Research Topic

Bearing witness: The practice and discourse of journalist witnessing in South Sudan

Richard's research develops the idea of 'bearing witness', present in existing work on the concept of witnessing, as being both a discourse used to justify the ethics of journalists' presence in front of suffering and a practice requiring material and discursive resources to be enacted. Looking at the case of South Sudan, his project attempts to outline the form of this discourse and some of the resources that may enable or constrain its practice. I draw on the humanitarian literature around 'Peaceland'/'AidLand', as well as work on the changing nature of foreign correspondence and elements of journalistic identity as potential entry points to developing this approach.

Supervisors: Professor Lilie Chouliaraki and Dr Wendy Willems

Biography

Richard has an academic/research interest in the intersection between narratives of 'Africa', conflict and development assistance. He holds an MA in Media Studies from Rhodes University analysing the understandings present in coverage of the 2011/12 Somalia famine and a Masters in Public Policy from the Willy Brandt School, Universitaet Erfurt, examining the validity, reliability, and legitimacy of conflict databases as research tools in memory/archive projects. Richard is currently studying at the LSE on a LSE PhD Studentship, and is an assistant editor for the Media@LSE working paper series.