• Africa Journalism Educations Network annual meet (13 September 2022).
• SACOMM annual conference for academics in southern Africa. This year's theme is Unravelling Big Tech: Power and the Global South, to be held at Wits University (14 - 16 September 2022).
• Jamfest 2022 for media and information innovators hosted by Wits Centre for Journalism's Jamlab. This year's theme is Unplugged (but still connecting) and will be in hybrid form (13 October to 2 November). 
• The 18th African Investigative Journalism Conference for journalism training and networking returns in-person and will take place at Wits University (31 October - 2 November 2022).
• Register for a free online training workshop hosted by the Africa China Reporting Project (27 July 2022).
• State of the Newsroom to launch first publication in Senegal.
• Wits Journalism celebrates Alumni. 

Africa Journalism Educations Network: 13 September 2022

The Wits Centre for Journalism will host journalism teachers from across the continent for a one-day round table meeting in September.

The in-person event is planned for September 13 2022 and will bring members of the African Journalism Educators Network (Ajen) together for discussions around campus media, decolonising journalism education, indigenous language journalism and other issues of common concern. The overall theme of the gathering is Bringing the classroom closer to the African newsroom.

Invitations are still being finalised. 

More details here 

South African Communications Association Annual Conference: 14 – 16 September 2022

The South African Communications Association (SACOMM) Annual Conference will be taking place at Wits University from 13 - 16 September 2022. This year's theme is Unravelling Big Tech: Power and the Global South. 

The conference seeks to bring together academics to debate and engage in professional communication practices in southern Africa.

Register here 

Jamfest: 13 October – 2 November 2022

Jamfest is an African media and information festival directed at a diverse set of African media makers and media publics. The second annual festival will be held in hybrid form with the theme Unplugged (but still connecting) from 13 October to 2 November 2022.

Hundreds of media makers and innovators from across Africa will come together for 21 days of purposeful conversations, networking as well as showcasing new content style approaches and great innovation emanating from the continent. 

More details here.

Survey

The Jamlab team invites you to complete a survey to help curate a programme that will bring the right thought leaders, journalism and media experts and entrepreneurs together to stimulate new conversations, new information and new audiences in the African media market landscape.

Kindly complete the survey. It will only take ten minutes of your time.  

18th African Investigative Journalism Conference: 31 October – 2 November 2022

The dates for this year’s African Investigative Journalism Conference (AIJC2022) have changed. It will now be held from October 31 - November 2 2022, at Wits University, Johannesburg. We apologise for any inconvenience, but this change is due to circumstances outside of our control.

Please diarise the new date.

Apply for the AIJC2022 Fellowships

Fellowships are open to journalists with a proven track record in investigative journalism who want to develop their skills and network with their colleagues.

Fellows will be asked to produce at least one piece of content arising out of the conference.

To apply, please fill in this form and send your CV to [email protected] by July 31 2022.

Special consideration will be given to those who submit a short video on what the conference means to them.

All applications will be acknowledged on receipt and a final decision on places will be made by Monday, August 18 2022.

More details here

The Africa-China Reporting Project in partnership with China Dialogue presents the Online Journalists Training Workshop on Africa-China Relations and the Climate Crisis with: 

1. Ma Tianjie (China Dialogue, Beijing Editor), 
2. Geraurd Neema (China Global South Project),
3. Li Shuo (Policy Advisor, Greenpeace East Asia), and
4. Paula Fray (CEO, Fray College)

When: 27 July 2022 

10:00 – 11:35 AM (CAT) 

16:00 - 17:35 PM (EEC)

More details here

At the end of May, the Wits Centre for Journalism (WCJ) joined FOJO Media at Linnaeus University in Kalmar Sweden to launch the Sustainable Journalism Partnership as a registered NGO with an elected Board. WCJ Acting Director, Dr Dinesh Balliah will join the Board together with esteemed international colleagues to drive this important work forward.

The  Sustainable Journalism Partnership seeks to:

- Define sustainable journalism as a new research area, opening up for new research projects

- Find out what kind of journalism effectively communicates sustainability challenges

- Find out what kind of sustainable journalism the public is willing to pay for

- Communicate successful sustainable business models for media in middle- and low-income countries

- Communicate environmentally sustainable production and distribution models

- Develop knowledge on how to set up a socially sustainable newsroom

- Develop training in sustainable journalism reporting

- Develop a syllabus on sustainable journalism for schools of journalism.

Membership is free for the first year! For more information and resources see here.

For the first time, State of the Newsroom, an annual report published by the Wits Centre for Journalism, will be published in Senegal in partnership with E-jicom, a leading journalism school in Francophone Africa.

In 2021, working with our country partners, Continuing Journalism Education, the first State of the Newsroom outside of South Africa was published in Malawi. In 2022 a follow-up issue of State of the Newsroom Malawi will be published.

The annual State of the Newsroom report for South Africa is a publication that offers the opportunity for a unique reflection on the state of the media environment in this country, with perspectives and analysis from different stakeholders, on topics ranging from media sustainability, challenges journalists and newsrooms face, to policy and industry shifts, and media freedoms.

We look forward to this exciting initiative, and the chance to map and better understand the challenges that newsrooms face in Senegal.

Former students of the Wits Centre for Journalism’s Honours Programme are making waves in the field of journalism and arts in South Africa. 

This year, Naledi Mashishi (2018) and Shandukani Mulaudzi (2013) were named in the Mail & Guardian’s Top 200 Young South Africans - an honorary title given to young South Africans pioneering in their respective fields and driving change - while Onke Ngucka (2018) was awarded the Sikuvile Award for upcoming/rising journalist of the year.

Mashishi, Mulaudzi and Ngucka join a long list of Wits Journalism alumni who have been awarded and recognised for the great work they do in the South African media landscape and the country as a whole.