War of words: why journalists need to understand grammar to write accurately about violence
The nuanced difference between ‘dozens of Palestinians have died’ and ‘Israel kills dozens’ is one journalists need to fully comprehend before crafting their headlines, argues Macquarie University’s Annabelle Lukin in this crossposting from The Conversation.
The recent killing of unarmed Palestinians by Israeli forces has sparked not only a reasonable outcry, but commentary on the language journalists use to report these events.
For instance, writer and English professor Moustafa Bayoumi, of City University of New York, wrote:
It is the peculiar fate of oppressed people everywhere that when they are killed, they are killed twice: first by bullet or bomb, and next by the language used to describe their deaths.
Bayoumi draws attention to one of the most important but contested roles of modern journalism: the act of putting political violence into words.
Why is Mumbrella giving a soapbox to someone who claims to write about neutral language, but quite clearly has an agenda in this fight?
I think the fourth paragraph of the story provides her answer (whether you agree with it or not) to your question:
“The bad news for journalists is there is no neutral mode. If your words sound neutral, it’s likely you’ve simply avoided laying responsibility for the killings, or have imputed responsibility only indirectly.”
because even having a ‘view from nowhere’ is itself is a kind of bias.
Should we assume you have one too but the opposite one?
Thanks for writing this piece Annabelle, very informative and is already making me rethink how to read headlines
Journalists and subs spend a lot of time trying to get this right. And declaring from the other side of the world who is right and wrong in such a complicated situation, is foolish. I think it is important to be careful with language to avoid judging the situation instantly. In any case, context is provided by further details in the article. And further developments in the story, such as the fact 50 of those killed were members of Hamas.
Surely, the shortened version of this headline viz “why journalists need to understand grammar to write accurately” is more encompassing?
This article should come down. Less about grammar, which is increasingly becomingly less relevant, and more about someone who has an agenda against Israel.
To be fair maybe the journalists didn’t have all the facts at the time about who was to blame and how they were to blame.
Staggered at the commentary on this piece. Do any of the posters above deny that unarmed civilians violently died at the hands of the state? The author has done a good job pointing the importance of nuance in such reporting.
This article is merely a platform for her pro-Palestinian agenda. On that basis, it’s interesting she makes no mention of Hamas’ role in contriving the protests and being culpable as well. Perhaps that’s why media organisations took the approach to headlines accompanying their news reporting.
Annabelle either doesn’t understand or, I dunno, forgot, is that journalists are trained and REQUIRED to write in active voice because most people don’t read beyond the first few pars.
Also, she’s plucked on a tweet from the NYT to make a point, when that was more than probably written by someone in the social media team, who isn’t a journalist.
As for the other examples, ummm, they’re headlines? They’re not meant to tell you the entire story right there. That’s what the ACTUAL story is supposed to do.
And, like other commenters have said, this was more than likely a developing story, where information at the early stages was scarce. Geez, lady, go nitpick about kids and their social media speak instead.
An excellent article that tackles the mainstream media’s fear/laziness/reluctance to cover this issue and to actually attribute the source of the violence its victims.
A massive thanks to Mumbralla for having the courage to publish this article, and to Annabelle for writing it
Associate Professor Lukin criticises Professor Bayoumi for saying that the statement “Dozens of Palestinians have died in protests as the U.S. prepares to open its Jerusalem Embassy” is in the passive voice. “Bayoumi wrongly called this structure the passive voice,” Lukin says. She then explains that the passive-voice version would be: “Dozens of Palestinians have been killed in protests as the US prepares to open its Jerusalem Embassy.” That is, the sentence is exactly the same, except for the verb: “have been killed” replaces “have died”. But the difference between the two versions is technical, not substantive. It is true that “have died” cannot be parsed as the passive voice, because “die” is not a transitive verb, and only transitive verbs can be made passive; but in both versions the construction, as distinct from the voice, is still passive. No agent or cause of death is mentioned, either in Bayoumi’s original or in Lukin’s ‘improved’ version. It is truly a pointless correction. Why am I not surprised that it comes from The Conversation?
So much for grammar. Here for the consideration of Professor Bayoumi and Associate Professor Lukin is how the events should have been reported:
“Israelis target Hamas operatives to repel human-wave invasion attempt”. Active voice, perfect grammar, how pleased Professor Lukin should be!