One Minute

I am in the balcony of Fulton Chapel, tape recorder at my side, pen poised over paper waiting for the forum to begin. In a few moments, eight education experts from across the country will take their seats in the leather armchairs on the brightly-lit stage to discuss education policy. Below the balcony, the house is packed with teachers, students, media and others in the education field anxious to hear what these people will say. I am more anxious for the three-hour forum to be over so I can go home.

Someone takes the stage and utters a welcome to the university guests. Following the applause, a woman silently takes the stage. She doesn't introduce herself. She doesn't welcome the guests. Instead, she begins to speak in a ringing voice, full of conviction:

"'I have only just a minute, only 60 seconds in it,
forced upon me, can’t refuse it, didn’t seek it,
didn’t choose it, but it’s up to me to use it,
give account if I abuse it, suffer if I lose it.
Just a tiny little minute, but eternity is in it.'

Let me say that again. 

'We have only just a minute, only 60 seconds in it,
forced upon us, can’t refuse it, didn’t seek it,
didn’t choose it, but it’s up to us to use it,
give account if we abuse it, suffer if we lose it.
Just a tiny little minute, but eternity is in it.'"

No one came to this forum to hear poetry, but that is what we heard. Simple lines read in a brisk, confident voice by a woman who never mentioned her own name. The three-hour forum is merely a blur in my memory, but that poem has never left my mind.

Good, Better, Best

Recently, my editing professor gave the class a list of five ways to make a story better. He then asked us to look at two stories, one from The Daily Mississippian and one from the Florida Times-Union, to see if those elements were present.

Allison Wing’s article “Over exercising leads to joint pain, fractures” (The DM) contained some but not all of those elements. The story affected ordinary people because it could potentially prevent someone from an exercising-induced injury. The story was written to warn people against over-exercising. However, the story’s “nut graph” is the fifth paragraph. It should be much higher in the story.

For the article, Wing interviewed Jenny Wilson, a graduate student at the Turner Center; Barbara Collier, director of University Health Services, and Dr. Kim Beason, associate professor at the Turner Center. Collier and Beason are typical authorities for this type of story. Wilson seems to be an nontraditional authority figure. However, Wing missed the mark by failing to interview students or people who had suffered from injuries related to over-exercising.

These are the key questions I gleaned from the article: How are students over-exercising? Is the trend increasing? Why do students over-exercise? What are the effects of over-exercising? What is considered an ideal amount of exercise? What other age groups are over-exercising?

Bridget Murphy’s “Hitching at the Crossroads” (The Times-Union) was an example of a story that embodied all five elements. It affected ordinary people by informing them that not all hitchhikers are shady characters—but some are. Basically it was written to tell a story about a group of people that is often misunderstood.

Murphy used almost strictly nontraditional authorities: Town & Country waitress Naomi Engle and hitchhikers Kenny Bramlett, John Gotti, Belinda Kashella and Lance Moravits. She got a quote from a trucker who picked up con artist Kashella. Murphy also talked to authorities who had arrested Kashella previously and listed a hitchhiking law from the Florida Highway Patrol.

These are the key questions: Why is this person hitching? Why is Engle jaded to hikers? How long has this person been hitching? What are the dangers to hitchhikers? How do they make money? Do hitchhikers take any ride that is offered? Where is this person going and why?

Five Steps to a Better Story:
1. Who is affected by this? The answer should be ordinary people, not officials.
2. How are people affected by the news?
3. Why is the story being written?
4. Who are the authority figures? Are there some that are not identified?
5. What are the key questions?

The Art of the Well-Told Story

Bill Rose came to Ole Miss on a golf scholarship.

That is the way Rose began recounting the story of his journalistic beginnings to an auditorium full of students during his guest lecture Sept. 8. Seeking an easy A, Rose enrolled in Journalism 101 during his first semester of college.

While he had written a few sports pieces for area newspapers, the Shelby, Miss., native couldn’t tell a lead from a headline. Once his instructor set him on the right path, Rose fell in love with the art of journalism. Today, he is managing editor of the Palm Beach Post.

Rose’s biggest concern with today’s journalism graduates is their inability to write.

“Learn how to write,” he told the audience, urging aspiring journalists to write often and to read great writers.

Rose spoke animatedly about storytelling in journalism, encouraging students to “throw off the shackles” and use narrative features to tell the stories they are covering.

I found it incredibly refreshing to hear the editor of a major daily newspaper encouraging young journalists to be creative when writing their stories. I generally dislike news writing because it is bland and uninteresting—both to read and write. I am glad to know that creativity still has its place in journalism.

An Exorcism of Hate, or an Exercise in Hate?

At first, nothing seems terribly out of the ordinary. Two of the University Museum’s galleries house the works of Alabama artist William Christenberry. One is filled with his renderings of trees. The other contains only a few larger pieces.

Two guards keep watch outside a section of the gallery cordoned off by a black and red curtain. The only real preview of what stands behind the curtain is an enormous painting on the wall near the entrance: angry white-clad figures splashed across a brilliant yellow background.

There are plaques, and handouts, and warnings. After reading them, this no longer seems like an ordinary art exhibit. One gets the sense that no one should ever step behind that curtain alone.

On the other side is Christenberry’s installation piece, the Klan Room Tableau. Visitors are surrounded by life-size drawings of hooded faces and miniature Klan dolls being lynched, tarred and stabbed with pins. These voodoo figures stare out of miniature jails and tiny coffins.

Holly Bethune, the museum’s curator of education, said she has never heard people use the word “creepy” as much as she has since the exhibit opened.

The project is based off Christenberry’s encounter with a fully robed and hooded Klansman more than 40 years ago. The artist refers to his work as an “exorcism,” a cleansing of the Old South’s racial injustice.

The artist’s violent hatred of the Klan is blatantly obvious in his work. While he is trying to dispel the Klan’s doctrine of hate, he is perpetuating hatred toward that group. In effect, he is saying that while it is not OK to hate minorities, it is perfectly acceptable to hate the people who hate minorities. 

In no way do I support the Klan. Those white-sheeted ghosts haunt my past along with that of any other white Southerner. The Klan hates without reason, while Christenberry has just cause to hate the Klan. They have perpetuated unspeakable crimes against African-Americans and other minorities for decades.

What I'm asking is this: is it logical to battle hate with hate? 

The answer I have reached, after much internal debate, is no. Christenberry's figures are tortured in effigy, and I cannot help but wonder if he would like to see real Klansmen subjected to the same treatment. Violence is still violence and hatred is still hatred, no matter who it is directed toward.