Thursday, March 21st, 2013 South Asian Stories in the Newsroom

Description

It’s 2013. Visible minorities are 50% of the GTA population. What impact has this had in the coverage of stories that fall outside what is considered “the mainstream?” Are the shootings at the Sikh gurdwara in the U.S., Tamil protests in Toronto or the Shafia murders treated like any other story or treated as stories about a specific community? Who does the reporting and does ethnic background make a difference in reporting style?

Stewart Bell is an award-winning Canadian journalist and the author of three non-fiction books, Bayou of Pigs, The Martyr’s Oath and Cold Terror, a national bestseller. He has reported from Africa, the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, Central Asia, Europe and the Balkans. In 2009, Stewart won a South Asian Journalists Association Award for his writing about the civil war in Sri Lanka. His magazine article about child soldiers in West Africa, “Guerrilla Girls,” was awarded the Amnesty International prize. Stewart’s writing about terrorism issues for the National Post, where he is a Senior Reporter, was awarded a Citation of Merit from the National Newspaper Awards. He contributes occasionally to the Global National newscast and co-wrote the Global Television documentary “Know Your Enemy,” which won the RTNDA award for Investigative Journalism. He holds a Master of Journalism from Carleton University and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of British Columbia.

Nicholas Davis is the Manager of Program Development for CBC Radio. He is an accomplished journalist and writer who has worked in radio, television and print and has done so for the past 26 years covering everything from current affairs to the arts. He has worked as CBC for the last 15 years and was the former Senior Producer of Metro Morning on CBC Radio One and oversaw the transformation of the show to reflect Toronto’s diversity. He has won many awards for his journalism, including a 2006 Gabriel for a story on Holly Jones. Nick was a regular guest on TSN’s Off The Record and SUN TV’s Grill Room. He has taught radio skills to new journalists across the country for CBC Radio and also lectured on journalism at Ryerson University, Seneca College, Sheridan College and Centennial College.

Noor Javed is an award winning reporter with the Toronto Star, and is currently a feature writer at the paper. She fulfilled a life-long dream when she joined the Star in 2007, and since then has been working to tell the stories reflective of the city’s diverse communities. In 2011, Noor won a National Newspaper Award for her analysis and reporting on Toronto’s booming condo market. She was nominated for a Canadian Association of Journalism investigative reporting award for her series on polygamy. Noor holds a M.A. in Journalism from the University of Western Ontario and a Human Biology degree from the University of Toronto.

Rita Trichur is a telecom reporter in The Globe and Mail’s Report on Business and writes about a variety of topics ranging from manufacturing to maple syrup. She joined the Globe in late 2010 after spending three-and-a-half years as a financial services and economics reporter at the Toronto Star. Prior to that, she did a six-year stint as a reporter-editor at The Canadian Press and spent three years in a variety of positions at the Ottawa Sun. Rita has a Bachelor of Journalism and Political Science and a Masters of Arts in Canadian Studies – both from Carleton University. Her love of journalism, however, began at age six when she earned $10 for writing a short story for the Star.