Misattributions
by Alex
The Gaper’s Block/SPEC blogger reading a few weeks back was a great success, and it generated a couple of articles in the local papers, including one in the Harold . This would be gratifying if the quality of the reporting weren’t so mediocre.
Of course, the main reason that I’m irked is that I was denied my own 15 nanoseconds of fame when they misattributed a quote by me to David Elfving:
“Elfving found that out when he dropped a reference to the 1980 movie ‘Caddyshack,’ and got no response. Then he worked the 2001 film ‘Memento’ into his spiel, and got some laughs.
‘Ah!’ he realized. ‘The demographic is becoming apparent!’ ”
I mean
1) How many people reference Caddyshack in one breath and then say something like “the demographic is becoming apparent” in the next?
2) YOU MUST CORRECTLY QUOTE YOUR INFORMANTS! Don’t be a sloppy fieldworker. I’m sure I’ll make mistakes in my dissertation so I’m not trying to be higher and mightier. But I lived there for two years and am writing up my stuff years after the fact. This guy sat through three hours of presentations and then wrote it up a week later. Please.
I appreciate the publicity and I’m glad The Block has got the nod from the local press. Really I do. But I’m too much of an anthropologist not to notice poor craftsmanship when it come to writing up one’s experiences.
All right. I feel better now. At least they noticed I had a forty.
1. Your example after “Consider the line:” isn’t showing up.
2. It’s the Daily Herald, not the Herald Tribune.
How frustrating. That was indeed sloppy reporting. Oh well! At least you get to set the record straight on your weblog.
Heh – so much for my ranting about accuracy! I fixed it now. Thanks. {face-saving cough} if this were a more formal arena I would have checked more closely…. :-/
As a journalism student, that type of faux-pas would have graced the reporter with an “F” for the story. And that is exactly what I think he deserves. Today’s “aren’t I clever to be writing my article like blog entries” is quaint and completely patronizing. A blog is a format, just like oil painting is a format. Not every blogger is the Bob Ross. Grr!
Would it be intentional that you linked “one in the Harold” rather than “one in the Herald”?
I do all of my blog entries in less than a half hour.
Ross
In the future both newspaper articles and the blog entries critiquing them for factual errors will be done in less time than it takes to write them, so we can all go eat.