On the record

Here is my latest article published in Prospect:

Through Wikileaks, phone-hacking, and the obstacles facing journalists across the Middle East, the traditional practices of the media industry have come up against many challenges over the past year. According to Reporters Without Borders, around 57 journalists were killed last year in connection with their work. This month a new play On the Record arrives at London’s Arcola Theatre, dramatizing the dangers faced by the world’s independent journalists.

Stories about journalists are usually reported either in print or in documentaries, so it is rather novel that Christine Bacon and Noah Birksted-Breen have decided to bring the stories of six real-life journalists to the stage. As Birksted-Breen notes, “it has been a challenge, as obviously the relationship between the actors and the audience is quite different in documentary theatre compared with film documentaries. There isn’t a lot of theatre about journalism and when there is, it’s usually satirising journalism. We really wanted to show how big a difference there is between independent journalism and mainstream media.”

Published on 26-07-11. Read on here

The Belarusian 'Clapping' Revolution

My first blog for Huffington Post UK:

While strikes and protests the world over have dominated much of the news this year, the Belarusians are adopting a rather unusual form of anti-government protest: clapping.

In what has now become a weekly ritual that has steadily gathered momentum, on Wednesday hundreds of people once again lined the streets and clapped in silence. Why clapping you might ask? Well in June, Russian news agency Ria-Novosti reported that Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko had placed a ban on all forms of protest. So the Belarusians are getting their own back now and instead of chanting or holding banners and placards, they merely stand in silence and clap their hands in a taunting gesture to protest against Lukashenko’s government.

Published on 12-07-11. Read on here

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