Storytellers should produce stories that reproduce the experience African people have across the continent more accurately.
That was the crux of a recent Africa No Filter (ANF) dialogue that took place on July 30 and highlighted issues of language and other factors that shape reporting and writing about Africa.
The all-women panel of media practitioners Heba Aly and Emily Renshaw-Smith, academic Prof Relebogile Moletsane and land activist and storyteller Dimuna Phiri also focused on what medium of publishing was relevant to people living on the continent.
New Humanitarian CEO Heba Aly said her organisation was steering clear of pessimistic narratives of Africa.
“Rather than the story that is going to be sexy for the international audience, what’s the story that is going to improve the lives of people who are affected by the crisis?” Aly asked.
According to an ANF report, a third of all stories in African news media are sourced from foreign news agencies. The research also found stories focused on poverty, poor leadership, corruption, conflict and disease. These storylines are particular favourites of development funders, the media and western storytellers according to the report.
ANF executive director Moky Makura said the prevailing narratives have harmful effects on how Africa is portrayed.
“The problem is that they lead to harmful stereotypical narratives about the continent, that we are broken, that we are dependent, that we lack agency,” Makura said.
A real impact
According to the How to write about Africa in 8 steps handbook by Africa No Filter, there is a need for storytelling to not only provide support but to have a real impact on the people whose stories are being covered.
The handbook describes ethical storytelling as “creating better, more authentic stories that
connect people of different backgrounds and disrupt inequitable power relations as well as representing lived experiences more accurately,”.
University of KwaZulu-Natal John Langalibalele Dube chair of rural education Relebogile Moletsane expanded on the theme of the dialogue by pointing out that negative writing reinforces bias.
“It means not exploiting storytellers by extracting their stories and then leaving the scene [...] it's also about ensuring that the stories do not reinforce harmful stereotypes about the issue itself,” said Moletsane.
Land rights activist Dimuna Phiri said NGOs sometimes paint communities as vulnerable and lacking bargaining power when reporting their issues in order to motivate for funding.
“We don't tell the story from the perspective of the community but from our own perspective of the community, but rather from the perspective of our own to further our own agendas,” said Phiri.
Finding solutions
Moletsane highlighted that ethical storytelling does not necessarily ignore the bad things that are happening but engages and helps communities imagine solutions.
“What do we do once we have listened to the stories of bad things happening, how do we use those stories to imagine alternatives?” Moletsane asked.
However, proper ethical storytelling takes time, which can be a challenge given the fast news cycle, said Makura.
“As a newsroom, it is important for our journalists to prioritize the relationships we have in our community over being the first ones to report on breaking news,” said Aly.
In recommendation of how ethical storytelling can be embedded into storytelling, Comic Relief head of content Emily Renshaw-Smith said asking questions through the creative process was crucial to find alternative voices that could deliver local context and accurate representations.
Moletsane encouraged storytellers to keep their eye on the prize. “What you want to get out of the community are stories told from their perspective,” she said.
Watch the full conversation here.
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