Sports Journalism Professional Legitimacy
Despite the fact that journalism sector has witnessed recently some remarkable challenges, It still heavily represents an important platform for keeping people well informed and updated with changing activities and trends (Kröll, 2015). Additionally, the pursuit of journalists career has comprised the necessity to academic degree. Where lately in the United Kingdom this academisation has become even more pronounced, as 98% have at least a bachelor’s degree and 36% with a master’s (Thurman et al, 2016). Hence, Obviously journalism has become fully academised triggering the necessity to pursue professionalism, which has become an indispensable discourse for journalists especially when non professional journalists are trying to adopt professionalism norms. Furthermore, the advent of new online practices into journalism’s domain challenged the definition of professionalism in sports desk, which adopted those routines and threatened traditional journalists leading them to paragrate and accuse online colleagues by missing professionalism norms. As well as to classify them as non professional with no legitimacy (McEnnis, 2018). Based on Simon Mcennis Research (2018) about online sports journalism, Traditional sports journalists are seeking to maintain their professional stature through neglecting online section by using the ‘toy department within the toy department’ reputation emerging from how news journalists disparage the sports desk to elevate their own professional claims (McEnnis, 2018). The aim of this essay is to provide a comprehensive elucidation about the “toy department within a toy department” reputation and the legitimate professionalism in sports journalism. as well as explaining the criteria of identifying professional journalists, and discuss online sports desk professional stature.
Historically, news journalists are playing the role of journalism professionalism gatekeepers. Where they are taking sports colleagues less seriously, and considering them only “fans with typewriters” or “cheerleaders” with limited ability for professional stature (McEnnis, 2015). News Journalists are distancing their professional norms from those of the sports desk, and aiming to set professional boundaries to prevent their adoption by outsiders using a ‘toy department’ reputation to disparage sports colleagues (McEnnis, 2018). Where simultaneously, Sports journalism has been characterized with an abundance of dimerites and drawbacks, such as rumors, boosterism and dissolution of limits between opinion and information (Ramon, 2015). Thus, News department is accusing sports one of tenuous professional claims and fostering its stance through accusing sports journalists of missing definite professional features and being subjective rather than objective when doing their journalism roles (McEnnis, 2018). This illustrates the insistence of news journalists to disparage sports ones in order to emphasize on the ‘toy department reputation’, isolate them and oblige them to look for their own legitimate professional identity (IBID).
However, the digital evolution of the 1990s has dramatically reshaped the journalistic framework, with sports journalism being one of the leaders of this shift, as sports journalism moved online and various sports contents become available online (Boyle, 2017). This tremendous rise of innovative digital practices has heavily impacted journalism namely blogging. Where bloggs number worldwide was reported to an increase from 36 million in 2006 to 181 million in 2011 (Nielsen, 2012). Sports desk has adopted those new routines which threatened traditional sports journalists who patrol the professionalism boundary .Where recently live blogging which has started in the U.K. during the 1998 soccer World Cup in France, overruned the digital provision of sports journalism organisations. The guardian for example relied on this innovative tool which helped in more audience engagement (McEnnis, 2016). As a consequence, Those news digital journalism processes have created a situation of ‘us’ and ‘them’ between the two typologies of sports journalism. Traditional Journalists are neglecting online colleagues and deeming them non professional entities with only high speed news publication to obtain attention rather than publishing accurate sports news. And from this point, “toy department within the toy department reputation” for online sports journalists has emerged. While at the same time, those digital journalists are considering themselves autonomous and aiming to establish their own professional project (McEnnis, 2018). Nevertheless, As the objective is to indicate online sports professionalism stature and criteria, Simon McEnnis study explores the professional legitimacy of online sports journalists in the United Kingdom, building on interviewing twelve sports Journalists aged between 24 and 40 six in traditional roles and six in online positions during a period of two years from 2014 to 2016. (McEnnis, 2018). It analyzed in depth the work routines for the two journalists typologies, traditional and online for the purpose to set a professional identity or a framework which through it professionalism will be recognizable (McEnnis, 2018). Consequently the outcomes identified that standards of professionalism are manifested in three indispensable sub-definitions, which all must be acquired to reach a professional stature, Normative, Cognitive and Evaluative (McEnnis, 2018).
Therefore, to gain a professional reputation, possessing all three norms is required. To start with, normative dimension is established on definite features, such as trust, verification and ethical behaviors. This sub-definition was used by traditional journalists in sports desks to emphasize on the “ toy department within a toy department” reputation of online journalists (McEnnis, 2018). As the barriers of entry to digital sports journalism production have been minimized, a vast number of sports blogs have been created by fans who are playing the role of virtual sports journalists. Sports consumers are simultaneously adopting journalists routines resulting exuberant questions about professional identity and making it blurring (McEnnis, 2016). In response, traditional journalists are perceiving digital colleagues as bloggers who are sourcing stories and information from other websites, with no checks on the accuracy and veracity, committing plagiarism conducts which makes them concerned with rumors and speculation rather than hard facts impinging on the credibility of the journalists (McEnnis, 2018). Besides that, digital journalists predominantly produce contents sourced from TV or press conferences practice. And they could unethically publish misleading, untrustworthy and partial products (McEnnis, 2018). Thus, online journalists’ professionalism is dubious. and they are seen non legitimately professional from the traditional perspective. Equally important, the traditional department is taking the cognitive aspect in account about professional legitimacy norms. This aspect summarizes the needs for skills acquisition to become journalists, techniques and training taken before entering this field,where this norm is adopted by traditional sector to consolidate their stature. In the United Kingdom you have to acquire professional qualifications awarded by the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) in order to start a journalist career (Kröll, 2015 ). Hence, Traditional journalists use it as an outlet to expose online journalism lack of competence and accuse digital fellows by professional deficiency (McEnnis, 2018). As well as that, digital journalism practices are office-based with no live attendance in sports events, rendering it classified away from the professional environment and emphasize on the idea of sourcing their contents from other journalists work (McEnnis, 2018).
Subsequently, to foster their attitudes towards digital department, traditional journalists rely on the evaluative dimension of professionalism in order to expound the deficiency in the professional framework of online colleagues. This sub-definition stems from notions of autonomy, prestige, status and dimension (McEnnis, 2018). Despite the merit and the capability to elevate economic performances, online journalists in sports desk are deemed underestimated in terms stature compared to traditional ones. For example, digital journalists are earning much lower financial income compared to newspaper sports writers who have considerable salaries even if their work is widely consumed. Also, online sector is lacking a considerable prestige to be given by its environment. Printed newspapers are still seen as more valuable than the innovative patterns ( McEnnis, 2018) . Additionally, online journalism especially blogging, suffer from prejudices and biased opinions namely towards internet as a medium. It is always consumed with suspicion and online sports Journalists are predominantly linked with preconceived opinions of doubt, precaution and uncertainty (McEnnis, 2018). To cite an example, despite their high quality production on the live blogs, they are still classified as a suspicious digital tool.
To sum up, the finding of the study highlighted that the “toy department within a toy department” reputation is emerging from how printed sports journalism groups are classifying online colleagues below them, similarly how news desk is disparaging sports journalism sector and accused it by the lack of professionalism. Hence, traditional Journalists specifically within the sports desk who control the boundaries of professionalism and who felt the threats coming from the advent of online routines are using the “toy department within a toy department” reputation to neglect those online outsiders and conduct crucial boundary work to establish an own professional legitimacy. Besides that, through applying professionalism sub-definitions, cognitive, normative and evaluative sports desk has failed to reach a professional stature. Thus, despite their innovative abilities, future vision and capability to boost economic revenues online journalists are seen legitimately non professional .
References:
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