Written by Fatima Hassan, Photo from NU-Q Website.
Kick-starting the spring semester, Northwestern University in Qatar’s first community hour of the year covered the important topic of navigating Doha—and the world—as a reporter, while remaining an ethical, law-abiding citizen.
Mary Dedinsky, associate professor in residence and director of the journalism program at NU-Q, introduced the topic. She told the students in attendance that they should work hard when reporting and searching for answers, but that students also need to make sure they are safe and acting within the boundaries of law.
While things have improved in Education City in terms of getting permission to film around campus, Dedinsky said, some security guards who might be unsure of EC or a university’s policy might try to stop students from completing their work. In such situations, she recommends it is best to call either the professor in charge of the assignment or Dedinsky herself to help solve the problem.
“If it so happens that none of the professors respond,” she said, “Then the student should play the role of a negotiator by calmly and maturely talking to the security personnel, instead of being aggressive and demanding for their right.”
Director of Facilities Management Ray Corcoran reaffirmed Dedinsky’s statement that the situation in EC has improved. “Professors have spoken with the administration to help further improve this situation,” he said. “Any issue that has risen has been either because of no communication or miscommunication.”
Corcoran then went over a checklist that was emailed to all NU-Q students prior to the meeting, which gave general guidelines as to how to set up film and photo shoots within EC. He said students must obtain general filming approval from the Qatar Foundation (QF) Communications Directorate, and strongly recommended that students fill in the required paperwork two or three weeks before the film shoot. He also stressed the importance of checking the filming location for any site-specific issues or safety risks before the day of the shoot.
Afterwards, Associate Professor in Residence Amy Sanders tackled the legal challenges students might face in Qatar. She began by stating that Qatari law protects freedom of speech in Article 48 of the Constitution of Qatar, which declares that ‘freedom of press, printing and publication shall be granted in accordance with the law.’
There are, however, limits to this freedom and Sanders said the right to privacy is one of them. For instance, she said reporters and students do not automatically have the right to film in all public places in Doha, and in places where filming is allowed, a person is still not allowed to film a person or a family without their permission first. “This applies to many places in the world, even in some situations in the United States,” Sanders said, noting that, in both Qatar and the U.S., one might need permission to record someone through video or audio, even in public.
The reason behind the strict privacy rules is due to fear of defamation, Sanders explained. While in other countries the truth may be able to protect or defend people, in Doha it does not due to cultural notions of personal and family honor.
“There are times when the law does not matter,” Sanders also added, “If the police officer, government official or security guard does not know the law, you can’t stand there and lecture them.”
In fact, the best bet for a student in this situation is to either call their professor or calmly try and speak with the security official. “Fighting such people is no good. As a student, your job is not to educate them on the law. That is what NU-Q is for,” Sanders said. “If they do allow you to successfully film, even then come back to university and report your troubles to one of the professors so that such problems can be ironed out for later.”
This was not the first time this topic has been addressed during NU-Q’s community meetings. However, Tiffany Ho, the student affairs communications manager at NU-Q, said that while she had heard some of these points discussed before, she learned a few new tips from this session on how not to get into trouble.
Another point that interested her during the lecture was Sanders’ comment that the truth will not necessarily set you free. “This was a cultural difference for me, that even if you have hard evidence of the truth, it doesn’t necessarily mean anything will come out of it, or that the truth would help you get out of trouble with the authorities,” Ho said.
“The lecture was informative because it gave us advice on how to go about reporting and what to do in emergency situations,” said Hissa Al-Hitmi, a freshman journalism student at NU-Q who was also in the audience. “It was also beneficial because it informed us about the Qatari law and how the law might not be on your side always. In the end I think every journalism student would benefit from this lecture.”
