria protests of 2012 to show how journalists in Nigerian print newsrooms negotiate their appropriation of alternative media content and new media technologies in reporting key events. Together, these examples highlight the creative appropriation of new media technologies in Nigerian print newsrooms and the need to avoid technological determinist perspectives which totalise experiences elsewhere as being universal. The study therefore reinvigorates the continued relevance of newsroom ethnography and argues that a sociological approach, which importantly considers local context imperatives, remains useful in understanding how Nigerian print journalists appropriate new media technologies and the resulting alternative journalisms. The findings of the study provide useful insights into the journalistic cultures in Nigerian print newsrooms and highlights how these journalists negotiate their appropriation of alternative media content. While the (disruptive) impact of new media technologies on newsmaking practices in these newsrooms cannot be ignored, the study finds that a number of local context factors constrain and shape how appropriations take place in these newsrooms. Thus, Nigerian print journalists appropriate alternative media and new media technologies to suit traditional journalistic practices. The study’s contribution to knowledge therefore lies in acknowledging that, beyond binary assumptions about the impact of new media technologies on journalism practices in Africa, particularly Nigeria, there is the need to consider the creative and complex ways in which journalists in these contexts appropriate these technologies. This study should thus be read as a step towards that end.