
Writer: Odoobo C. Bichachi. PHOTO/COURTESY
Last week, profiles and descriptions of areas of study of Makerere University 2025 PhD graduands published in Daily Monitor of January 15 caused a public stir, at least on social media.
One particular profile of Brian Makonzi, PhD, went viral. It read: “He studied noncommutative resolutions of non-Gorenstein singularities and constructed classical deformation spaces. He recovered the Artin component of the deformation space for a cyclic surface singularity using the quiver of the corresponding reconstruction algebra. By deforming the algebra’s relations and varying the Geometric Invariant Theory quotient, he achieved simultaneous resolution”.
Many readers no doubt had a headache processing this. Only a handful, perhaps, did eventually understand what the gentleman had studied and how important his findings are.
Whatever the case, this is one of those convergences of academic and journalistic writing and as can be seen in the extract, it is worlds apart! A few significant differences are worth pointing out. I picked them from www.Quora.com answers for “How does academic writing differ from journalism?
“Academic writing and journalism serve different purposes and audiences, leading to distinct styles and conventions. Here are some key differences:Audience: Academic writing: Primarily targets scholars, researchers, and students.
The audience is expected to have a certain level of expertise in the subject matter. Journalism: Aims at a general audience. Journalists write for the public, making complex issues accessible and engaging.
Purpose: Academic writing: Seeks to contribute to knowledge, analyse theories, and provide evidence-based arguments. It often aims to persuade through rigorous analysis and critical thinking.
Journalism: Focuses on informing the public, reporting news, and providing commentary. The goal is often to tell a story or provide a timely update on current events.
Structure: Academic writing: Follows a formal structure, often including an introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion. Citations and references are crucial.
Journalism: Typically uses an inverted pyramid structure, starting with the most important information and followed by supporting details. Articles are often shorter and more concise.Style and tone: Academic writing: Formal, precise, and often dense. It uses specialised vocabulary and is less concerned with narrative flow. Journalism: More conversational and accessible. It often employs storytelling techniques and aims for clarity and engagement.”
******From the above, the problem with the referenced extract is not that it was wrong. It is just that one form of writing (academic) was simply transferred to another platform (journalism) without moderation for the mass audience that journalism writes for.
In my column, “When the journalists and academics walk together” (Daily Monitor, March 24, 2023), I made reference to the efforts of a Danish journalist friend, Vibeke Quaade, to bring academics and journalists together to solve this exact problem so that the two worlds of academia and journalism understand each other better and say things better to the public.
The programmme, aptly named “Bridging the Gap” has been running at the MS Training Centrer for Development Corporation (MS-TCDC), a renowned Pan-African training centre situated in Arusha, Tanzania for the last four or five years under Danida support.
Several Ugandan journalists and academicians/researchers have benefitted from this training. The poor rendering of these worthy academic achievements notwithstanding, there are good reasons for publishing these works and the writers and editors are commended for this.
Why, so much knowledge that can help resolve or bring understanding to common problems is confined to research labs, lecture rooms and libraries. The media is the bridge between the public and innovators. Marius Dragomir and Robert Nemeth of Central European University’s Democracy Institute in their June 2020 article titled, “What Happens When Academia and Media Work Together”, summarised well the importance of this intercourse.
They wrote: “When journalists team up with university researchers, only good things can come of it. With scale and structure, this type of collaboration can solve many, if not all, of the woes both journalism and academia are faced with.
As our modest journalism experiments are showing, joint work between academia and journalism is incredibly powerful, helping academics reach audiences they would never dream of reaching and journalists improve and increase their output, all with a more efficient use of resources.
Undoubtedly, there are snags. Deadline means a totally different thing for academics and journalists. Their work ethics differ. They write differently. They think differently about their audience.”
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