This article seeks to reflect on how the topic of the environment is present in scientific research conducted in the field of journalism. We recognize that most academic studies in the field of journalism analyze communication products and processes, and investigate how information of general interest reaches society through news and reporting. researchers in the area Already in 2012 he noted the growth in the number of academic works examining journalism and the environmentOur goal is to show how to promote this field. To do this, we start from studies based on dissertations and dissertations produced in Brazilian graduate programs in Communication from 1987 to 2019.
In this text we will deal with a A study by Isaltina Gomes suggests this Challenges and trends in this emerging research field. The research was presented at the Center for Cultural and Media Policy Studies, University of Warwick, UK, in May 2023, and brings together an analysis of 35 academic works with the main focus being environment and journalism. It was defended between 2010 and 2019 (seven theses and 28 dissertations) and was placed in the dissertations and dissertations portal of the KiPS platform (Coordinating the Improvement of Personnel in Higher Education), an agency linked to the Ministry of Education.
The published research comes mainly from the south and southeast. The regions combined account for more than 70% of the specific production, which can be explained by the fact that they have the largest number of postgraduate programs, some of which are the oldest in the country, as in the Universidad Methodista de São. Paulo and from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, which have programs created in 1978 and 1995, respectively.
We hope that this discussion will be increasingly repeated in academic productions and that this progress will find an echo in the interest of professional journalism in including environmental issues in the daily coverage of the most diverse editorials.
This is the difference in direction It was noted by researchers Ilza Girardi, Eloisa Luce, and Angela Kamana in one study About 101 theses and dissertations dealing with environmental journalism that were defended in Brazil between 1987 and 2010. At that time, the South and Southeast together accounted for more than 70% of production, and the Southeast accounted for 50% of published production. He works . The result is consistent with the distribution of research groups subsequently registered with CNPq (National Council for Scientific and Technological Development).
However, Isaltina Gomez’s study, which deals with the productions of the past decade in the field of journalism and the environment, indicates progress in the participation of the Northeast. Although it hosts programs established only in the 2000s, the region was responsible for one in four works published in that period. The Federal University of Pernambuco is the institution with the second largest participation in the sample, behind only the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul.
Although the study did not identify production in graduate programs in communications in northern Brazil and only has one record from the Midwest, there is room for increased production as there is investment in research institutions in these regions. By understanding the biomes of the Amazon, Cerrado, and Pantal, we recognize that these regions make essential contributions to advance the theme through local approaches.
Interdisciplinarity is a hallmark of journalism and environmental studies
Environment and media is the most popular topic among dissertations and dissertations defended between 2010 and 2019 in graduate programs in communications across Brazil, followed by climate change and media. The climate issue is unified as an unavoidable topic of research and journalism practice on the environment and the mobilization of different fields of knowledge, similar to other environmental issues that emerge as a topic of study, such as the green economy, the energy matrix and agriculture.
Incidentally, interdisciplinarity can be ascertained in the fields of study of the authors most cited for the work analyzed in Gomez’s study: the environment, journalism, discourse analysis, and the humanities and social sciences. This knowledge dialogue is consistent with environmental journalism theory, a perspective that understands the environment as a cross-sectional agenda in the news. That is, environmental issues, according to environmental journalism, are not limited to coverage that strictly deals with sustainability and the preservation of the natural environment, but are also in areas such as politics, economics, and science.
Although it is not possible to measure the direct impact of academic reflection on the work of journalists, research on journalistic products shows that the recurrence of disasters and environmental crimes requires the achievement of a goal Contextual news coverage, which avoids stupor and approaches events from a critical perspective, i.e. prioritizing the sustainability of life on the planet over political interests or economic growth, for example. Beyond Increase coverage of these topics In the national media, projecting the agenda through multiple editorials is essential to ensuring a structured approach, which takes into account all the complexities involved in the environmental crisis.
We therefore hope that this debate will be increasingly repeated in academic productions and that this progress will find an echo in the interest of professional journalism in including environmental issues in the daily coverage of the most diverse editorials.
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