Ethics is about taking the right action in difficult circumstances so thinking about vulnerability in ethical terms we should concern ourselves with the concepts of minimizing harm; fair and honest representation; truth and trust; accountability to those in the story, to the audience and to news employers, and independence of action.
We invite journalism scholars and practitioners to present articles that have a theoretical, analytical, critical, methodological and empirical approach which provide significant insights and understandings about the ethical challenges and potential benefits of media reporting of vulnerable people. Topics authors might want to consider, but should not be limited to, include:
* Hearing the voices of the marginalised
* Approaches to interviewing/not interviewing vulnerable people
* Mental illness, access to the media and the issue of consent.
* Intrusion into grief/privacy versus fair representation
* Media representations of grief, bereavement, mental illness, suicide, disability, ethnic minorities, faith or sexual orientation.
* Using innovative practices to tell vulnerable people’s stories
* The influence of social media
* Engaging the audience in death, trauma and personal vulnerability e.g. overcoming compassion fatigue, including user generated content or offering audience interactivity
* Teaching ethics relating to media reporting of vulnerable people
Submission instructions
Send 200-word abstracts to the guest editors (addresses below) by April 23rd, 2017. Papers of around 6,000 words will be needed by June 23rd. They will then be sent out for peer review. This process should be completed quickly – so final copy should go to the publishers by early August. The issue should appear in mid-September 2017.
Editorial information:
* Guest editor: Sallyanne Duncan, University of Strathclyde, (sallyanne.duncan /at/ strath.ac.uk) * Guest editor: Jackie Newton, Liverpool John Moores University, (J.Newton1 /at/ ljmu.ac.uk)