The Kicker

By Columbia Journalism Review

The Kicker is a podcast on the media and the world today. It comes out twice a month, hosted by Josh Hersh and produced by Amanda Darrach for the Columbia Journalism Review. It is

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· News

4.5

7171 ratings

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FAQs about The Kicker:

How many episodes does The Kicker have?

The podcast currently has 306 episodes available.

The Kicker episodes:

April 25, 2024 'Inside Wagner': Video journalism unmasks Russia’s secretive mercenary group
This week, host Josh Hersh dives into the world of documentary news. Amel Guettatfi and Julia Steers just won the Polk Award for Inside Wagner, their hourlong Vice News documentary on the Wagner Group—Vladimir Putin’s private army of militiamen. They discuss their unprecedented access to a military training operation in the Central African Republic, the unique challenges of doing this kind of reporting on film, and why, sometimes, video is the only way to tell the story. Show NotesInside Wagner: The Rise of Russia's Notorious Mercenaries, Amel Guettatfi and Julia Steers, Vice Newsbit.ly/3UtURmh
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42min
April 03, 2024 Josh Fine: How to Revive Investigative Sports Reporting in the Age of the Athlete
In recent years, numerous beloved sports news institutions have been shut down, or dramatically reduced their operations, while digital shows hosted by professional sportspeople, current and retired, have become ubiquitous.Meanwhile, traditional sports journalism—particularly of the type that asks uncomfortable questions of what is, ultimately, a huge and powerful business—has been in decline. Last year, Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, an HBO show that mixed softer features with hard-nosed investigative journalism, wrapped its final season after twenty-nine years on air. Josh Fine was an investigative producer at Real Sports for seventeen years. He has some ideas on how sports journalism can revive itself.Host: Josh HershProducer: Amanda DarrachShow Notes:Can sports journalism survive in the era of the athlete? by Josh Hersh for CJRhttps://www.cjr.org/business_of_news/sports-journalism-survival-foul-territory-mcafee-braun-mlb.php
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39min
April 03, 2024 Josh Fine: How to Revive Investigative Sports Reporting in the Age of the Athlete
In recent years, numerous beloved sports news institutions have been shut down, or dramatically reduced their operations, while digital shows hosted by professional sportspeople, current and retired, have become ubiquitous,
Meanwhile, traditional sports journalism—particularly of the type that asks uncomfortable questions of what is, ultimately, a huge and powerful business—has been in decline. Last year, Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, an HBO show that mixed softer features with hard-nosed investigative journalism, wrapped its final season after twenty-nine years on air. Josh Fine was an investigative producer at Real Sports for seventeen years. He has some ideas on how sports journalism can revive itself.

Host: Josh Hersh
Producer: Amanda Darrach

Show Notes:
Can sports journalism survive in the era of the athlete? by Josh Hersh for CJR
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39min
May 12, 2023 Alissa Quart: on reimagining reporting on a recession
News of stubborn inflation, increasing unemployment, and the housing crisis dominate headlines of late. Alissa Quart is trying to improve that reportage, in content and form. Quart is the executive director of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, which challenges traditional narratives of economic class and issues through funding original reporting, done by independent journalists from diverse economic backgrounds. Quart explains to Kyle Pope, Columbia Journalism Review’s editor and publisher, how this helps dismantle the “American myth” of self-reliance — the subject of her latest book, Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream. In the interview, Quart and Pope discuss how the media’s reliance on this myth impacts electoral politics and what solutions exist. Quart suggests changing language standards, expanding recruiting criteria for newsrooms, and even reimagining news sections.
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26min
May 10, 2023 Svitlana Oslavska: On Documenting a War on Her Home Front
Before Russia invaded her home country, Ukrainian journalist Svitlana Oslavska was reviewing books for Krytyka, a Ukrainian magazine, and writing nonfiction books. Now, she’s documenting war crimes committed by the Russians against Ukrainians for the Reckoning Project. Since joining the Project, Oslavska’s reporting serves two purposes — to provide detailed witness testimonies for court cases against the Russians and to publish accounts of the war in the international media. In this episode of the Kicker, Oslavska recounts the war crimes she documented for the Project and later published as a story in TIME.
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26min
May 09, 2023 How Authoritarians Erase the Past
The Columbia Journalism Review recently invited journalists, academics, and experts to convene at a conference called "FaultLines: Democracy." In this episode, taped at the FaultLines conference, Masha Gessen, of The New Yorker; Jodie Ginseberg, president of the Committee to Protect Journalists; and Sheila Coronel, an expert in global investigative journalism, discuss how authoritarian regimes are erasing traces of the past and recasting history in dangerous ways.
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38min
April 19, 2023 Hearts and Minds Media
For decades, Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty have broadcast into countries all over, in dozens of languages. Yet in some places where the United States has invested the most soft power, authoritarianism has only gotten stronger—and journalists remain at risk. That may be especially true in Afghanistan since the Taliban’s takeover. For CJR's latest digital issue, Emily Russell reports on hearts and minds media in Afghanistan and beyond.Visit cjr.org to read the Authoritarianism Issue.
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34min
March 13, 2023 Feven Merid: On Jacaranda Nigeria Limited
In 1982, about twenty Black journalists quit their jobs at American networks, banded together under the name Jacaranda Nigeria Limited, and flew to Nigeria, where they would work under the country’s newly elected president to revamp a state-funded journalism network. On today’s episode of the Kicker, Feven Merid, a Columbia Journalism Review staff writer, tells their story.She explains the many unforeseen challenges Jacaranda’s journalists faced — the Nigerian government’s interference in their reporting, the lack of proper training and resources, the confusion over their racial identity — and, ultimately, how the problems they went to Nigeria to escape never really disappeared.Read Feven's article at https://www.cjr.org/the_feature/black-american-journalists-nigeria.php.
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20min
February 07, 2023 Jeff Gerth on the press versus the president
Last week, the Columbia Journalism Review published a four-part investigation into the media’s fraught relationship with Donald Trump. In this episode of the Kicker, Jeff Gerth, who authored the report, talks to Kyle Pope, CJR’s editor and publisher, about the origin of the investigation and the intense responses to it, with which Gerth admits he is still “grappling.”On the podcast, Gerth says he considers his 24,000-word story an “anatomy,” reconstructing how the media covered Trump and Russia. In reporting the piece, Gerth interviewed Trump at – predictably – a golf course, and reached out to dozens of journalists who covered Trump-Russia, albeit with limited success. “Many of them are loath to want to discuss or/and engage with what they do,” Gerth says in the episode. “I find it perplexing.” For additional news on this story and on the media, subscribe to CJR’s daily newsletter at cjr.org/email
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19min
January 31, 2023 FT's Rana Foroohar: What the Davos Crowd Doesn't See
After two decades of attending the World Economic Forum's annual gathering of business elites in Davos, Rana Foroohar, associate editor of the Financial Times, stayed back this year. In this week’s episode of The Kicker, Foroohar tells Kyle Pope, editor and publisher of the Columbia Journalism Review, why the annual meet-up of global technocrats imparts “icky” feelings, and why the Davos crowd, including the journalists reporting from the conference, might have a skewed outlook on the economy. Also joining Pope in conversation is Mercy Orengo, a CJR fellow. Orengo shares insights from her recent conversations with business reporters tasked with covering an uncertain economy.
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27min

FAQs about The Kicker:

How many episodes does The Kicker have?

The podcast currently has 306 episodes available.

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