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The resurgence of personal narrative in journalism that Kiera Butler explores in our cover story may be rooted in various bottom-up movements of the 1970s, but the more proximate cause is a very human need to connect — to empathize and understand — in an information age that can be, in terms of pace and scale, dehumanizing. The idea of connections, meanwhile, runs through this entire issue of CJR. In his Letter From Paris Jeremy Harding examines how the French media’s lack of a connection — racial or cultural — to the Arab neighborhoods that ring Paris resulted in one-dimensional coverage of last year’s riots. In his Second Read essay, Robert Lipsyte recounts the evolution of his connection to the legendary sportswriter Paul Gallico as Gallico moved in Lipsyte’s mind from role model to “old whore.” In her lyrical review of a new collection of Martha Gellhorn’s letters, Lorna Scott Fox gives us a new way to connect to, and understand, that trailblazing journalist: as an insecure and conflicted woman. And speaking of understanding, Daniel Schulman tries to parse John Lavine’s “revolutionary” vision for how journalism will be taught at Northwestern’s Medill, but comes away scratching his head.
To read the articles in the July/August 2006 issue, click here.
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