Foreign journalists, now boarding

In the life of more and more people there is a crucial moment in the airport: luggage in both hands, hope and excitement in their heart, just before heading off to different destinations, for a short or long journey

The omnipresent globalization requires journalists to be more mobile and flexible, and let us be honest: we happily deli­ver. The question is: are we competi­tive enough to work at a newspaper, a television station or radio channel in another country moreover in a foreign language? In other words: is it really that easy to find a job in journalism abroad?

Daniel Vernet, foreign editor of French newspaper ‘Le Monde’ has the impression that mobility for the journalists in Europe does not really exist, as the main tool of a journa­list is his ability to use language to express and describe ideas. Only few can play with a foreign language the same way as they do in their mother tongue.

But the language issues are not the only cause of this lack of mobility. “Not so long ago it was difficult to imagine a colored presenter on French TV. All the biggest TV channels want their presenters to represent the average viewer, which is basically a mix of people with different cultural backgrounds”, he says. “But someone with an accent still does not fit into the picture,” he adds.

Just as Gregor Krajc, the Deputy Director of the Government Office for European Affaires, said on the opening panel of the EYJA-conference, young journalists have to be lucky. But how much luck do we exactly need if we decide to be mobile?

We probably only have a slight chance to be as lucky as Nenad Sebek. This Executive Director of the ‘Center for Democracy and Reconciliation in South-east Europe’, was just in the right place at the right time and was asked by the BBC to cover the Yugoslavian civil wars for the BBC. But than again mister Sebek’s second language is English. And didn’t we all wish at least once in our life to be native English speakers?

“I admit that language is a major issue. As a foreigner, a journalist has to be two or three times better then a native speaker, because on the language field we can never beat them. So we have to beat them at the journalistic field. Coloring articles with the elements of our original backgrounds, speaking in a different way, as “different” in journalism usually means better.”

We can only hope. But do the editorial doors really open up to a different style of writing and thinking?

“I have difficulties to make a joke in the Netherlands. I just cannot be that IRONIC” says Leen Vervaeke, a Belgian participant of the award who works as a journalist at the Dutch national newspaper “Volks­krant”. Fortunately, her different background is playing as an advan­tage so far, moreover she is not the only foreigner in the editorial team. “For one and a half a year I learned about Dutch society as I lacked a cultural background of almost 22 years. And how could I know the interest of a national reader if I didn’t know the history, the culture and the society of a country? At the end I knew more about these topics than the average Dutchman.”

Although she had to learn not to use Belgian expressions in Dutch sentences, in her case the integration was not a real problem. But the experiences differ from country to country, from society to society.

“I believe that electronic media in general are not prepared to have people with an accent,” says Nenad Sebek. “But we can also refer to British media as an exception which accepts some accents, like for exa­mple the American, Scottish, Irish or the Canadian. They even think this last one sounds sexy. Countries that are more open to the cultural minorities are more opened to the foreign journalists as well. Somehow it is a reflection of society while in other countries – which I prefer not to name – the average viewer can say: ‘I don’t want to have a foreigner to tell me what s going on”. This reac­tion is a basic reflex of the human nature, a fear of the others, the fear of what we might not know”.

As for the journalists: their fear is being the black sheep and not being at the same level as their competi­tors. But don’t we all think that the black sheep is the most interesting of the herd?

By: Dora Haller