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Abstract
The Saami and the Roma are both transnational peoples with robust journalistic practices. Although vastly different in socio-economic standing and relationship to the state, both groups choose to develop journalism and journalists to share their perspective of the world; and do so while remaining true to the distinction between journalism and propaganda. This requires access and ability to frame issues and actors, problems and solutions while maintaining professional journalistic standards. Media—both having one's “own” media and creating stories that appear in the “mainstream” media—is key to this practice. Saami and Romani journalists very clearly show there is a way to be objective without being neutral. By interviewing 45 journalists, journalism educators, funders, and evaluators across six countries, as well as examining primary source documents, I show that although emerging from radically different contexts, the Saami and Roma are both distinct nations stretching over two or more states—transnational—which allows, and indeed requires, a unique approach to journalism. I identify two distinct strategies in approaching the goals and practice of, “transnational peoples’ journalism”: nation building/speaking within and intervening/speaking outside.
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. It is important to note that I am neither Saami nor Romani nor did I grow up in Europe. I have been involved in research in Europe since 2001. I do not speak Saami nor Norwegian but I do speak the Arli dialect of Romani. All interviews were conducted in Romani or in English, often people's second or third language, and all people were given copies of the transcripts of the interviews and an opportunity to make changes. There are inevitable linguistic and cultural hurdles that must be acknowledged. In addition, although Saami people do live in the Kola Peninsula of Russia, the socio-economic and political structure of the country is vastly different from that in the Nordic countries. There was an attempt to have a Saami radio station in the Russian side and two of the people interviewed, Liv Inger Somby, a veteran journalist at NRK and Torkel Rasmussen, the director of the Journalism program at the time, were very active in that project.
2. According to the United Nations Permanent Forum on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, due to the diversity of Indigenous peoples and the potential misuse of the identification system by states, the United Nations has purposefully chosen not to define Indigenous but rather provide guidelines for identification strongly based on self-identification. These include: “Self-identification as indigenous peoples at the individual level and accepted by the community as their Member; Historical continuity with pre-colonial and/or pre-settler societies; Strong link to territories and surrounding natural resources; Distinct social, economic or political systems; Distinct language, culture and beliefs; Form non-dominant groups of society; Resolve to maintain and reproduce their ancestral environments and systems as distinctive peoples and communities” (http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/5session_factsheet1.pdf).
3. This work specifically looks at Romani media and Saami media as two transnational groups in Europe that have a significant history of media production and yet emerge from extremely different contexts (Flyvbjerg Citation2006). This by no means suggests these are the only transnational groups using media, just the two that I chose to focus on for this conversation. There has been much scholarly and policy-based work examining Kurdish media as well as pan-Arab media (Sakr Citation2007), as well as work focusing on diasporic and border communities.
4. UNESCO has engaged in media trainings throughout the Muslim world—often bringing together journalists, particularly Muslim female journalists. In the early 2000s, the Open Society Foundation also tried its hand at focusing on North African female journalists and filmmakers as a whole. Very few of these programs extend beyond one or two projects. In 2009, Inuit journalism students from Nunavut Arctic College have engaged in an exchange program with Sami University College for short workshops. For information on Indigenous filmmaking, see Wilson and Stewart (Citation2008).
5. The people I spoke with used the names Sámi University College and Sámi allaskuvla interchangeably, especially when speaking and writing in English. I follow their convention in my writing.
6. In 2014, OSF's Network Media Program was renamed the Independent Journalism Program, however, at the time of the research it was known as the Network Media Program and to reduce confusion, I will continue to refer to it as such throughout this article.
7. There are a variety of reasons that some people were interviewed more than once. Some people were interviewed multiple times because, upon review of the transcript, it became evident that there were points that could benefit from clarification and further discussion. Torkel Rasmussen and Aslak Paltto preferred me to interview them in their homes over a series of days. In addition, due to their schedules and the time differences, some people were interviewed over a series of Skype conversations (Loza, Druker, Jankovic).
8. Although the majority of people were comfortable having quotes attributed to them, a few wished to remain anonymous. This is noted in the text when initials (which usually do not correspond to their name) or noms-de-plume are used. I shared all transcripts with those interviewed and solicited their feedback, including providing them with an opportunity to modify their words and/or ask to not be identified in certain sections. One person, after reading his transcript, asked to be omitted from the research project. Two people asked to be consulted before any direct quotes were attributed to them.
9. Like Stake (2006, 36), I view “triangulating” not as a way to provide “proof,” but rather as a means of “gaining assurance” for a pattern that appears to emerging.
10. In fact, based on audience surveys, at least two-thirds of the people consuming the pan-Sápmi television program are not Saami. Various (albeit sporadic) audience survey's of Romani media show the same is true for many of the radio and Web-based film programs.
11. There are actually nine distinct Saami languages and many are endangered. The most common Saami language is Northern Saami and that is the dialect used by the majority of the Saami media; for the purposes of this paper when I use the term “Saami language” I am referring to Northern Saami unless otherwise noted.
12. I am using the conservative estimate of 10–12 million Roma in Europe as cited by the United Nations and the Council of Europe. Statistics range from 8 to 30 million. For an in-depth look at the heated debated surrounding Roma and statistics, see “Roma and Statistics” compiled by the Project on Ethnic Relations (Citation2000) regarding a conference in Strasburg, France, May 22–23, 2000.
13. For an incisive contribution to this debate, see the editorial written by former Executive Director of the European Roma Rights Center, Dimitrina Petrova, at www.errc.org/cikk.php?cikk=1844, as well as the 1999 special issue of Roma Rights, a quarterly journal in English for the Romani activist community, which devoted the entire issue to this topic (Petrova Citation1999).
14. Occasionally languages may be mixed with other minority languages such as Albanian and Turkish in the southern Balkans (especially Macedonia, Kosovo, and Bulgaria) or Hungarian in parts of Slovakia (Gross Citation2006; Lange Citation2006; Plaut Citation2010).
15. MS and ODI explained the lack of controversy surrounding public broadcasting even further, stating “the debate is done. It is public broadcasting. We don't have the distinction that there is the United States where public journalists don't think they can be that free, that they are too close to the state. We don't have that debate here. Of course then the private journalists, the corporate journalists [in the United States] they don't wonder how free they can be right? But how close are they to the companies?” (personal communication, May 23, 2011).
16. Macedonia, a country of 2.2 million people, has six recognized national languages. A legacy from the Yugoslavian system, MTV 3 is the public channel that serves all non-Macedonian-speaking viewers. Although often considered to have the best trained and professional Romani journalists in the country (because of state-mandated requirements on education), MTV 3 Roma division is constantly struggling financially and suffers from high turnover (Plaut Citation2010; Petrovksi, personal communication, May 2013).
17. I thank Eben Friedman for his assistance in clarifying this point.
18. For an in-depth review of the issue and the various ways it was framed within Northern Norway's media, see Søreng (Citation2008).
19. A clear example of this can be seen in the fishing rights negotiations between the Saami Parliament and the Norwegian state and the effects on the Sea-Saami community. For more information, see Søreng (Citation2008) and Plaut (Citation2014).
20. The project involved Romani and non-Romani journalists from five countries and was organized by national media partners. Local coordinators and an international trainer (all from North America) were assigned to each team. I had permission from the trainers, organizers, and participants to attend the trainings in Hungary and Slovakia for the project “Europe: A Homeland for the Roma.”