The Critical Need For Training And Resources for Disability-Inclusive Journalism
Issue Fourteen
Dear Readers,
Reframing Disability has hit the six-month mark! It has dropped in your inboxes consistently every other Friday since November 2023, and I’m delighted to publish the fourteenth issue today. Thanks to each one of you who has supported me by reading, subscribing and sharing my newsletter.
Heartfelt gratitude to Rishad Patel of Splice Media who planted the seed of this newsletter in my mind. Your belief in my idea and encouragement were pivotal in getting Reframing Disability off the ground, Rishad! A huge, huge thanks!
In this issue, find an interview with Indian journalist Shreya Raman, Looping as a communication technique, NewsAble’s launch, and a very important poll. Additionally, find two brilliant resources, webinars, an opportunity and an invite to the Reframing Disability social. To celebrate the half-year anniversary of my newsletter, I've chosen to incorporate media recommendations as a new feature, moving forward.
“For more good disability reporting, we need more training and resources”
Shreya Raman is an independent data journalist who reports on gender, health, labour and public policy and splits her time between Mumbai and Goa. An ICFJ and IWMF grantee, Shreya is a winner of last year’s Laadli Media Award for Gender Sensitivity for her story, “Why elderly women with disabilities are at highest risk of abuse, neglect”.
The report was part of a series on women with disabilities run by the feminist Indian media, Behanbox. Based on a fellowship model, the series was reported by three journalism fellows selected by Behanbox, and trained and sponsored by the NGO Rising Flame. Read an interview with Behanbox founder Bhanupriya Rao in Issue Six.
Shreya spoke to me about her work on the series and how critical the training was to the success of her work.
What are the challenges you faced in reporting your stories for Behanbox’s disability series?
There were multiple challenges at multiple stages of the project. Initially, I was apprehensive. As an able-bodied person, I wondered if I was the right person to tell these stories and be able to represent my sources’ lived experiences with accuracy, nuance and sensitivity.
Then, each story came with its own myriad challenges. But what stayed common for all stories was finding sources. It was during the peak of the pandemic, so meeting people in person was impossible. All interviews had to be online. All stories were incredibly sensitive as they dealt with violence, in some cases, perpetrated by caregivers.
The most challenging story was the one that looked at the increased risk of elder abuse faced by women with disabilities. Because a lot of older women with disabilities rely on caregivers to use their phones and access social media messaging applications, it was very difficult to talk directly to the women and create a safe space for communication. Their increased risk of COVID-19 also made meeting in person impossible.
How did you address these challenges?
A lot of these challenges could be addressed only because of the consistent support from Rising Flame and Behanbox.
Before we even began discussing story ideas, Rising Flame conducted a three-day training session which prepared us all with the context needed to think of new approaches to cover disability and gender issues. The training also covered power dynamics in the lives of disabled people, the language to use, and how to be less extractive while reporting. They told us not to push for answers, and instead focus on what the sources were comfortable talking about.
They also helped us a lot with finding sources, sharing our online appeals for sources in their networks and connecting us with organisations and activists working on disability rights.
Behanbox editor Bhanupriya Rao also created the space for us to explore story ideas that had not been explored before and pushed us to keep at a story despite roadblocks.
What’s the one misconception about disability among journalists that you want to be debunked?
A common misconception is that persons with disabilities are a homogeneous group, which is not true. Every person has different challenges and faces different barriers, which change with factors such as their socio-economic background and location. So, I think we need to look beyond the binaries of a disabled person and an able-bodied person and report on the nuances in the lived experiences of disabled people and the role of power structures like patriarchy, colonialism and caste system in exacerbating the challenges faced by disabled people.
What irks you about disability coverage in India?
Many journalists talk about disability issues as isolated incidents, without addressing the structural nature of the problems. And a lot of this is due to lack of training, but also lack of editorial will to improve.
There is a lack of awareness, but also apprehension. For more good disability reporting, we need more training and resources. Backgrounders, primers and toolkits would make journalists more confident and accurate in their coverage of disability issues. There is also a desperate need for more inclusive newsrooms that not just hire journalists with disabilities but also provide them with the accommodations they need.
What would you like to tell other journalists about reporting on disability?
Disability reporting is not as daunting as it seems. I know that most journalists do not have a lot of time to work on stories, but doing adequate research and understanding the background of the interviewees and their disability helps a lot. I have found people with disabilities to be open and accepting of my mistakes. They have corrected me whenever I was wrong. So, I would say, do your due diligence and be well-prepared for each interview. I recommend taking training in disability journalism.
Also, leave your assumptions aside when you are to interview someone. Be completely open and just observe your sources and listen to what they say. Repeat what you hear to get confirmation from your source. Doing this kind of validation check* can be very useful in ensuring accuracy during interviews.
*This technique is termed “Looping”.
Tell me more
Looping helps to improve communication via deep listening. Developed by the Center for Understanding in Conflict, looping is a four-step process, as described in this toolkit by the Solutions Journalism Network.
Listen with the intent to understand what your partner is saying.
Offer your understanding: communicate what you think they meant in language that conveys understanding.
Observe their reaction to be sure you got it; ask “does that sound right?”
Polish your understanding, correct what you got wrong by asking them what you missed, and finally encourage them to tell you more.
Looping is an invaluable tool for journalists, but helps in any kind of communication. I’ve tried it successfully with interviewees, friends, family and strangers alike.
New workshops/training for you
Now that Reframing Disability has completed six months, I’m on to making some editorial decisions. For starters, I want to conduct workshops and would appreciate your input about your preferences in the poll below. Based on the interest I receive, I’ll announce training/workshops soon. I’m an accredited trainer of Solutions Journalism and Gender Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, with expertise in training journalists in disability inclusion.
Since there’s a restriction on word count on the poll, the workshop titles are written below for your reference.
Making social media accessible
Framing stories that avoid stereotypes and stigmatisation of disability
Disability-inclusive solutions journalism
Conducting an accessible online meeting
Writing a journalism pitch for a story on disability
Now, to the poll:
Newslaundry’s NewsAble initiative has been launched!
Chitranshu Tewari, a subscriber, and friend of Reframing Disability, announced that the news site’s accessibility features are now live. Apart from screen reader compatibility and keyboard navigation, voice search, colour filters, contrast themes, and transcripts and subtitles in English are available. Reader mode - a screen with just clean text, free of images, sidebars and banners, is a valuable feature. Motion control and an alternative font, OpenDyslexia, tested by dyslexic users are also available.
Don’t be surprised if you’re non-disabled and will still use these features. Accessibility is essential for people with disabilities, but benefits everyone.
Newslaundry might be the first mainstream Indian media to have intentionally worked on making their website accessible. In Issue Five of Reframing Disability, Chitranshu told me about Newslaundry’s motivation: tapping into new audiences by embracing accessibility.
I’m pleased to share that he noted using my Reuters Institute research paper, “A 9-step plan for ‘curb-cutting’ disability access to India’s news and newsrooms” as a resource in understanding newsroom representation of disability.
A wellbeing tip
In this week’s Sanity, creator Tanmoy Goswami shares a brilliant idea about creating a one-page wellbeing profile that reveals a bit about your personhood. Share it on your offline and online workspace.
Tanmoy suggests a template with three things about yourself:
What others appreciate about you
What is important to you as a human being going beyond your professional identity, and
How you expect your employer (and peers) to support you at work.
It’s a great idea to adopt, Tanmoy says, for really understanding your co-workers as “humans” not “resources”. A simple and effective tool indeed, to understand the gifts and strengths of team members and how they can be used to find the best ways to support them.
An Image Resource
Have you thought of reframing visual narratives around women and sexual violence with your work?
In this brand new pathbreaking image bank by the Institute of Southasian Research and Exchange, you will find illustrations and photographs by South Asian artists of depictions of women around sexual violence. Diverse conceptualisations of healing, community, autonomy and justice beyond the standard imagery of victimisation are appropriately portrayed. The project was coordinated by the director of the institute, Laxmi Murthy, a brilliant journalist herself.
Accessibility tip of the week
Audio descriptions for videos
Ever wondered how blind people enjoy silent portions in videos? Whenever there are pauses in dialogue, a scene change, action, or on-screen text, not described in the main soundtrack, audio description comes to the rescue. It is an additional voiceover track that describes those silent portions for those who may not be able to perceive them visually.
Check out this audio-described documentary for the Disability Justice Project, in which Sa Utailesolo reports on an inclusive response to extreme weather events in Samoa.
I often cite the example of this Lion King clip for audio description. Notice that the entire clip has only music, no dialogue. With the audio description, the scene comes alive for someone who cannot see the animals.
Unfortunately, around the globe, audio description is an exception, when it should be a norm, adding to the inaccessibility of media for blind people.
Watch
I can’t wait to watch Srikanth, a Bollywood biopic of a blind Indian man who didn’t let sympathy and stigma from society take control of his life. The movie will be in theatres on 10th May, fortunately with audio descriptions on the mobile application, XL cinema. Check out the trailer first, with audio descriptions by XL Cinema.
Read
The Grammar Of My Body is a memoir by writer, poet, and performer, Abhishek Anicca.
Indian daily Hindustan Times describes it as a brilliantly written “radical act of self-love and acceptance by the author.” The memoir is a “no-holds-barred narration laced with sharp observations, pithy humour, philosophical questions and sublime poetry (that deserves a book of its own).”
Listen
BBC’s Access All podcast (available with a transcript): Climate Change, as seen by disabled people in peril. Ari Hazelman, a blind filmmaker from Samoa and Melvina Voua, a filmmaker with a physical disability from the Solomon Islands are joined by Disability Justice Project’s founder Jody Santos in a chat about how climate change is affecting disabled people in the Pacific Islands.
Attend a webinar
To learn about accessibility tools, strategies and networking.
Date: May 16, 2024
Time: 10 am IST onwards
Opportunity
Course by NIMHANS, Bengaluru, on Media and Mental Health
For: Media professionals and students
Fee: INR 3,600
Deadline to register: 15 June 2024
Duration: 36+ 18 hours between August and October 2024
Reminder: Invitation to the inaugural Reframing Disability social in Bengaluru
Do you live in Bengaluru? I’m organising a social at Matteo Coffea, Church Street, on Sunday, 12th May. Join me and other friends of Reframing Disability between 11:30 am and 1:00 pm. We’ll chat, get to know each other, and have a structured session with five-minute contributions from a few attendees. If you’d like to talk about your own work or someone else’s, read something, or perform, please hit reply and let me know. Your contributions don’t necessarily have to be about disability inclusion. If you forget to RSVP, just walk in. I look forward to hearing from you and meeting you soon!
That’s it for today. Reply to this email with your thoughts on today’s content and let me know if you’ll be attending the Reframing Disability meet-up next month. Connect with me on LinkedIn and Twitter!
Warmly,
Priti