ASSIGNMENT ONE:
PROVIDE THE INFORMATION BELOW

Name Miaozhuang
Mobile phone 13683634113
Email merlinincuc@yahoo.com.cn

Add photo here: nop

Personal Web page none

Blog address really haven't got much to say...

Survey:

Career goal:

What do you want your job to be in 20 years?
Boss
In 5 years?
Boss-to-be
When you graduate?
go on get a Postgraduate degree
Are you interested in a career in journalism?
not really, well, as long as it provides me good terns
How can this course help you reach your goals?
don't really know....
Goals for this course:

Are you interested in producing for this course:

Podcasts? nop
Video segments for YouTube? nop
Newspaper or wire stories? nop
A Blog? don't know....
A regular news broadcast? never

Guests:

Would you like guest speakers from any particular professions?
I know some (Chinese) jounalists and I don't think they could share much with us by coming to the class.... However it would be great if you manage to invite one.

Experience:

Please briefly describe any work you have done in the news media.
Nothing, absolutely nothing.
How many television packages have you produced at this school? (Please include links if possible)
0
Do you have any production skills necessary to run a news broadcast? Please list.
I do speake....and I do write...some....

News Habits:

Which foreign and Chinese newscasts do you regularly watch?
CCTV , and I visite CNN BBC NYT online some times.
How familiar are you with foreign news broadcasts? Can you watch them at home? Over the Internet
Over Internet
Please list some strengths and weaknesses of foreign news broadcasts compared to Chinese broadcasts.
Stre: They are not compulsory, you don't have to see them once you turn on TV at home.
You may see them through internet, but whenever there is something, you don't see them anymore.
W: same as above...
What newspapers and news Web sites do you visit regularly?
CNN(inter& home) BBC NYT
Do you read the Washington Post and the New York Times? (Hint: You should)Do WP has a online edition? I'll check it later, Better it has,otherwise
there's no way I see it.
ASSIGNMENT TWO

Now Let's see what's new in China.
In Shanghai an activist lawyer accuse government of violating humanrights in its recent real-estate redevelopment program. And the lawyer is said to recieve warnings for leaking state secrets.
The activist lawyer, Zheng Enchhong, is now under police surviellance. He can't leave home without permision.
Zheng says Shanghai officials targeted him after he draw attention to a conflict bewteen local residents and a prominent real-estate developer. Residents claim the developer didn't compensate them adequately then left them nowhere to live.
The residents tried to sue the developer as Zheng offered help. But now the case will never go to court because of Zheng's arrest.

ASSIGNMENT THREE
Please paste the Obituary assignment here.
No Obituary it's not funny
ASSIGNMENT FOUR
Write three pitches that you and some classmates can actually produce with the time and resources available to you.

The audience will be English speaking You Tube viewers. Your pitch should offer them something they cannot see elsewhere. This means slice of life and human interest stories are OK, but try to come up with some hard issue pieces or stories related to breaking news as well. Foreigners love to hear about: The Olympics, counterfeit or dangerous products, the environment and global warming, martial arts, student trends, China's economy, interesting tourist destinations, and anything unusual or surprising. Think about a story you would like to hear about in another country, and try it here.

Also think about the big stories in the world, and look for a Chinese connection. Are there Iraqi students here? Does China have an Islamic insurgency? What do Chinese students think about the US presidential race? Who is in charge at the Palestian Embassy here now that the Palestinians have split amid civil war?

Your pitch should include the names of the people you plan to interview, and the shots you plan to include.

Analysis about the 'pig-disease' story

Generally speaking, it's a good report worthy of careful study. It follows the common practice in news-writing like listing facts, using quotations, providing arguments and reaching conclusions. The reporter tried to show the event to us from different perspectives when she used reports from sciense facilities, government release and sources.

And about bias, I'd like to say the story is perfectly good with Americans who is also the reporter's 'strategic public'(a term borrowed from my PR class). However, as a Chinese reader who's been used to see good news everywhere, I feel this story to be rather inconvenient. Anyway truth can always be inconvenient and I reckon the story to be trustworthy. But from my observasion, there are some flaws in the writer's use of language and logic deductions. Here is the analysis:

In the 3rd paragraph. She used the phrase of 'wiping out entire herds' of which I judge to be too sensitive. Though the saying is supported later by a scentific report, it can still agitate readers to a excces degree. I would suggest the use of more neutral sayings. But this is still ok, she's only trying to emphasize the killing effects of the disease. If she doesn't exaggerat a little, no one would care about it.

In the 5th para. Her use of language becomes almost intolerable. The paragraph is full of cover-free sarcasm which would undoubtly lead the readers to form a kind of pre-conclusion. The actions taken by Chinese government seemed no more than desperate tacts to cover the whole thing up by her repeated use of "it says ....it says....". It would be much better if she could just use plain language to describe the efferts of the government. I believe leading readers to accept the prepared attitude or conclusion of the writer with implications and sensitive writings is against the basic principle of jounalism and also the principle of 'free-will'. But it's become a common practice thesedays too.

In the middle part of the story, the writer changed her tongue quite much, praising China "Since then, the government has made regular public announcements detailing the number of ill pigs and the progress of the disease through the country. This stands in sharp contrast to how China dealt with SARS," which is also quite true. Yet sadly I have to say the
saying here contradicts a lot with what the writer said in the 3rd para.. Maybe the two parts were finished by different persons?

The story is also good in consideration that, in spite of its sentimental descriptions, it pointed out a key weakness of China's disease-control system. " While China's central government has made numerous improvements since then in how it deals with infectious disease control and informs the public, it has once again been slow to share scientific data and tissue samples with other countries." And I think this is quite true and the saying is also quite sincere, it wants to point out the problem instead of uselessly accusing the government. I think this can actually help China to improve its desease-control system which should be the ultimate target of a story ---- making a difference instead of making an accusition.

These are some of the point I picked to analysis. The writing skill of the story is mature and wothy of learning and even imitating, but in some parts it is still not free from the disturbance of bias.(Or maybe it's because if it's completely bias-free, then people in US and China will not read it any more?)