I came across The Huffington Post’s “Health and Fitness Healthy Living” page (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/health-fitness/). It’s got a little bit on health (including mental health), a little bit on fitness, and occasionally the two together. One of the more humorous featured blog posts I found on August 24 was antisocial Nicholas Miriello’s “No, I Don’t Want to Work Out with You” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nicholas-miriello/work-out-alone_b_4282236.html?utm_hp_ref=health-and-fitness&ir=Health%20and%20Fitness). However, they also included some material I thought was poorly placed, such as “This Bengaluru Engineer Decided to Drive a Car Without a Horn. Best Decision Ever” by Rituparna Chatterjee (http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2016/07/05/mansoor-ali-sharif-car-ho_n_10811096.html?utm_hp_ref=health-fitness&ir=Health+and+Fitness). The article touted better mental health (which is health-related) and better time management (which is not), but I still think it would go better in a different section of the paper.
Category: Module 2
Where I’m At
My beat is Health and Fitness. With a solid background in biology and firm interest in health and medicine, I thankfully know a good little bit about this subject. I find myself attracted to health magazines like WebMD when I sit in doctors’ offices, and I like to know how I can improve my health.
Fitness is a bit different, however. Although I practiced martial arts for eleven years and hold Black Belts in two styles (a first degree in American Kenpo and a second degree in Korean Tang Soo Do), I don’t have the time or money to practice currently, and consequently, I have gained weight. I tried running for a while, training for an obstacle-course 5K race, and although I loved how it made me feel, it’s hard to keep up with because I don’t enjoy the running process itself. I had hoped to become more involved in sports here at UGA, but I’ve generally had too many demands on my time and energy keeping up with classes and my graduate assistantships. I know what it takes to be healthy, and I’m capable of conveying that knowledge to an audience, but the practice itself is difficult.
Vertical
I chose Vice’s IMPACT as an example of the vertical pertaining to my own interests. New York Times might admittedly be the first thing I open in the morning, before I’ve spoken an intelligible word or consumed anything but coffee and a cigarette; VICE is consistently the most entertaining read of my morning. I’m most likely to recommend VICE to friends or share on social media. While there are issues with the slant/ethics of some of their documentaries (notwithstanding are still some of the most daring and edgy journalism I’ve seen on a popular site) I’ve found that IMPACT vertical does a really thorough job of covering important human rights issues and longer-running crises that may only get a hundred words once a week in other press outlets. It’s the kind of writing I envy.
Beat Vertical- Fashion and Lifestyle
http://www.interviewmagazine.com/fashion/
Interview Magazine’s fashion vertical may have some very basic “here’s lipstick colors for summer” kind of clickbait but it doesn’t take much closer examination to find articles that focus on couture fashion and showcase incredibly artistic photography by some of the greatest filmmakers in the world. They do a good job of exploring the historical contexts of fashion and examining trends through a cultural lens. I plan to focus my beat around Athens/Atlanta area but I like Interview Magazine as an example of what journalism around fashion and lifestyle can be. It also sprang to mind when talking about verticals because the graphic design on the website is absolutely incredible.
New York Times- Business Day Vertical
As someone who is very much interested in writing business/financial news, Business Day, from the New York Times might be one of my favorite verticals to follow. More than just reporting the stock market like a horse race, this vertical explains larger market trends and makes them relevant to the general population. Often times, the writers make typically hard to understand or “boring” business issues more interesting by centering them around a particular subject. It might be a family affected by the recession, a young couple selling their house in a recovering housing market or a student that’s worried about the rising cost of higher education. When it comes to writing business news for the general public, a lot can go wrong. Sometimes writers use too much jargon to the point where readers can’t keep up. Sometimes, they fail to make the story relevant to their audience and readers lose interest. Other times, writers fail to grasp the general business concept themselves, misinterpreting numbers or concepts that are vital to understanding the point of the article. I feel as though keeping up with this particular vertical can give me a lot of pointers and new techniques so that I can be a more effective business journalist.
Health and Fitness Verticals
EatingWell is a page on Facebook that I follow. They post tons of awesome, creative recipes that are healthy and (supposedly) delicious! I really enjoy following pages and sites like this because they help to spark a new idea for a recipe I would want to try, and most of the stuff they suggest is easy enough for a college student to do, but still intricate enough to have fun with. As I mentioned in a previous post, I don’t usually like sites or pages centered around fad diets and counting calories, so I think things like this are a great and happy medium. It helps people, or me at least, get excited about eating healthy foods, and excited to cook. You can check out the site here.
Eat-Fit-Fuel is a similar page to EatingWell, however, on top of healthy recipes, this page also posts work out plans that target specific body parts, advice from health and fitness professionals, general stories about people trying to get healthier or lose weight, and things of that nature.
I think that using Facebook for these verticals is really useful and a modern way to stay up to date on fitness ideas and a great way to get new recipes. The fast-paced recipe videos are especially helpful and much easier to understand than a regular cook book or written recipe. Its important for people to have easy access to this kind of information, to make it a part of a daily habit or routine, so that people can constantly get new ideas and new inspiration for themselves. While I do have some reservations about fitness trainer and diet pages, these kind outlets are ultimately a good thing.
Living Intown & Living Northside Verticals
I’m very interested in the “downtown life” portion of “downtown life and business,” and would like to explore that a little more. In thinking about what I would like to do with my beat, I’ve looked to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s “Living Intown & Living Northside.”
The focus of both is to “provide an insider’s perspective into the attractions and events in and around the unique neighborhoods of metro Atlanta, both intown and on the northside of the city…[and] explore the distinct neighborhoods, events and entertainment, and arts and culture that are unique to these exciting areas.” That is what I would like to do for Athens’ downtown area through my work—look at it through a broad lens and, in doing so, showcase its ‘something-for-everyone’ vibe.
Kelcey’s Portfolio
This portfolio was originally created to showcase my work about a year ago, but I found that WordPress was more difficult to use and didn’t showcase my work as well as Squarespace. That said, I am excited to try again with WordPress now that I have more knowledge about HTML/CSS, a classroom full of peers and an instructor to give me feedback and advice on how to make it work for me.
New York Times- Modern Love
Though my interests have changed, sometimes going through phases: tech, business, fashion, etc. I have consistently followed the New York Times’ Modern Love vertical. The Modern Love column of the paper moves away from breaking news and politics. It becomes much more personal, and strikes a chord, especially with millennial readers who navigate new relationships and a new world of technology. The Modern Love vertical offers a snapshot into the lives of young lovers.
Through the years, several stories have stuck out to me. One talked about the complications that can come with navigating a new relationship and new type of relationship. It explained the nuances of having an open relationship. Another, focused on the fairly new phenomena of “ghosting” that occurs in the dating world. After communicating extensively with social media, sometimes the other person just disappears and stops responding. The piece did a great job of capturing the confusion and humiliation that sometimes comes with this experience. There is no closure.
Shelby’s Portfolio
This is a pre-existing site I have been using off and on since about 2009 (I had a very hip high school English teacher who decided we should all have blogs.) Last fall, however, I was required to establish an online portfolio, and rather than beginning from scratch, I decided to renovate my WordPress site. I have thus removed all of the angsty 15-year-old-me writing (sorry, yall), and what you see here was built in the fall of 2015. Any (polite) feedback is most welcome.