“I refuse to shoot dancers,” he said. That's because he knows there's more to the powwow scene than shooting the grand entry of men, women and youths dancing in the arena.
Sings In The Timber, a journalism major at the University of Montana, trusts he can offer newspaper readers a different perspective. And he plans to encourage others to do the same by choosing a career in the news business.
“There aren't enough journalists of color and there aren't enough in the professional journalism community,” said Sings In The Timber, a junior majoring in photojournalism.
“The students at the University of Montana will be recognized as leaders and trendsetters,” NAJA President Mike Kellogg said. “They have taken the initiative to start their journalism career on a very strong foundation.”
Although South Dakota State University has had Native journalism groups, Montana is the first to seek charter status with the Native American Journalists Association. Denny McAuliffe, a UM journalism professor, said he urged Montana students to beat University of Oklahoma students who were also planning to seek chapter status.
Overall, the number of Native journalists working in newsrooms across the country remains consistently low. In April, the American Society of Newspaper Editors annual report on newsroom diversity numbers showed 309 Natives working in newsrooms, an increase of 14 over the prior year.
McAuliffe said the ASNE numbers likely over-inflate the true number of Native journalists in newsrooms where journalists self-identify for the industry report.
The University of Montana arguably has one the largest groups of Native journalists at any college or university in the country with about 15 students declaring journalism as a major. The average university boasts one or two Native journalism students, McAuliffe said. “We work hard at it. That's the difference.”
McAuliffe casts a net around fledgling Native journalists throughout the country by hiring them to write for Reznet News, an online newspaper for university and tribal college students.
The number of tribal college students who write for the Native student college Web site, however, has always been low, he said. About half the Reznet writers have attended the American Indian Journalism Institute in Vermillion, S.D.
McAuliffe attributes the low success rate of tribal college students to a lack of writing skills.
“I wish it would be so easy as having more journalism classes at tribal colleges,” he said. “It really is a challenge. It's frustrating.”
Sings In The Timber said he and other members of UM's NAJA chapter plan to go to reservations around the state to encourage high school students to consider becoming reporters and photographers.
“I don't think many kids on the reservation understand what journalism is and what it can do for them, and in turn, what they can do for their communities,” he said.
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