War correspondent as teacher

Taking instruction from someone who has literally been in the trenches brings immediacy to aspiring journalists on the Indianapolis campus

By Susan Williams

Sherry Ricchiardi and IU graduate student Gina Barton (second and third from left) walk with personnel from the International Center for Education in Journalism and a Red Cross volunteer during a visit to a Croatian village.

This coming summer, just as last, Ricchiardi will teach “Foreign Studies in Journalism: Following the Path of the Pulitzer,” a course which includes the opportunity for students to spend two weeks reporting from former battle zones in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Part of the journalistic experience, she believes, is “bearing witness.”

On Sept. 11, Americans turned to television to verify information on the street that a plane had crashed into a tower of New York City’s World Trade Center. And, there, in one long, unfathomable moment, another plane approached and then crashed into the second tower.

Sherry Ricchiardi, an associate professor of journalism at IUPUI, researches, teaches and writes about news writing and reporting, editing and international news-gathering systems. Also a senior writer for American Journalism Review (AJR), she was immediately on the phone with her editor exploring what angle of this attack she should cover for the magazine.

Ricchiardi, who commutes from her home in Washington, D.C., to teach in Indianapolis, said her active career as a reporter and a commentator on how the media covers the news “absolutely” enhances the education she brings to her students. “It seems to add to my credibility with students,” she said. “They often remark about my professionalism and attachment to the ‘real world’ of journalism on course evaluations.”

In the classroom, Ricchiardi uses her stories to explain the writing/reporting process, illustrate key points about focus/theme, and to stimulate discussion on such issues as off-the-record interviews and confidential sources. For example, after speaking with her editor on Sept. 11, she drove “at break-neck speed to the Chicago Tribune newsroom to chronicle how one of America’s premier newspapers was handling the worst terrorist attack in American history. It ended up as one of the cover stories,” she said.

“I shared the entire experience with students, including the emotional interviews with reporters and editors who, despite being stunned and grieving, produced top-quality work, including an unprecedented two extra editions that day.”

Ricchiardi came to IUPUI in 1989 after 14 years as an investigative reporter, Sunday magazine writer and international travel columnist for The Des Moines Register. While working full time, she also earned a doctoral degree from Iowa State University.

Entering academia didn’t slow her down. In 1991, after writing a book about women journalists, Women on Deadline: A Collection of America’s Best, she started to develop a personal expertise on how the media covers war, another subject she frequently writes about for AJR.

“I began covering the (Balkan) war in 1991 after I traveled to the region and witnessed the terrible human suffering brought on by the Serbian onslaught,” she said. “This was the bloodiest European war since the Nazi era and resulted in dozens of arrests for war crimes, including genocide. Clearly, it was one of the most compelling international assignments.”

She finished another book, Bosnia: The Struggle for Peace, in 1996 and then during her time as a Fulbright lecturer, co-authored textbooks on news reporting and media ethics with a colleague from Zagreb University, the first published on these topics since Croatia gained independence from Yugoslavia in 1991.

Her close contact with the Balkan area continues, to the benefit of both IU and its students.

“In January, I will direct a first-of-its-kind conference on “The Aftermath of Conflict: The Emotional Toll” for regional journalists in the Balkans who have covered war,” she said. “I received funding from the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma (University of Washington), and the IU School of Journalism has become one of four satellite Dart programs nationwide. Dr. Brown (James Brown, associate dean) encourages this kind of innovation. That is one reason I stay at IU.”

And this coming summer, just as last, Ricchiardi will teach “Foreign Studies in Journalism: Following the Path of the Pulitzer,” a course which includes the opportunity for students to spend two weeks reporting from former battle zones in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Since Sept. 11, Ricchiardi published two articles in AJR analyzing the press and its coverage of war and terrorism. A third focused on how the media covered itself when it became a target during the anthrax crises. Her research has included contact with reporters on the front in Afghanistan, where they are dealing not only with a general lack of official information regarding allied efforts, but also with harsh physical conditions.

Understanding why journalists endure the difficulties, discomforts and dangers of reporting on war is no problem for Ricchiardi, who recalled taking her own personal risks

“On one occasion, when we (journalists) were pinned down by snipers outside a village, a Croatian soldier ordered his men to provide cover fire and help get us to safety. Later, when I asked why they risked their lives, the soldier said, ‘To us, a journalist is worth a thousand guns. You must tell the world what you see here.’ Bearing witness became an important part of the journalistic mission.”

For more about Ricchiardi, visit the following Web site:

http://asia.cnn.com/2001/COMMUNITY/10/24/ricchiardi/

For information on Ricchiardi's work on journalism and trauma/victim studies through the Dart Foundatio visit this Web site:

http://dart.journalism.iupui.edu/resources.html.