Writing with authority: When to drop the “he said, she said”

If the UPIU mentoring team asked student journalists we work with around the world to stand up if we’d ever told them they needed more sources in their stories, it’s likely that every single student would rise.

Named sources add credibility to stories, we argue. By peppering news stories with real names and documents, a journalist is far less likely to make errors and get into legal trouble.

We still believe all that. But the trouble is that we often wind up with stories that read something like this:

Restaurants around the university have been serving beer to underage students, Student Affairs Director John Smith said.

“The restaurants aren’t worried about getting caught,” Smith said.

It’s common for university students to try to find ways to drink alcohol, said Jane Doe, a third-year student.

“It’s one reason we enroll at university,” she said.

The story is technically fine, but a little boring. The set-up, quote, set-up, quote framework is more likely to put readers to sleep than engage them.

To kick things up a notch, it’s important to learn how to write with authority. This means that you as the reporter and writer knows enough about the topic that you can confidently make statements that illuminate context.

The New York Times published a great example of writing with authority on Dec. 1. Reporter Alissa J. Rubin wrote about Gulnaz, an Afghan woman who was charged with adultery after she reported having been raped. The woman was pardoned from a prison sentence, but then told that she should marry the man who raped her.

Take a look at these statements, pulled from throughout the story:

“(The announcement that she should marry her rapist) revealed the ways in which even efforts guided by the best intentions to redress violence against women here run up against the limits of change in a society where cultural practices are so powerful that few can resist them…”

“The problem for (women in Afghanistan) is the deeply held belief that women uphold their family’s honor. Thus any attempt to expose abuse is so humiliating to the family that a woman who speaks out often becomes a pariah among her relatives, ending up isolated as well as abused.”

“Gulnaz’s case shows the power of cultural norms…”

None of the statements above are clearly attributed to a source via the standard “..he said” or “…she said” or “…according to a report by…” method. Yet the statements have weight, and are unlikely to be challenged.

Why? Because Rubin crafted a story with a strong framework of incontrovertible facts. A cursory skim of the story might suggest that Rubin is drawing her own conclusions instead of allowing readers to make their own judgments (another of UPIU’s big no-no’s), but that’s not what’s happening in this story. In fact, Rubin is utilizing quotes and facts that appear in the story, in addition to her expert knowledge of Afghan culture, to build a story that is multi-layered, honest and, most importantly, accurate.

Read the story. Take a careful look at the sentences in which Rubin writes with authority.  Each time, the statement is an echo of a quote or fact – but the statements help the reader dig below the surface of what sources are saying. Each statement can be traced back to a quote or fact.

Moreover, Rubin has reported from Iraq and Afghanistan extensively over the past 10 years. She didn’t show up in Kabul one day and write this story the next. Rubin has a deep understanding of Afghan culture.

Meanwhile, Rubin did NOT attempt to draw conclusions that might reveal a personal bias about the situation. For example, she did not write, “Afghan men don’t love their wives,” or “Afghan families treat their daughters like property.” Especially when writing about other cultures, it can be easy to make assumptions about people and practices because we don’t recognize ourselves in them. But while it might be true that SOME Afghan men don’t love their wives, and SOME Afghan families treat their daughters like property, it would have been a gross assumption – and a grave error – to make such statements in the story. None of the quotes or facts suggest either statement is true.

Often, when we review UPIU stories, we’ll ask, “How do you know this?” We expect that you’ll be able to answer quickly that you know something because a credible source told you, or that you saw something with your own eyes. In many cases, we’ll want to see the name of that source in your story. But not always. When sourcing, think about building a story that will allow readers to dig deep into an issue. Take them below the surface – don’t settle for quotes that trivialize or over-simplify the issue.