Community media play an important role in informing local communities, usually providing an alternative to mainstream media narratives and representing an extraordinary variety of opportunities for local communities to express themselves freely.
The training formed part of IFJ-led project Rewriting the story and was a first opportunity to involve community media journalists in the programme.
The workshop was organised in cooperation with Radio Dreyeckland and run by IFJ trainer Mahtab Dadarsefatmahboob. The whole training was adapted to radio journalists who are part of the project Our Voice (The Voice of the Invisibles), a project aimed at giving a voice to migrants who have fled their country.
Debates focused on issues related to intersectionality and the portrayal of women public figures in the media and in public space from an intersectional perspective.
Drawing on the lived and professional experiences of the participants and examples provided in the training modules, the trainer offered an informed perspective on the portrayal of women in media and the strategies to avoid bias in reporting. As journalists whose experience is shaped at the intersection of migration and gender, participants recalled situations in which they were also subject of discrimination. The training motivated them to fight stereotypes about themselves and the women they report on.
One important issue that came up involved the gendered German language.
“German is a language where nouns have masculine and feminine forms,” explained Mahtab Dadarsefatmahboob. “Participants highlighted the challenges of generic masculine and possible solutions and alternatives to this (e.g. Studierende instead of Student or Studentin).”
The issue of sports reporting was also pointed out as one where there is an acute gender discrimination. Some participants reported how they were even more discriminated against, not just as women but also as non-native German reporters, having to work harder than others to prove their ability, just as women politicians do in most cases.
The EU-funded Rewriting the Story project addresses barriers to the fair representation and portrayal of women and men in political life and aims to train 400 journalists across the EU on reporting political life through a gender lens. Partners include the IFJ, the University of Padova and COPEAM.