How did you find that out? Transparency of the newsgathering process and the meaning of news: a case study of New Zealand journalism

Abstract

This paper investigates the transparency of journalists' methods of newsgathering in New Zealand. By examining media coverage of genetic engineering, the study reveals that reports lack explicit markers of place, time and means by which the information has been obtained; the paper explains how this ambiguity leads to disappearance of context and it demonstrates that there is a link between the use of sources and the precision of news. It also discusses how the disappearance of newsgathering transparency alters knowledge about a subject, and indicates that the process might be related to a specific, Anglo-American understanding of objectivity that resists the practice of 'interpretative' reporting.