A stimulating day on May 10th for journalists and ‘believers’ which contained a sharing of professional expertise, a chance for encounter and a special training session on the use of Social Media and How to Write a Press Release . See my blog on the NUJ Training Wales site. [Images by @HirstPhotos]
Continue reading Reporting Belief 2017 – an appetite for engagement
Competition Adjudicator, Laura Foakes said of my story, Acting Abby
This multi-layered story stayed with me long after each reading, which is always a sign of a job well done. The author conveyed his/her understanding of the vagaries of the human condition in a profound but unsentimental way. The wistful first-person narration drew me immediately into the story and the “voice” was strong. I particularly liked the device of using a stage play as a metaphor for the judgements people/audiences make, and the eventual unfolding of the “choice” the narrator made. The author invites us to judge at our peril. This is a very accomplished and thought provoking piece of work.
Credit: Painting by Stephen Morgan
A website is one thing but a person is the real thing. Gethin Evans, Associate Director of the Sherman Theatre, Cardiff gave the Cardiff branch of The Writers’ Guild an up-to-the-minute tour of opportunities for engagement and a sense of the Theatre’s ambitions and future projects in a lively encounter at May’s meeting.
The Sherman’s Artist Development page has not quite caught up with the calendar as most of its references are to 2016 so it was enlightening to get a sense of how the various projects are developing.
The very first Tȳ Newydd on Tour day was held in Cardiff on Saturday 6th May as the writing centre begins to showcase its courses around Wales. A dozen writers got a flavour of ‘A Novel Journey: Writing a Novel from Beginning to End’ which will run at the centre near Criccieth from Monday 12th to Saturday 17th June. A few places are left and the taster day was a great advertisement.
Cardiff Media Summit 29 March 2017
My Intro and Conclusion plus Follow-ups. More on http://www.iwa.wales/click/
This Media Summit is being held on the day when Article 50 is triggered. Aimed at taking this country out of the EU, this will alter fundamentally the framework within which the UK is governed.
The referendum, like the election of Trump in the United States, raised major concerns about the quality of information put before the public, by both politicians and media. ‘fake news’ and ‘post-fact politics’. The founder of the internet, Tim Berners Lee, has gone public on his deep concerns at the capacity of big data companies to distort the democratic process.
These huge issues impact on us here in Wales. The media scenario is constantly developing and it’s going to get more complicated – which is one reason why the Institute of Welsh Affairs maintains a very necessary focus on media issues in Wales. The Audience, Viewers and Service Users are our prime concern. Continue reading Cardiff Media Summit – Top, Tail and Follow-ups
This article first appeared in Wales Arts Review.
I am thrilled to have been awarded a Literature Wales Writers’ Bursary for 2017. I admit (career suicide for a writer!) to being at a loss for words to describe how encouraging I find it to have expert opinion, and public money, invested in me. Maybe ‘inspiring’ will do the job. My congratulations to all the bursary recipients.
What’s not to like about a scheme which tackles more than one problem at a time? Ffilm Cymru Wales has launched Foot in the Door / Troed yn y Drws focused on a large group of people in Wales who are currently hampered by exclusion from the workforce, while the workforce is hampered by losing out on their skills. Continue reading Getting a Foot in the Door – Increasing Diversity in Film in Wales
This post first appeared on the blogsite of the School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies, Cardiff University, 21st March 2017.
I’ve had the pleasure of arranging a number of articles to be posted on the IWA’s clickonwales blog site (see link below) from 20th March in the run-up to the IWA’s Cardiff Media Summit, 29th March. Those in italics are already posted. Continue reading Blogs on Media Policy for Wales