Objectivity: Why it is Important and How it Can be Realised in Media Practice

Abstract:

This study interrogates the growing tendency to assume the impossibility of journalistic objectivity. Specifically, it sieves through the controversies and articulates the way forward. The study adopts a Discourse Analysis approach and anchors its contentions on the Correspondence and Coherence theories. The analysis concludes that journalistic objectivity is distinctively a news function. And that it is not only desirable but possible and realisable if approached within a defined context. Based on this framework, the study provides a standard for achieving journalistic objectivity in media practice.