Join our network
Subscribe
In June this year the Africa-China Reporting Project (the Project) announced the African Journalism Workshop for Chinese Journalists (the Workshop) to be held at Wits Journalism in October 2016, with a call for applications to partake in the two-week Workshop. The Workshop was conceived as a practical skills training experience for Chinese journalists on how to report in and on Africa, with one week of lectures and training at Wits Journalism as well as several excursions to selected sites in Johannesburg; followed by a week of fieldwork and reporting during which the journalists pursued their selected feature topics.
Nine Chinese journalists from a range of media institutions in China (see list below) participated in the Workshop. The video below was produced by Wits University and gives a brief introduction to the journalists and their selected fieldwork projects during the Workshop; much of the footage was filmed during a visit to Johannesburg's Cyrildene Chinatown.
The following are the nine Chinese journalists who participated in the Workshop and their individual fieldwork projects:
| Journalist | Media affiliation | Fieldwork project |
|---|---|---|
| CHEN Jing (Candice) | China Youth Daily | Chinese merchants and malls in South Africa |
| CHEN Lusha | Freelance | Chinese community in South Africa and use of guns |
| CHOW Crystal | The Initium Media, HK | Illegal trade in abalone and Asian connections |
| HUANG Kaixi | Caixin | Chinese manufacturing companies in South Africa |
| NI Yanshuo (Albert) | ChinAfrica Magazine | Chinese companies and Sino-SA cooperation |
| SHI Wenjing | CCTV | Cross-cultural understanding video project |
| WANG Wenwen | Global Times | Modderfontein Chinese investment project in SA and human impact of investment |
| XIE Yujuan (Echo) | Jiemian News | Chinese private sector investment in Africa |
| ZHANG Cheng | CCTV | Chinese language and culture in Africa |
For the first week of Workshop, October 17-22, the Project assembled a group of African journalism experts and media professionals to provide practical training and skills development to the journalists. These lecturers included Wits Journalism staff Prof. Mathatha Tsedu, Dr Bob Wekesa, and Kevin Davie; working journalists Ufrieda Ho and Phillip de Wet; as well as Nechama Brodie (Africa Check) on factchecking; Cobus van Staden (Wits Media Studies) on multimedia journalism; and Huang Hongxiang (Africa House, Nairobi) on the Chinese presence in Africa and Chinese journalism on the continent.
The week also included visits to Johannesburg's Chinatowns as well as news rooms, and concluded with a Soweto day trip. This was the full programme for the first week:
While Johannesburg for the Workshop, Global Times journalist Wang Wenwen published two features in Global Times' English edition:
Here is Wenwen pictured with the relevant edition of Global Times, found in Johannesburg's Cyrildene Chinatown during a group visit:
Wang Wenwen, Global Times journalist, in Cyrildene during the African Journalism Workshop.
Here is a further selection of images taken during the Workshop:
