I promised a few months ago that I would eventually post an update on my religion/media project. Now that I’ve completed it, I feel confident enough to share a few of my findings here, as well as some reflections. Most of my project focused on problems with religion reporting in newspapers and magazines (see the bottom of this post for more explanation), so for the sake of brevity, I’ll use bullet points to detail some of the main issues I discovered:

• Lack of knowledge. In other beats, especially ones like politics and sports, reporters are rewarded for special expertise in their subjects. When it’s time to staff the religion desk, though, news organizations are often wary of hiring religious people due to fears about objectivity, and as a result, journalists without an intimate knowledge of religion can be prone to embarrassing errors in their coverage.
• Bias. In the research paper I submitted for my project, I wrote about a blunder by Newsweek magazine, when a reporter listening to Jerry Falwell misquoted him speaking about a salt ministry. The reporter figured he must have said “assault ministry,” and Falwell’s quote entered the magazine that way. In reality, of course, Falwell used the term “salt ministry” in reference to the Book of Matthew, but it seems the journalist was either unfamiliar with the term or was biased by preconceived notions about Falwell.
• Lack of funding/resources. Ah, the old favorite. Every beat, of course, is endangered by money problems at news organizations, but religion seems to have been hit particularly hard. Though I didn’t get a chance to survey editors and news executives about their opinions, I assume that religion reporting just isn’t considered as important, hard-hitting or relevant as other topics, which is a real shame.

On a positive note, I interviewed several religion reporters for my project, and they all seem to be doing great things with their beat even in these hard times. Each reporter expressed optimism about the future of religion reporting, and even though numerous problems plague the field, I’d like to agree with their assessment. So many current events are influenced by religion in one way or another, and opportunities for insightful journalism abound. If news organizations can devote enough resources to the beat and ensure that passionate, knowledgable people are hired, I think there are great things ahead for religion journalism.

If you’re curious as to how I conducted my project, by the way, here’s a brief rundown: I spent several months working on a long research paper about religion reporting, referencing mostly scholarly books and a few articles and Internet sources (the tidbit about Jerry Falwell above came from an online guide called “Reporting on Religion: A Primer on Journalism’s Beat Beat.”) For the second half of my project, a kind of compendium on the current state of religion journalism, I spoke with a couple professors and several religion reporters. I then condensed all my interviews into a readable format, wrote some brief analyses on them, and then researched a few different types of commonly seen religion articles and wrote papers about those, too. The project was sometimes cumbersome but always interesting, and as I wrote above, it gave me some hope for the future of this profession.

Check out my new Tumblr blog (Tumblog?), where I’ll post quickie items like links, photos and quotes.

I wonder if this counts as a new online “skill.” Better update the ol’ resume.

Middle-class malaise has never really appealed to me.

Films like “Revolutionary Road,” with their themes of suburban discontent and unfulfilled potential, usually strike me as more selfish than resonant. Only in a rich country like the United States, I think, could people have everything — money, work, family, security — and still lose themselves to unhappiness and delusions of grandeur.

This mindset, I think, is largely a result of my own experiences. When I was growing up, my parents emphasized the importance of stability and hard work, and in tough times like these, those values become even more important. These days, we should consider ourselves lucky to live in a house, to work a 9-to-5 job, to put food on the table each night. The big things — the important things — are more than enough. Right?

Well, in theory.

In spite of my better judgment, in spite of the economic turmoil, some daydreams of impracticality are hard to quash. If I wanted to, say, spend time in a west-coast city or a foreign country, wouldn’t now be the ideal time to do it? After all, this might be one of the last periods in my life when I’m free of personal ties and professional obligations. On the other hand, my more sensible side tugs at me incessantly. I’ve worked hard to get where I am, and putting career ambitions on hold in this economy seems unwise. If I don’t add more journalism experience to my resume now, I could land in real trouble if economic forecasts doesn’t brighten over the next year or so.

The quandary of pragmatism versus idealism, of course, is not exactly unique to me. Thanks to Dustin Hoffman and Katharine Ross, the dreamy yet uncertain college graduate has become something of a cliché in American culture. Still, I think the anxiety pervading today’s economic news adds a significant new element to the conflict. Indecisiveness, it seems, is a luxury reserved for flush times — unlike other graduates before me, I’m not sure I can afford to fulfill any unrealized goals or flights of fancy. In the end, this may turn out for the better, but it’s a disappointing idea to grapple with nonetheless.

I’m reminded of an oft-quoted line from Henry David Thoreau: “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined.” Thoreau probably didn’t anticipate the job market of 2009, but I don’t think that means his words should be discounted. In the end, perhaps, it’s all a matter of figuring out how to reconcile that life you’ve imagined with the basic responsibilities of the life you’re already living.

Every so often, when I come across a story that resonates with me, I’ll e-mail it to my friend Brett with a brief summary and a few words about why I liked it. Brett has been suggesting I start posting some of these stories — and my synopses of them — to my blog, so here’s a good one to get this series started.

The Washington Post: Fatal Distraction

Gene Weingarten, who won last year’s Pulitzer Prize for feature writing, examines what happens when a parent forgets a child in a hot car. Relying on interviews, court records and complex scientific research, he crafts a story about whether these errors should be considered crimes or tragic memory lapses.

Many people, he writes, seem to believe it could never happen to them, but science has shown that these mistakes are usually unrelated to parenting skills — they constitute only a failure in brain function. This fact, of course, isn’t of much comfort to the parents in Weingarten’s story, who are so overcome with grief and guilt that they sometimes contemplate suicide.

One reader comments on the story: “Thank you for this fine and compassionate article. In my mind, THIS is what journalism is all about.”

As my friend Brett knows, I’m pretty wary about the powers of technology.

That isn’t to say I think the future of journalism is on printed paper, but it does mean I’m sometimes skeptical toward the Internet and its business models for news (or lack thereof). As wonderful a medium as the Internet has proven itself to be, there are still times, I think, when its limits and drawbacks are all too apparent.

Case in point: A month and a half ago, I was stuck on campus the day Barack Obama was to be inaugurated, so watching the ceremony on television didn’t seem like an option. Luckily, I’d brought my laptop with me that day, so I figured I’d just head to the library and watch the inauguration online. Easy enough, right?

Think again. As I sat in the library eating a yogurt, I began feeling more and more like I was watching some terrible rave party with too many strobe lights. Bill and Hillary Clinton are grinning widely… and the screen goes black. Look, there’s Barbara and Jenna Bush! …And the screen goes black.  Here comes the Obamas’ big moment… and the screen goes black.

Because I was watching online, I fully expected sub-par viewing quality, but I wasn’t prepared for huge delays and gaps in the streaming video of every site I visited. In the end, I missed the actual swearing-in, which left me more than a little miffed (did I pay attention to every second of that nightmarish presidential campaign just to end up missing its grand finale?).

I posted a tweet about my troubles, which ironically helped land me in an AP story about technology and the inauguration:

“There were so many pauses that I missed really crucial moments of the inauguration,” said Lewis. “I didn’t expect it to be TV quality, but I definitely thought it would be a lot better than it was.”

Of course, the story ran the day after the election, which might make this whole post seem a bit dated. But I use this particular situation only to illustrate a larger point: The Internet, while vast and powerful and wonderful (it did help me get in that story), is still not the answer to everything.

A friend of mine recently got a job in the Seattle area, and I probably won’t get another chance to see him before he heads west. Luckily, he already gave me the perfect parting gift a couple weeks ago:

What more could I ask for?

As a synthesis of my last few years of study, I’m completing a thesis-like project this semester about the intersection of religion and journalism. Specifically, I’ll be studying religion coverage in Florida’s newspapers, keeping an eye out for the ways in which cutbacks and layoffs have forced editors to trim religion stories. I’m also interested in media bias and oversimplification of complex issues, a problem I hear lots of complaints about in my religion courses. Sometimes, I think, the complainers just don’t understand how news works, but a few of their grievances seem merited.

One prominent example concerns stories about Muslims. Most of these articles, I’ve heard people assert, deal only with topics like Al Qaeda and fundamentalism, which in turn provoke fear and misunderstanding in media consumers. I’m sort of torn about this — on one hand, I see the need to play up news about terrorism, but on the other, there are so many ways to cover mainstream Islam that newspapers routinely ignore.

Religion stories have the potential to be powerful and revealing, but it’s sometimes hard to find pieces that aim to educate readers rather than worry them. A heartening exception is Andrea Elliott’s series “An Imam in America,” which chronicles a Muslim leader’s trials as he confronts religious issues in Brooklyn. The stories earned Elliott a Pulitzer Prize for feature writing in 2007.

I’ll be exploring these topics over the next few months through interviews, books (including “Blind Spot: When Journalists Don’t Get Religion”) and possibly some database research, but I’m always looking for more ideas. If you have advice or suggestions for how to approach these subjects, feel free to leave a note in the comments or shoot me an e-mail. As my project progresses, I’ll probably post periodic updates to this site as well as some of my research, so look out for that if you’re interested.

New Year’s resolutions seem to be the butt of every joke. These goals, as we all know, are well-intentioned but usually fleeting, and that new gym membership is liable to be canceled by February. A couple days ago, The New York Times even did a story about the futility of New Year’s resolutions (using Oprah Winfrey’s infamous weight gain as an opener).

In 2008, though, I had some great success with yearlong goals. These weren’t typical resolutions — that is, I didn’t haphazardly draft them on New Year’s Eve — but they were long-term plans that I stuck with as the months passed by. With those triumphs still fresh in my mind, I’ve given some thought to my ambitions for 2009, and I think I’ve got a few I can commit to.

• Write more stories. I’m proud of myself for staying so focused on schoolwork over the past year, but I’ve got to get back to doing some actual journalism if I want to be, you know, a journalist.

• Continue keeping my grades high. Raising my GPA was a goal in 2008, and I’m happy to say I followed through on it, so I can’t let myself slack during my last few months as a college student.

• Become conversational in Spanish. At this point, I know more words and grammar rules than beginners, but I wouldn’t exactly be comfortable interviewing in Spanish. What’s the point of knowing anything about a language if you can’t put it to use?

• Stick to healthy and/or organic options as much as possible at the grocery store or when eating out. (Originally, this resolution was going to be about learning to cook more vegetarian food, but I know myself well enough to recognize that would never actually happen.)

• Be in touch with my family more often — and I don’t mean only by phone. A little Hallmark card can make a world of difference to someone.

• Most important: Make time for myself. This could mean going out a few extra nights a week, scheduling more doctor’s appointments, setting time aside to see a movie at the theater, or even mapping out an itinerary for my upcoming trip to San Francisco. It’s so easy to get lost in the daily grind, and I always suffer for that later. This year, I want to stop allowing meaningless details to get in the way.

What are your resolutions?

I’ve always liked to read, but as time slips by and memories become hazier, I sometimes find I have little recollection of books once deemed my favorites. In an effort to change that a bit, I’ve compiled a list of some of the pleasure books I read this year and wrote a bite-sized review for each of them. The list is in no way an exhaustive collection of everything I read in 2008 — textbooks and newspaper articles accounted for a huge chunk of my time — but it does represent a sampling of works I felt particularly strong about. And hey, if you’re looking for a last-minute gift idea, my list could serve as a good starting point.

THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY by Jean-Dominique Bauby
One of my favorite movies of the past year was Julian Schnabel’s “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly,” whose lyricism and dreamlike intensity could never be mirrored, I assumed, in the slim memoir that served as its source material. As I read that memoir’s English translation a few months later, I found I was correct in some ways but wrong in a few others.

Bauby, a former editor of French Elle, composed his book after a stroke left him entirely paralyzed, forcing him to communicate through a coded system of blinking (”Diving Bell” was dictated using only an eyelid). The memoir chronicles Bauby’s stay in a Berck-sur-Mer hospital, where he copes with his condition and finds himself buoyed not by prayers but by memories and dreams: a decadent meal, a kiss with a beautiful woman. Film, of course, is a great medium for such imagery, but Bauby’s sparkling prose illuminates his book in a way movies can’t match.

Divided into tiny, delicate chapters, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” reveals its narrator’s story only in fits and spurts — fantasies, nightmares, day trips, diagnoses. In doing so, it achieves a kind of rhythmic power that asserts the unrelenting spirit of its subject, whose strength and humor allow him to celebrate the wonders of life from the prison of his body.

Along with “Atonement,” this was certainly one of the best and most moving books I read all year.

RELENTLESS PURSUIT: A YEAR IN THE TRENCHES WITH TEACH FOR AMERICA by Donna Foote
As I debated applying to Teach For America a few months back, I knew I wanted to look beyond its promotional material for help in making my decision. The TFA Web site is a treasure trove of inspiring stories and calls to service, but tales about management conflicts, personal problems and administrative issues are harder to come by. “Relentless Pursuit” includes all that and then some.

The book follows four TFA teachers through their first year in a Los Angeles high school, and its storyline manages to be both maddeningly frustrating and incredibly uplifting. The new teachers, all fresh out of college, spend much of the 2005-2006 school year fighting bureaucracy, struggling to maintain control of their classrooms and wondering how anyone could make it to high school without basic literacy skills. Then there are the kids themselves, who live with a daily threat of gang violence and are often malnourished or neglected at home.

But the teachers, fueled by idealism and TFA’s deep sense of purpose, persist in their missions, eventually eking out signs of progress and earning the admiration of their kids. Though Foote devotes a little too much time to TFA’s inner workings, she captures these classroom experiences perfectly, noting the importance of small victories among a tiring parade of disappointments. In the end, hope and optimism win out: All four teachers raise their kids’ scores by the end of the school year, and by the end of the book, I was filling out my TFA application.

ATONEMENT by Ian McEwan
When I begin a new novel, a small part of me always hopes I’ve stumbled on something more than a story — I want characters who will linger in my mind for years and a narrative that will remind me why I love to read. So few books, of course, actually live up to that hope, but “Atonement” is an exception. I read it in spring, starting slowly and picking up the pace as the plot became more engrossing. By the time I reached the last page, I had stayed up all night to get there.

Most people are, by now, at least marginally familiar with “Atonement” thanks to the film version that came out late last year. I put off watching it till I’d finished the novel, and while the movie was indeed well-made — those sweeping panoramas! Keira Knightley’s green dress! — it paled in comparison with McEwan’s writing. “Atonement” is ambitious in every sense of the word, spinning a complex tale around a crime committed in the tense days before World War II. Told in three parts, its story carries readers to a pre-war estate, the British retreat toward Dunkirk, and a London hospital in the days before the Blitz, finally culminating in a mind-bending epilogue that serves as both crescendo and catharsis.

Richly textured yet masterfully plotted, “Atonement” is a meditation on the nature of guilt and the ways in which past and present are inextricably linked. It is, I think, as close to perfect as a novel can be.

I WAS TOLD THERE’D BE CAKE by Sloane Crosley
I bought this essay collection on the advice of a friend, who promised Crosley’s ups and downs in the jungle of New York twenty-somethings made for a humorous read. Unfortunately, the most remarkable thing about the book is how utterly unmemorable it shapes up to be. Touted as a female David Sedaris or a modern Dorothy Parker, Crosley falls far short of expectations, devoting most of her essays to the kind of you-had-to-be-there humor comprising the bulk of high school jokes.

Though the selection wastes space on family quirks and the trials of big-city apartment life, there are a couple gems buried in its pages. “You on a Stick,” one of the book’s longer stories, succeeds thanks to its relatable premise about the awkwardness of staled friendships. But most of the essays feel self-indulgent and unnecessary, and it’s difficult to shake the impression that Crosley’s book deal was less a result of major talent than of major publishing connections (she works as a publicist for Vintage Books).

Still, perhaps I’m biased because the stories don’t seem that outrageous to me. In one essay, Crosley locks herself out twice on the same day, but believe it or not, I once landed in an uncannily similar situation myself. Where’s my book deal?

HIROSHIMA by John Hersey
What can I write about “Hiroshima” that hasn’t been written a hundred times before? In the sixty years since its publication in The New Yorker, Hersey’s account of the Hiroshima bombing’s aftermath has been lauded as much for its meticulous detail as its even-keeled tone, which gives survivors’ stories the spotlight they deserve. And, of course, “Hiroshima” is a classic example of new journalism, meaning I had all the more reason to begin reading.

As the events of Aug. 6, 1945 unfold, six Hiroshima residents who survive the bombing struggle to keep themselves and their families alive as the city burns, and Hersey recounts their memories in startling detail. Evoking a post-apocalyptic landscape, “Hiroshima” is sometimes gruesome and always frightening, yet the strength of its survivors also renders it awe-inspiring. The book’s final chapter, written 40 years after its initial printing, finds Hersey back in Hiroshima to learn what became of the six people in his story. Some prospered while others faltered, but all found their lives forever changed by that August morning.

In reading others’ opinions on “Hiroshima,” I’ve noticed its message often seems misconstrued. The book has been decried as anti-war propaganda, but the power of “Hiroshima,” I think, stems from what I perceive to be a complete lack of an agenda. In clear and piercing language, it tells the stories of those who lived — the implications of those stories are left up to the reader to decide.

UF’s student newspaper, as you may have heard, has been in some trouble lately.

For the first time anyone can remember, no one applied to be the Alligator’s editor-in-chief for the spring term. The news struck me as upsetting but not altogether surprising, as the paper has had problems with staff turnover for years. Throw in some newer issues, such as a sinking economy and the scary state of journalism, and you’ve got an all-out crisis.

The other day, I’m told, the paper finally got an EIC applicant, but only after the application deadline had been pushed back twice and the staff publicized its problems in an article. Alligator alumni responded in large numbers (some even messaged me), and a few seemed angry with staff complaints about low pay and long hours. But those are staples of many student newspapers, and Alligator employees know it. Even though the paper’s immediate future is probably no longer in jeopardy, I think bigger issues are still tugging at the staff.

For readers who may not know, I was editor-in-chief of the Alligator last fall, and I’d spent three years at the paper climbing toward that role. So, from my perspective, it stung to see the Alligator in turmoil over a position that I worked so hard for, and I think quite a few other alumni had similar feelings. Whether they were in management or on metro desk, almost everyone who’s been at the paper has stories about how tough yet rewarding their experiences were.

Although I’m only a year removed from my job, I can certainly empathize with older alumni, even the ones who have lashed out a little. As EIC, I sometimes found myself subject to teasing about how long I’d been with the paper, but when I first came on board, a few of the older editors had toiled in the Alligator’s crumbling building for years. Spending one’s college career there seemed like a surefire way to break into Florida journalism.

The thing is, that’s often not the case these days.

As current EIC Jessie DaSilva explained in a Facebook thread, the Alligator is struggling to attract new talent and stay innovative, making it harder for staff members to stand out to recruiters. So, snagging those all-important internships becomes a challenge, and as Jessie writes:

“Many members of the staff find their first internships through personal connections with the faculty. Others sign up for programs where you pay to take classes and intern in a big city (the programs guarantee you an internship).”

I can attest to the truth in Jessie’s words. Moreover, layoffs and cutbacks seem to be poisoning the industry we j-schoolers want to join, and as a result, many end up opting for law school or other routes, figuring they have no viable future in journalism.

Granted, this isn’t the first time these worries have burdened the Alligator staff, but it could be the first time so many problems have heated up at once. Can the Alligator survive the storm?

Hard to say for sure, but I’m optimistic. I was heartened to hear someone stepped up as an EIC applicant not only because it means the Alligator will see another semester, but because it proves staffers will come through for it in a crisis. What’s more, I think, is that the EIC catastrophe may eventually prove to be a blessing in disguise. As I wrote up top, alumni seem really shaken by this, and they’re offering advice and donations in response.

The paper is and always will be a student publication, but in times like these, those students need a hand from the professionals who came before them. I’m excited to see the Alligator invest in newer technology and tap into a powerful alumni network, which can hopefully aid in staff retention and lead to more efficient recruitment efforts. These changes won’t happen overnight, of course, especially as the journalism industry continues to struggle. Nonetheless, there’s a lot to look forward to.