Few journalists speak Maori
Title -- 4561 NZ: Few journalists speak Maori
Date -- 7 November 2004
Byline -- None
Origin -- Pacific Media Watch
Source -- Pacific Journalism Review 7/11/2004
Copyright - AUT
Status -- Unabridged
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FEW NZ JOURNALISTS SPEAK MAORI
http://www.pjreview.info
AUCKLAND (Pacific Journalism Review/Pacific Media Watch): Barely one in five New Zealand journalists can speak Maori, one of the country's two official languages, a new national survey of journalists has found.
And most of them describe their fluency as merely "moderate" or "minimal".
Thirty nine of the minority of 57 (19 per cent) respondents saying they could speak Maori indicated their linguistic ability extended only to common words or greetings.
The findings, published in the latest edition of Pacific Journalism Review, are included in the third national survey of journalists conducted by Associate Professor Geoff Lealand, of Waikato University, on behalf of the NZ Journalists Training Organisation (NZJTO).
The article, entitled "Still young and female: A (modest) survey of New Zealand journalists", reported on the findings of the 2003 research.
It also found that only 4.4 percent of NZ journalists regarded their journalistic work as being provided mainly for a Maori audience.
According to the 2001 census, people of Maori ethnicity made up 15 percent of New Zealand's 4 million population.
The survey quotes one senior editor as saying: "There is a lamentable, ongoing ignorance among Pakeha journalists about things Maori and our colonial history.
"Therefore, prejudices are repeated and Maori development is frustrated."
Only 297 journalists were surveyed in the 2003 report - far fewer than in the two previous national surveys in 1987 and 1994.
Professor Lealand offered several reasons for this low return, including reliance on an electronic delivery system for questionnaires that was "not as efficient or effective as hoped".
A large majority of 267 (93 percent) of the surveyed journalists identified their ethnic background as Pakeha, with 13 Maori journalists, two Tongans, one Samoan, three Chinese and two other nationalities making up the balance.
Fifty three per cent of the surveyed journalists were females and 47 percent males.
The survey was dominated by tertiary educated journalists, with a significant number (149) having completed an undergraduate degree, and a further 21 progressing to a postgraduate degree.
This edition of PJR has a "Media ownership and democracy" theme, including case studies about City Voice, the independent NZ community newspaper that eventually folded; media ownership in Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Tonga and the region; and the political cartoonist's right to freedom of expression.
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