Comments on: Aspiring journalists must specialise, says Malcolm Gladwell. Try stats or accounting… http://hackademic.net/2009/10/20/aspiring-journalists-must-specialise-says-malcolm-gladwell-try-stats-or-accounting-delicious/ hackademic.net -- journalism, teaching and learning, the media, research, and more... <br> ... from the perspective of a journalism educator Thu, 09 Sep 2010 06:54:28 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Greg Watts http://hackademic.net/2009/10/20/aspiring-journalists-must-specialise-says-malcolm-gladwell-try-stats-or-accounting-delicious/comment-page-1/#comment-21943 Greg Watts Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:21:50 +0000 http://hackademic.net/2009/10/20/aspiring-journalists-must-specialise-says-malcolm-gladwell-try-stats-or-accounting-delicious/#comment-21943 Having a specialism in journalism is something I recommend to my students. You don't have to know everything about a subject and you don't need to have studied it at university. But you need to know enough to provide insightful comment and analysis and be able to place a story in the bigger picture. That's your value to an editor. What you specialise in is important. There is little demand in media for articles about goldfish or Morris dancing, for example. You need to choose something that features regularly in news agendas, such as housing, career and jobs, religion, transport, health, technology or new media. Moreover, you can have more than one specialism. Having a specialism in journalism is something I recommend to my students. You don’t have to know everything about a subject and you don’t need to have studied it at university. But you need to know enough to provide insightful comment and analysis and be able to place a story in the bigger picture. That’s your value to an editor.

What you specialise in is important. There is little demand in media for articles about goldfish or Morris dancing, for example. You need to choose something that features regularly in news agendas, such as housing, career and jobs, religion, transport, health, technology or new media.

Moreover, you can have more than one specialism.

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