Marion

As a French student abroad, I was wondering how Brexit influenced the life and the work of a French immigrate in Scotland, especially in this country which has voted “NO” to Brexit. Today, Scotland is facing two situations: Brexit and the current affair of independence.  

“Gigi” aka Ghislain, is a French immigrate in Edinburg. The 36-years-old man is the manager of the restaurant “Petit Paris” in Edinburg (38-40 Grassmarket, Edinburgh, EH1 2JU). He comes from Montélimar, a French Town in the South of France. He is established in Edinburg for 15 years, he first came for 6 months, to learn English and he never came back to France.

  He enjoys the Scottish people who are nicer than the French people. He likes the town, he loves the generosity of the city and the people, but he dislikes the weather: “You can’t have everything” says Ghislain. As a manager, he works a lot, everyday from 10 a.m until 1.30 a.m, but he loves what he does because of the environment and the atmosphere; the restaurant “Petit Paris” is a “cliché” of France. If you come in, you will find some baguettes, red wine, cheese, French advertising prints, French products, and squared tablecloth for each table. Everyone who works at “Petit Paris” is from France, so they all speak French, they yell in French, “but it’s the job. People need to feel France, and to imagine it as they were in France.” declares the manager. 

When we may think that Brexit could frightened immigrate, Gigi he’s “not worried about Brexit”. He explains: “I am not worried about Brexit. I am married to a Scottish woman, I have two children and I work here for 15years. I pay all the taxes. They won’t make me leave the country because I’m French and I don’t have the nationality”. ‘Gigi’ has all the requirements to get the Scottish nationality, but he won’t ask for it because it’s very expensive (1200-1400 pounds). At worst, he will pay it to stay with his family. The manager is against the Brexit, but unfortunately he wasn’t able to vote to express himself; “I am able to vote for 90%. I can vote for everything according Scotland because I live here for more than 10 years. As regards Europe, I can only vote in a French Consulate. Now, unfortunately for a year the consulate is in London.” claims Ghislain. According to the French immigrate, Brexit is one of the biggest error from the United Kingdom. “We had the best deal in Europe. The United Kingdom could accept what they want, and reject what they don’t want. But now we had loose this deal. And we have to find another one with the Europe Union (EU), as good as the one we had” says Gigi. Brexit was, according to the manager, a bad idea. There is another question for Scotland about its independence. Scotland answered “NO” to the Brexit referendum. “Brexit is good for business, there are more tourists than last year and they spend more money too because of the lower pound” says Ghislain. However for restaurant owner it’s not that benefit because of the products importations. According to all the workers at “Petit Paris”, Brexit is too young now to observe real effects on daily life. 

They think now about the independence from the United Kingdom. For Ghislain, this idea is also a bad idea: “There is no proof that we will be able to enter in the European Union”. Indeed, on the 26th of January 2016 during the meeting of the 27 EU’s members after Brexit, Mariano Rajoy, President of Spanish government since 2011, claimed that if Scotland will become independent, Spain would oppose Scotland comeback in the EU. If Scotland gains its independence from the United-Kingdom, it could encourage Catalonia to do the same. Nowadays, after the referendum and the current affair about Catalonia Independence, Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs Alfonso Dastis claimed in 2017 that Spain may not prevent Scotland to return in the EU if every country agreed on this question. After all these declarations, Scotland could return in EU but it’s not certain. If the response is “NO”, the Economy of the country and its relations with EU countries will go down. Furthermore, Scotland economy is based on oil, salmon and whisky. If the country gains its independence, the United-Kingdoms won’t hesitate to dig to find oil under the border, leaving Scotland without good resources to export.  

Mandy Rhodes, a woman of influence

While Society changes, a journalist needs to adapt himself to work in a new environment. How do they do?

 Mandy Rhodes is the managing director Holyrood communication in Edinburg, Scotland. She is responsible for the editorial content of the other publications associated to Holyrood. Rhodes studied Scottish History and Sociology at the Stirling University in the nearly 1980’s. She trained on a local newspaper in Wester Hailes and she improved her skills in journalism at Napier University (Scotland). She is not new in her favorite field, she worked as journalist for nearly 30years at television, radio, and newsprint.

This year, she won several distinctions for her work: PPA Magazine Editor of the Year, Feature Writer of the year and Columnist of the years and more. Rhodes is a brilliant writer who doesn’t let the politician power scary her. She uses everything at her disposition and everything she finds to write the best paper and tell the truth. She adapts herself very well to the new technologies, she knows how to use it and she likes tweeting. Holyrood is Scotland’s paper dealing with actuality, current affairs in politics and Society. Reading by politicians, by Scottish Governmental agencies, educational organizations…  Holyrood is a reliable source, often quoted within the Scottish Parliament. 

             How is the journalism of today evolving with Society?

 ‘The rules and skills of journalism remain the same: truth, honestly, credibility and balance. Technology has both assisted and hindered with the job. It has allowed people to become lazy about facts and research but also to shortcut the usual career progression. Anyone can call themselves a journalist these days by simply publishing articles online. It has also led people confusing opinion for neutral reporting. However, technology offers an immediacy and means stories can be published quickly and with images online.’     

 What are the differences between the old journalism and the new one?

‘The confusion over opinion and balanced reporting’.

    Has your daily work changed over the last year?

‘Not really’.

       What is your view on the future journalism?

‘I believe there will always be a place for well researched, authoritative journalism and I have faith in the future of the printed word. I think people will access instant news online but there will be a thirsty for long form in hard copy’.

        If you can change something in journalism what would you do?

Howard Luck Gossage, ‘mad men’, says: ’Advertising is propaganda; marketing is exploitation’

 According to the strategist Lianne Heite, there is a difference between advertising and propaganda, “[Advertising is] when you want to interest people about something, getting something, a surface, a product, or make them want something, how to have it, how to use it,” she said. She also defines propaganda as; “it’s all about selling a conviction, make people convinced about thoughts or leaders, make people believe in a certain idea, or party, theory, it’s about belief in something.” This is what makes advertising different from propaganda. 

 Lianne Heite is an expert in media- advertising. She works for Havaz Lemz at the strategy department. She fell in love with advertising during her internship at TBWA in 2000, the worldwide known advertising agency. She studied Information and Communication Sciences at Utrecht. Then, She began her career with the digital advertising. Currently, her role is to analyze the situation with the market, what is the brand about, what the consumer wants, and you match the three of them to find the gap in which to jump. 

Lianne Heite - Source: Lianne Heite's Linkedin profil 

She knows that people can consider advertising and propaganda as the same, but it’s different for her, “In advertising, the consumer is inside, it’s very important; you always have to think about what people want and need, and according to that, you sell them something or tell them something. Propaganda is not really focusing on people, it’s more convincing of a ‘truth,’” Heite said. 

However, propaganda and advertising are very close. We can talk about advertising campaigns being “propagandish”. There are educational campaigns, like governmental ones which can be a sort of propaganda, but “It’s all about money” declares Heite. Indeed, advertising is all about making money. It’s about consuming, and not believing. We live in a world where money and power run everything. We may say that advertising runs the money, and the propaganda runs the power. Advertising uses Society’s flaws to reach its goal. “This is the world where we live in” says Heite; that’s why we can confuse propaganda with the sneaky type of advertising.  

The new “mad men” tries to avoid this confusion with propaganda. It can be hard, because advertising sticks on Society. “Be realistic, it’s what our society is all about. It can change if the world changes,” states Heite. The strategist doesn’t think about good or bad propaganda. She believes that everything is subjective, and if there is any chance to convey a message to the world, to make it safer and healthier, propaganda is useful. From this statement, thanks to the knowledge on people and Society, Advertising uses propaganda trying to change the world to make it “a better place” according to Heite. 

“I would like to say that I really really like, as a person who works in advertising that we are now moving. We want to do something more purposeful with marketing and advertising” says Heite.  She adds: “What we do it’s really prove to brand that if they do something, that helps the world for the better. That’s cost their money obviously but that’s create so much good thing that in the end, it would earn that money.” The strategist still repeats that it is all about money. Because of this realistic idea of how Society works, sometimes advertiser have to convince themselves and companies to do not do things they think they are too commercial or only commercial. They try to use the money argument to make companies understand and convince them that it can bring good things with the money and improve Society thanks to them. If they understand it, companies will go for that. Mad men of today and tomorrow want to prove that you can make the world a little bit better if you spend your money on the good way. “This is a beautiful development and of course, it’s gonna make me much prouder to work in advertising” reveals Heite. 

#TAKEAKNEE

 Everything began during the summer 2016, when Colin Kaepernick, quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers team decided to knee during the national anthem before the kickoff, protesting for the equality between black and white people. Colin Kaepernick has been fire.  On Friday, the 22th of September 2017, the President D.Trump made a declaration about the kneed and insult every players who followed this movement.  The Medias take care of this case with attention, and the whole world of sport, celebrity and normal people reacted to his declaration. A lot people showed their support and embraced the ‘new’ Anti-Trump Movement aka #TakeAKnee This time Donald Trump fights against for the first time against an united sports nation, which defying him during the last week-end of September 2017.  #TakeAKnee protestation is not the first time in History that black sportsmen fight for respect and justice. The movement reminds the ‘The Revolt of The Black Athletes’. 

24th of September, 2017: NFL Players defying Trump before Kickoff After Trump’s declaration about firing the “son of a bitch” for disrespecting the flag, NFL Players defying Trump, kneeling before kickoff. This pacific protestation is a step among a range of, against racial injustices and police’s violence.   

03:15: Legend Stevie Wonder takes the knee on stage before his concert at the Global Citizen Festival in New-York City. The singer wants to support the NFL players and all American.He takes “a knee for America”. Actually, he takes both knees for America!       

Stevie Wonder takes a knee with the help of his son Kwame Morris during a concert Saturday in New York. (Shannon Stapleton/Reuters) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/news/stevie-wonder-takes-knee-america-donald-trumpattacks-nfl-protests/ 

 12:44: To respond the movement of players, Trump makes a call to the NFL’s owner team to fire whomever disrespect the “Flag & Country”. He also asks supporter to boycott football team! He is playing with the American patriotism, while the NFL protest for Civils Rights.

https://www.sbnation.com/2017/9/24/16356888/president-donald-trump-boycott-the-nfl 

15:30: In Wembley, London, NFL team Jaguars and Ravens take a knee before kickoff during the national anthem. It’s clearly a protestation against Donald Trump’s remarks. Players kneel for the Civils Rights and against racial injustices. Lot of NFL team do the same and give their support. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/24/sports/nfl-trump-anthem-protests.html?mcubz=3        

  Dallas Cowboys players and owner Jerry Jones take a knee before national anthem - BBC Sport 

16:27:  WWII Veteran kneels on twitter to supports NFL Player and their protestation “Those kids have every right to protest”. From someone who standing with arms to defend his country, the message this veteran wants to spread is global and relevant about fighting for your rights.  

Source Twitter of Brennan Gilmore, grandson of John Middlmas, older navy seal of 97 - years - old

 http://www.marketwatch.com/story/wwii-vet-takes-a-knee-slams-trump-and-becomes-aninstant-internet-sensation-2017-09-24 

 20:20: Trumps claims on twitter his approval about Americans who defend the country and the people, and his degust for those who kneel during the national anthem. President D.Trump doesn’t see the link between taking arms to defend and kneeling to defend. NFL spread a message of unity and community for the people who are not respected by the country and its “defenders”.     

   Donald Trump's Twitter                             http://edition.cnn.com/2017/09/24/politics/donald-trump-nfl-sunday-protestresponse/index.html   

21:23: Some of the NFL supporters dislike the movement # TakeAKnee and join President Trump. Supporters burn the flag of their team to support his comment and agree with the declaration. NFL players start a “cold war” with Donald Trump. On the other side, Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti “respect their demonstration and support them 100%”.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/sep/24/donald-trump-nfl-protests-kneelanthem 

During the day: Many stars support NFL players and #TakeAknee movement, posting on socials media picture and declarations against Donal Trump. Sport is what unifies a country when politic divides it.       

    The gesture of NFL players has its story: it comes from Martin Luther King, who kneeled in Selma before being arrested for demonstrating in 1965. 

" Saint-Martin is my second home"

The Hurricane Irma ravaged the Saint-Martin Island on Wednesday, 6th of September. Ten days later, Valentine de Bosson, French student at La Sorbonne (Paris, France), tells us why she feels affected by this disaster and how her friends from the Island have experienced the natural catastrophe. 

Valentine is twenty, she is a French student in Paris at La Sorbonne. She studies Foreign Languages and History. She comes from France but her heart is in Saint-Martin Island. “SaintMartin is my second home” she says. She goes to Saint-Martin every year since 2001, sometimes twice a year. The whole family fell in love with Saint-Martin.

This Antillean Island has every memory of Valentine’s childhood. She spends all her holidays there and she has a lot of friends. After sixteen years, she is still in contact with her friends. “When you go somewhere, at the same place, every year, you meet people. “You meet locals, you meet shop-owner, restaurant-owner, and tourists. Every year you spend your time with the same person and you get connected with them. This is my second home, my other life, and my country.” Explains Valentine.  This is how she is related with the island. While she was a teenager she realized how she was lucky to go each year to Saint-Martin: “I understand how it is beautiful. Saint-Martin has two sides: the French one, and the Dutch one. Both are different from each other, the Dutch one is Americanized. You can find a lot of nationalities, maybe it is what Saint-Martin has to offer.” We can understand how much the Island important is for the twenty-years-old girl. 

She knew about Hurricane Irma thanks to her friends via social media; her sources to know how things are going on in the Island is the Prisa family.  She and her family has a lot of friends in Saint-Martin, including Sylvie Prisa and her husband Laurent, and their children Eliott (16) and Maya (10). Today, divorced, the Prisa both live in Saint-Martin. Sylvie lives near the French side capital Marigot and Laurent lives in the famous Paradise Street.  

Valentine obtained news from her friends five days after the catastrophe. They had neither electricity nor medium to communicate abroad. Her friend Eliott told her that ‘it was very difficult during the Hurricane. Everything was down on the street, the broken cars, broken houses, and no way to communicate.” They posted pictures of the island on their own Facebook page to show their friends what happened. Laurent Prisa lost his roof during the Hurricane, everything was broken in his house. Fortunately he is doing well, and he is going to rebuild his house and help his neighbors. 

After Hurricane Irma blew strongly Saint-Martin and the possibly Hurricane “José” on the Island, the people of Saint-Martin want to “rebuild intelligently”, revealed Sylvie Prisa, friend of Valentine. This idea of a clever reconstruction comes from the catastrophe itself.  Today, they think about burying the electric wires for safety. The Island needs to be rebuilt with good materials which can face the wind of another hurricane. During Irma, institutions, City Hall, schools were destroyed because of the materials used to build them. With climate change, Prisa family and all the residents of Saint-Martin are afraid of following catastrophe.  “We have to rebuild with adapted materials to prepare ourselves for the future” claims Sylvie Prisa.  The priority is to turn the power on for the local residents and the hospitals, schools and the City Hall. Saint-Martin hopes for help from France, the Government and the European Union: “We never experienced something like Irma, it’s new and it’s scary. I hope they will be help, hope they will reborn and they will hold on. It’s a beautiful place and they should not be left alone. ” claims Valentine, thinking about her life in Saint-Martin. Eliott told Valentine that they “were shocked, and they never know something as big as Irma Hurricane. Everybody was shocked, especially the ones who lost someone or something” as his father. 

Portrait of Léonie Rothacker - Journalism&Society - Assignment

This girl wants to write, as she ever wanted. She is a born-writer.

  Since her childhood in Sindelfingen (Germany), Leonie Rothacker has been writing stories. Time flies and she is still here, in the world of words, with other angles and aims. Leonie doesn’t want to write just stories anymore, she wants to spread the good information, because it is the role of a real journalist. According to this free-writer, a journalist “has to be independent, neutral, and curious. It has to always search for something, and be disciplined.” She has a real ambition for her career. She used to be an intern in press relations and communication departments for numerous companies and organizations like C3 Creative and Content, Kreiszeitung Boblinger Bote and Jugendress BW. She  wants to work with words, she would definitely like to work as chief editor. 

Leonie knows that being a journalist is a hard work. She realizes that a journalist has to face the misinformation, the fake information, the “Alternative Facts” (Kellyanne Conway, January 2017). Nowadays, we can find information everywhere; there are a lot of platforms which spread information faster than ever. For Leonie, this is a huge problem: “it’s difficult to deal with it because you can’t tell the company like Facebook to remove the fake news because who would decide what is fake? Actually you need journalist to check if it’s fake news or not”. According to her, there is maybe one solution: the Education. We should “educate the people to see what fake news is and what is not. I think many people just don’t know”, analyses Leonie. She desires to show people the real truth even if it’s complicated. “In our Society, we have to deal with the new technologies” says Rothacker. She would rather be the journalist of today and tomorrow.

At the age of sixteen, Leonie dreamt of a journalist’s career. To reach her goal, she studied Cross Media, Journalism and Public Relations the past year, and now, she dreams would like to be a Chief Editor. The young Leonie started to think about her career when she wanted “to produce the stuff [herself], [she] wanted to learn how to be good at it.” For Leonie, a journalist has to be independent, even if it’s hard in some situations. She needs and wants to be free to write without the pressure of companies: “The Freedom to write, whatever is your truth”. Maybe idealistic, this journalist-to-be has values and she desires to defend them in the future via her career. 

A man who works in the SexShop « District » reveals to us some of the change which occurred during this past years. He works in the shop since 12 years and he makes “money as hell”. He misses the old Amsterdam, openminded and easygoing. He wants to go away when he retires.

AWKWARD PLACE - English for journalist - Assignmen - 3/3

AWKWARD PLACE ASSIGNMENT - English for Journalist part 1/3

Girls Talk Too Much

The girls are thinking, surrounded by people wearing orange, big hats, scarfs and sweat-shirts. Tonight it’s the World Cup football match (first round) between Nederlands and Sweden. In the café Starbucks, there are two girls, who don’t speak about football, but about girl’s stories. This is the meeting between two close friends, ready to enjoy every gossips they have. One is on her phone, the other one is looking through the window. The smile on Honey’s face appears suddenly, she is getting anxious and she immediately tells her friend something saucy.

Maybe Honey is not the real name of the girl, but her friend calls her this way. Honey has something to say. She smiles, and she doesn’t look at her friend. Something happened and Honey’s friend is not going to like it. Timidly, Honey, who’s trying to admit something, takes a sip of her drink. This is “The calm before the storm”. Her friend asks “What did you do? I know you, I know your look and your smile. Please tell me this not what I am thinking about”. Honey is smiling, her cheeks are going red and she starts to laughs nervously; “NO! NO! NO! I disagree, you know that I’m not going to like what you are about to say, so say it quickly, then I can punch you for a reason”.

Honey has a boyfriend, he owns an Italian restaurant and knows how to cook; she loves it. Honey is on her third year of study at the University. She is more focused on guys than she is on economics. She is a tall blond woman with beautiful blue eyes. She looks like a model. Her friend is smaller, and she has brown hair. She looks younger than Honey but she studies at University too. They know each other very well, like sister from different mothers.

 Honey finally admits to her friend, carefully trying to find the right words to say it. She touches her hair, looks around and gather her hands together. With a little smile, she says “Ok don’t be mad, but I want to see him again. I want to keep him in my life like a friend, nothing more.” Honey’s friend looks at her, close her eyes and breathe to relax. She whispers, putting her head in her hands: “I am not mad, just please tell me why, I need to understand. You are in a good relationship now, why do you want to stay in contact with your ex-boyfriend? He’s such a bitch”. She is not surprised, she doesn’t make any move. Honey’s friend stares at her, shakes a little bit her right feet, she is waiting for an answer to her question, still on the comfortable brown club chair. She crosses her arms, looks at her with attention and put her drink slowly on the table. Honey responds with attention and she tries, with pretty good arguments to explain her decision.

Everything around is getting louder, the National Dutch Football team is against the Swedish Team for the World Cup. People talk and many languages are mixed. Honey’s friend is looking at her, thinking about the situation. She takes a moment to answer. She seems to be used to her friend’s revelations. Honey, intrigued, asks her friend what she is thinking about the last news. “You are messed up, girl”, she laughs to her friend. They started to laugh together and realized how the situation was weird. The bar is Eden tonight, it gather the girls, make them talk and connect. Honey’s friend tries to find a good end to her friend’s story, and a good explanation. She touches her face, her jawline and tells Honey:” I don’t think it’s a good idea. But if you really want to do it, you have to know why, because you can’t love him anymore. You need to find a solution, any solution, any answer but not this one. I don’t want you to be hurt anymore”. This is the cute moment of the meeting, when Honey realizes that even if her friend disagree with her decision, she’s right standing by her side anyway.

After Honey’s revelation, the two girls start to talk about memories and dream about trips. They would love to make a journey with just a small bag and discover the Amazon Rainforest, or go to Peru and see the Machu Picchu. However it would be difficult because Honey doesn’t want to go somewhere where the situation is uncomfortable because she needs “to sleep in a real bed” and Wi-Fi “because I can’t post anything on Instagram if I don’t have the Wi-Fi”.  The discussion turns into girls talks, and people are still talking around about football. It’s a normal Tuesday night out in here.

The serial-killer Peter Pan kidnapped three children last night in the city of Bloomsbury,London. In the morning, the parents found their child  and heard the story of the kidnapping.The children talk about an old man, wearing a green suit who claimed to be a boy. According to Wendy, the eldest child of the siblings the kidnapper, who called himself Peter-Pan came into their room before.

As soon as he was in the bedroom, he has kidnapped the brothers and the sister to take them into a place named “Neverland".The scientific police found some narcotic powder on the beds, an easy way for Peter Pan to kidnap the child. We don’t know why yet, but in the morning, Wendy and her brothers were in their beds telling  their parents what happened in the night. The boys told the Police ‘there are a lot of children named “The Lost Boys” in Neverland’. Apparently, they can play until they grow up. At this moment, they disappear from the place where they are hidden. We also know that the psychopath has a partner in crime who helps him to take the kids. According to the kids, she is a little woman with blond hair. We have reasons to believe that she could be very dangerous for the little girls because of her jealousy.

But no one knows why Peter Pan let the children go home. The police tries its hardest to find him and the other kidnaped child. Wendy told the media that Peter Pan promised her to come back. Police has some leads but prefers to not confirm anything yet about the kidnapper.

- 3ème oeil - closeyoureyesandseetheworld NC.