In this episode of The Craft podcast, our host Rachel Westbury, Senior Editor at Shorthand, welcomes Dr Caroline Graham, Lecturer in Digital Journalism at The University of Queensland.
Caroline is the co-author of bestselling Australian novel, Larrimah. She’s also the co-author and co-producer of the Walkley Award-winning investigative true crime podcast series Lost in Larrimah.
Caroline shares some insights into her work as an investigative journalist, and talks about the importance of close observation, collaboration, and empathy in journalism.
She explains “We live in really divisive times, and I believe that stories are important. They’re a way to slip inside, for a little while, the lives of people who are different to you. I hope that the process of doing that makes us kind and more empathic.”
Listen as Rachel and Caroline discuss the emergence of slow journalism, the democratisation of storytelling, and how to overcome the challenges of longform story production.
Guest at a glance:
Links from this episode:
In this episode of The Craft podcast, our host Rachel Westbury, Senior Editor at Shorthand, welcomes Dr Caroline Graham, Lecturer in Digital Journalism at The University of Queensland.
Caroline is the co-author of bestselling Australian novel, Larrimah. She’s also the co-author and co-producer of the Walkley Award-winning investigative true crime podcast series Lost in Larrimah.
Caroline shares some insights into her work as an investigative journalist, and talks about the importance of close observation, collaboration, and empathy in journalism.
She explains “We live in really divisive times, and I believe that stories are important. They’re a way to slip inside, for a little while, the lives of people who are different to you. I hope that the process of doing that makes us kind and more empathic.”
Listen as Rachel and Caroline discuss the emergence of slow journalism, the democratisation of storytelling, and how to overcome the challenges of longform story production.
Guest at a glance:
Links from this episode:
You're listening to The Craft, a podcast for professional content creators who want to learn more about the people process and strategy behind the best content on the web. In each episode, we talk with writers, designers, and editors from the world's leading content teams and learn the secrets to their success. Let's jump in and get you inspired for your next story.
Rachel Westbury:Hello, and welcome to this episode of The Craft, brought to you by Shorthand. I'm Rachel Westbury, Senior Editor here at Shorthand, and today I'm thrilled to welcome award-winning investigative journalist, Dr. Caroline Graham, to the show. Caroline is a specialist in narrative nonfiction storytelling, and she's worked in both traditional and new media formats. She's done everything from podcasting and data reporting to long form creative nonfiction. And let me tell you, she is a true storytelling dynamo. In this episode, Caroline will share some insights into her work as an investigative journalist and provide some tips on how content professionals can improve their craft. Thanks so much for joining us, Caroline!
Dr Caroline Graham:Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.
Rachel Westbury:Oh, look, I really appreciate your time and the fact that you're willing to jump on and share some insights behind some of the amazing work you've been doing these last few years. So, to kick off, can you tell me a bit about your career background and how you got to where you are today?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, sure. I think I was one of those people I knew I wanted to write and I knew I was kind of curious about other people's stories. And so even though I didn't kind of grow up thinking I'll be a journalist. I think it was sort of a natural pathway for me to do those things and, and to make a living out of it. And I'm still kind of shocked that for the price of a notebook, you can knock on someone's door and ask them about their life and people are really generous and they'll open up and they'll tell you extraordinary things. So it was kind of one of those things. I went to uni, I studied journalism. I loved it. And I got my first job at The Daily Mercury, which was a small newspaper up in regional North Queensland in a town called Mackay. And that was a great job because you're kind of doing everything. One day you might be writing about the sort of Country Women's Association baking competition, the next day you might be covering a natural disaster. I did crime in courts. I did mining, cane farming, social issues reporting... So there was, there was a lot happening. And I really loved it and I got to meet people at kind of all different stages of their lives. And people, again, were really generous in sharing their stories. And I think I just also started to get a sort of hunger for wanting to maybe tell longer and deeper stories. I'd always loved feature writing, but there's not a lot of space for that, um, in a 24-hour news cycle. And so I went into freelance feature writing. I did a Master's in Creative Writing actually, and then went on to do my PhD. I started teaching initially part-time, and now essentially, I'm kind of full time lecturer, but also splitting that with, a lot of my research is, is creating journalistic outputs. So whether that's documentary or features or, or all sorts of kind of long form projects.
Rachel Westbury:Oh, amazing. You sound like one busy bee, but all great stuff. Before we continue, Caroline, I'd love to dig into a particular passion project that you've worked on in a few different formats. You've investigated an unsolved mystery in the Outback town in Australia called Larrimah, alongside your collaborator, Kylie Stevenson. Can you tell me about this project in Larrimah and what it's led to?
Dr Caroline Graham:Sure. Yeah. I've been kind of doing this for four years now, actually, and I never would've predicted that this would've happened. So Kylie and I go back. She actually worked at The Daily Mercury with me. So that's probably going back 15 years ago now. And she, as well as being a journalist, is also a writer. She was working on a novel at the time and accepted what is probably Australia's weirdest writing retreat. So it's run by the NT Writer's Center out of Darwin, and it's the legacy of a Darwin based writer called Andrew McMillan, who used to go down to this tiny town called Larrimah. It's the most extraordinary and peculiar town. It only had 12 people and he would go down there and just write for long stretches because there wasn't a lot else to do. And he fell in love with the place, to the extent that he actually applied to be buried there and left his estate to the Darwin Writer's Center, or the NT Writer's Center rather, to run this writing retreat. So Kylie went there. Fell in love with the place and there's no... So, I don't know how many of your, your listeners are international, but the Australian outback is, is, is, you know, one of the most remote places in the world. There's no telephone reception. It's a really harsh landscape. It's, it's, it's literally in the middle of nowhere and the pub is this extraordinary bright pink sort of ramshackle outback wonderland that's full of, you know, there's a crocodile with no eyeballs. There's emus, there's I know, squirrel gliders, like just extraordinary. And they do have wifi there. So she was messaging me from the pub and just telling me these extraordinary stories about treasure hunters, self decapitating emus. And I was just saying to her like,'Burn your novel and write this. It's incredible.' So she did, she was kind of pitching a podcast series about the town. And in the course of, of, I guess doing that, one of the, the 12 residents and one of the people she'd met and spent some time with, and the pub disappeared under really strange circumstances. So the story is, is quite extraordinary. Um... The man's name is Paddy Moriarty, and he was Irish born and had lived in the town for, for over a decade. And, you know, was really quite routine. He used to volunteer at the pub in the morning and he and his dog would be there every day. They'd have some beers in the afternoon, they'd go home and that was kind of, you know, rinse and repeat what he did every day. And one day they did exactly that. They went to the pub. They chatted to some tourists. They had some beers. They drove on, Paddy had trained the dog to jump on the back of his quad bike, so they drove not very far away from, you know, to get back home and nobody has seen them since. And so, yeah, I mean, and quite quickly the police started to say that they thought that this was a murder investigation. So they'd ruled out lots of other possibilities like snakes and sinkholes and all sorts of other things. But because it was the disappearance of a man and a dog, a lot of those things are unlikely. So I guess for us, we had been really interested in telling this story regardless, but we also had a sense that there was this urgency. That this was the story of a disappearance, but also this town was really on the threshold of, of potentially disappearing as well. We weren't initially sure what form the story would take. We just knew that we had, we had to tell it. That we couldn't live with the idea of not trying to tell it. It wasn't great timing for either of us. Kylie had a, had just had a baby. And I think it's not usually recommended in parenting books that you take your infant son on a potential murder investigation. I was supposed to be finishing my PhD...
Rachel Westbury:Uh, no!
Dr Caroline Graham:But that's what we did. We just jumped in the car, the two of us, or the two of us and her baby Eddie and drove down and, and people were amazing. She already had some relationships, but we knocked on doors and people told us not only about the disappearance, but they all have their own rich and incredible lives. And, with one exception, pretty much everyone in town talked to us for hours. And yeah, I've, I've never heard stories like it. We basically kind of... As soon as we left town, we managed to pitch it as a podcast series to The Australian. We turned the podcast around really quickly. And then, I mean, I think podcasting and I don't know kind of, you know, how much we wanna talk about format, but podcasting was new to both of us. We, we are both like very big podcast listeners and have been wanting to do something like this for a while, but it's an extraordinary medium. I think it really brought all of those voices to life. It was a medium that really suited these kind of rambling stories that people were telling us that had all of these incredible twists and turns and it felt like the right kind of medium to tell that story. But for us it's been really exciting because we reached quite different audiences as a result. But then in doing the kind of podcast, yeah, I mean I think there's something about podcasts that kind of lives outside of, you know, you're used to, with news reporting, things just kind of disappear in the cycle. And it's nice that a podcast maybe can help a story hang around a little bit longer and it means that you can ask different questions and maybe deeper questions potentially.
Rachel Westbury:Yeah, it's a very intimate sort of format, isn't it? And... I mean, I can imagine for that very small town to capture, I'm sure there were some amazing accents and some natural, natural born storytellers, I'm sure of it.
Dr Caroline Graham:Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. And these are, these are stories that people have been like rehearsing in pubs their whole lives, and were just waiting to tell you. It's very much kind of an oral kind of story. So it felt kind of perfect for that. So, yeah, the podcast did really well. We won some awards. It's been optioned potentially for the screen as well, which is exciting. But we actually kind of, we initially thought that would be the end of it, but we still had all of these questions. So it was all of this extraordinary history we still wanted to explore with the town. And so eventually we pitched and wrote a book, which we published at the end of last year.
Rachel Westbury:So for anyone who's tuning in and wanting to go and look up the book, can you tell our listeners the title and where they can find it?
Dr Caroline Graham:So the book is just called Larrimah, L a r r i m a h, which is the name of the town. It's got a beautiful red cover, with hundreds of things happening on it. It's very emblematic of the town. And you can find it pretty much at all good bookstores, I think. And there's also an audio book and an ebook and those sorts of things. And the podcast series is called Lost in Larrimah.
Rachel Westbury:What an incredible story to come across. In such a small town to lose one of their citizens would be a huge hole in the community. I just love that Kylie and yourself saw this as an opportunity to shine a light on the case, but also this quirky, outback town. I mean, how often do you see that? That's just incredible.
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah. And also kind of the plight of those outback towns too. Like we have this collective nostalgia and so many people kind of in listening to the podcast said, 'Oh, this reminds me so much of, of my childhood, or of my uncle'. Or, or those sorts of things. But it's, it's really tough to make it go of it in those places, and it's expensive and you're fighting the elements. So I think it was also kind of a chance to talk about our relationship with that landscape and yeah, the challenges of not just that environment, but remote life, you know, sends up all of these other challenges as well.
Rachel Westbury:Amazing. As promised, we're going to dive into some of your defining career successes, and I'm sure there's lots we can talk about here. Larrimah included. These successes can be a standout piece of content - hello Larrimah- um, a winning strategy you've taken or honestly, anything in between. So, Caroline, thinking about the span of your career so far, what successes stand out to you and why?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, sure. There's definitely a couple of big ones, I think for, for me and also for Kylie, in those Larrimah projects. I think with the podcast we made it in such a whirlwind. It was a really, really, really tight deadline. And we were quite new to audio even though we had a lot of experiences as storytellers in other formats. And I think also with any project like this, it was, it was kind of new territory for us. And I think with any project like that, those sorts of projects are just fused with self doubt and, you know, you really have to kind of, in a lot of creative projects, I think take a leap and back yourself and, and that can be a really difficult thing to do. And so one of the successes that came, I, I feel a bit awkward talking about this... But we won a Walkley Award for that podcast which was so exciting and so unexpected. And I'm not really someone who's kind of driven by those sort of external rewards. Usually it's, you know, the, the thing that you create stands for itself. But I've been shocked kind of since that, how much difference that has made. I think it's, it's just made me so much braver and more confident when I'm pitching projects and I don't know, I think there's been a psychological shift since that. It definitely makes it easier to kind of back yourself or take that leap the next time. So I think that has been pretty exciting. And actually with the book, I think the whole process of writing the book has... Um... and it's not necessarily so much as a marker of success, but I think having spent so long in daily news where you are leaving a story before you are done with it. You know, you, you would go into people's homes and you would hear a story and you would write something and, and it would work and it would be, you know, a solid story. But then you would move on and the world would move on and you would sort of think, 'Oh, I do still have questions that I wanted to ask about that.' And so having a couple of years to kind of really dive deeply into a story I think has been such an incredible process. And doing it with someone who's a good mate as well. I really love collaboration. But yeah, we just got to go to so many extraordinary places and people were so relentlessly generous with us in, in, you know, giving us contacts and telling us stories. And I think like in some ways, like that's the exact reason you go into journalism is because you believe in that and you wanna do that. But also in many ways, sitting with a story for so long has totally made me rethink how I come into journalism and how I think and feel about it. I think, you know, there's a lot of talk now about the slow journalism movement and I can kind of see how much difference time and head space makes to a story. And it also makes me think differently about like closeness and objectivity as well. It's impossible to kind of have that distance when you're four years deep into a project. But I also think there's a lot of value in being close to a project. I think it probably makes you kinder and more empathic in your reporting. So I think it's also just been like a total rethink of some of those basics of journalism for me, which I think yeah, has been, has been challenging and confronting, but also really powerful.
Rachel Westbury:I hear you though, Caroline. I feel like there's certainly a real hunger for that slower approach to storytelling like that slow journalism, as you say, especially in the audio format. People love that sort of episodic narrative they can come back to and feel a connection with, and it's very refreshing to hear you talk about how this project has made you rethink how you would approach a story. Can I ask in practical terms, like when you are going to approach any story now... whether it be big, small, of any nature... What's changed for you in terms of that, that first approach and how you are approaching production now given that experience with the slow journalism project in Larrimah?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, sure. I think I... particularly with stories that involve other people's personal experience. So I guess I'm not talking about your sort of daily accountability news where you might be investigating, you know, corruption or something. I think that's a really different journalistic process. But I think one of the things that was really very different with the book is that we were not only running a book, we were reporting the entire time. So you're also very accountable to the people you're reporting on, because you have this sustained relationship and that you, you will be calling them up in a week or a month or six months or whatever it might be. And I think it made us have to be a little bit more consultative. So, you know, with the book, one thing that I, I wouldn't normally have done in everyday journalism just because there's no time... but we took, we took parts of the book to, to people who are involved and this is their story. It's, you know, it's their life. Like I think people do have a right to kind of have some agency in how that's told. And that's certainly something that I've carried on into other projects. There's not always time to get, you know, approvals from people and you still wanna be able to tell the story as you see it and not to kind of be influenced by your relationships with people. But at the same time, I think, it's probably made me have more direct on the surface conversations with people at the beginning of that reporting process around what they're hoping to get from it. You know, expectation management around what might come out of it, but also, a much more transparent conversation about how they might like to be involved and how they might see that story rolling out. So I think that's probably one of the biggest things. Yeah.
Rachel Westbury:That's incredible. Well, thank you so much for sharing on that because I think it's not often that content creators these days get an opportunity to really slow down and reconsider how they approach a piece. So, having the insights coming from you today is just amazing. So thank you so much Caroline, I super appreciate it.
Dr Caroline Graham:No worries. Yeah, no, and I think it's one of the benefits of being outside of an everyday newsroom as well. I miss newsrooms all the time. But also having that head space built in and yeah, it makes me wonder about how might we be able to kind of structurally rethink how, how newsrooms might offer that space to reporters as well.
Rachel Westbury:Well, Caroline, it's been super valuable to hear about your successes and how they've influenced your approach to storytelling, so thank you so much for sharing. That said, you know, there's a lot of value we can gain from having a chat about failures and challenges and how we all pivot and learn and grow from these. So, with that in mind, thinking again over the span of your career so far, what are a few examples of failures that you've had and what did you learn from these?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, sure. Oh, there's so many, um, and even successful projects, you know, have so many moments of failure. You know, I'm just kind of, um, trying to, to generate the will to go back to a novel that I wrote as part of my PhD. I've probably rewritten that overall maybe three or four different times. It went out on submission. It got very close a couple of times, but it hasn't got over the line. So I've gotta kind of go back and look at that and see what to do with that. I've got another novel that I'm in the process of revising with a collaborator as well. So look, I mean, it's hard. Writing is hard. Fiction is especially hard actually. It's lonely and maybe moreso than nonfiction because you're not working with like external ingredients. It's so hard to assess from the inside of fiction like whether it's working or not, you just don't know. Um, which has been entirely challenging and scary and um, confronting at times as well. And then even with the two Larrimah projects, there were lots of moments that were failures during those processes as well. We did that project without a commission initially and then we're working on this really hectic deadline. The first episode script that we wrote we got the tone entirely wrong and we, you know, it just didn't work. And we had to pretty much throw that out and start over. I think with the book, we probably tried, I would wanna say like six or eight different structures before we found one that worked. Writing or storytelling generally is just a process of failing and you just, that's what you do. You just fail over and over and over again until you finally find something that works. It's an amazing process. It's what I wanna do with my life. And it's also really awful when you're in the middle of it. Like, I just have to keep reminding myself like, this is the process. And I do that with students all the time as well. There's a wonderful like visualisation online that's the process of making anything great. I think it's a man named John Sandingham who created it. And there's like every project, it starts off like this is gonna be the best thing in the world. And then like a couple of steps in, you're like, 'Oh, it's looking a bit hard.' And then there's this huge dip in the middle and it's like the deep pit of despair. And you just have to wade through that until you get to the other side. You're like, 'Oh, maybe I can pull it off.' And then you're like, 'Hooray, I made it! I'm really proud of it!' Um... but it is, it's, the process is, is hard and fraught and I think the more I can remember that it's the process and not the project and not me, that is helpful. George Saunders is another person who speaks really beautifully about editing and writing, and he has this lovely way of almost romanticising that process, that that failure is kind of inherent in it. And that's our dissatisfaction with, you know, there's always this huge gap between what you're wanting to represent and what you're able to kind of say about it. And see he talks about that as a, as an active process of love and also of empathy as well. That, that every time you're kind of coming up against your own dissatisfaction, it forces you to kind of tell the story more truthfully, or to dig deeper or to understand people better, whether those are fictional or nonfictional characters. So I try to remind myself of that a lot during the hard times. I think that's what you do is you sort of keep chipping away at things and you earnestly make the best thing you can and you kind of can't control the end thing. I mean, the most successful things I've done, we had no idea that they were going to work in the moment. You know, it looks like a very clear process from the other end, but it's absolutely not when you're through it. And all you can do is just earnestly try to create the best thing you can and to do it, you know, with good intentions and truthfully, and work hard and try to create something you're proud of and, and hope that other people will see that.
Rachel Westbury:That's incredible. I love that this idea of telling stories earnestly and with empathy is something that sort of underscores a lot of your approach and reframing around coming up against those challenges. The challenges of the process. You're so right when you say, with so many projects, when you're in it it's like, oh no, like is this the project that's painful or is it the process? But so true. Honestly, it's just the process. Gotta keep keeping on.
Dr Caroline Graham:And it's actually been one of the nicest thing about working with students in teaching as well, because they're going through that process. So I've seen so many people, like, it's almost like this sort of weird experiment that I'm in where I've just seen students take on project after, and the same thing happens every time. And so it is nice to be the person who, when they're in the thick of that, they can't see the value of it for, for those dark moments in the middle. Like you can be the person who's like, 'No, it's okay. This is just the process. Trust me. I trust you. It's a good project. You're going to be able to do it.' Yeah. I think it's helpful to think about it as part of.
Rachel Westbury:Yeah. Yeah. I suppose for any listeners who are in the middle of a, a big piece at the moment, they can tune into this for a little bit of encouragement anytime they need it. Caroline, you're here to guide us through, through the rollercoaster
Dr Caroline Graham:Don't trust the says it's a bad idea. And don't trust the voice that says you can't do it.
Rachel Westbury:Great advice for anyone to hear, I think. So this brings us to our next question. What's a rookie mistake that you've made that's kind of funny in hindsight?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, sure. I used to be a Sub Editor when I was working in, in daily news, and I actually loved subbing. It's almost weirdly calming. Like you just go in, you, you take other people's stories, you clean them up, you make them a bit better, you send them out to the world. Like, it's a, it's a really nice process. But what is a bit terrible about the process of subbing is that there, there are lots of ways that things can go wrong, and you are the one who's accountable for it. Um, so what would happen is, like sometimes I'd be working like a
3:00 PM till 11:00 PM shift or until midnight and you put the paper on the press and you'd go home and you'd have very late dinner and go to bed,
and then you'd wake up at 3:00 AM and you'd think 'Oh, did I check that headline or did I check that caption?'. And at that stage it was both digital but hard copy prints. So you'd just lie awake waiting for like the thump on the lawn of the newspaper being delivered, and then you'd like run out in your pajamas and check it. You'd be like, 'Oh, it's okay. I've done fine.' But the one time where I hadn't done fine, um, it was a sport story and I'm not like very well versed in sport and there was a huge headline on the back page that I'd put there. I don't know how you feel about swearing. I can talk around it. But if you can just imagine in a headline, you've got the word T-shirt and I've forgotten the 'r' so it's just like a 't-shit' on the back page, like in huge font. Um, and I explore it over It wasn't even one of those ones I'd woken up about. Um, And just having to go into work and I knew I was gonna be in trouble. It had been on like the radio people laughing about it. And I remember going in my Editor to just being like, 'We do not print filth like this!'. But obviously I didn't mean to. Yeah pretty funny.
Rachel Westbury:It's not intentional, like the devilish Sub Editor.
Dr Caroline Graham:a master plan. But it was because there was like, it had to come up on the spell check, but I just thought it didn't like the house style of t-shirt, with how it was hyphenated or the capital 'T' or something. So I don't know, maybe that's the lesson. Check, even if it's got the red underline.
Rachel Westbury:Oh, thank you so much for sharing that, Caroline.
Dr Caroline Graham:Ah, all you can do is up to it.
Rachel Westbury:Yeah.
Dr Caroline Graham:I should have a copy. I'm sad now. Maybe that's the lesson. Just keep a copy of your mistake. You'll, you'll laugh about it one day.
Rachel Westbury:So this next question then feels like a nice segue. What advice would you give your younger self?
Dr Caroline Graham:I think it's actually the advice I give students a lot as well is just don't wait for other people's permission to do things. I think there were a good couple of years where I really wanted to be working on these kind of meatier long form projects and it didn't feel like I had earned the right to do that. And I guess in saying this, like I'm not undercutting the value of experience, I don't think you should go into projects recklessly, but I think I was sincerely ready and capable of doing those things. And I just waited because I just didn't think I was allowed to in some ways. And it's so funny like hearing you reading my bio and words like investigative journalist or writer or author, like... Like, they always felt like these magical terms that like, I, I aspired to, but they were words for other people. And I didn't know how to, you know, do that. And, you don't magically earn those sort of titles. It's a really weird thing. You do have to earn them, but you earn them by doing the work. And I think, I would encourage my younger self to just be a bit braver and do that work sooner and not wait for permission.
Rachel Westbury:That's excellent advice. I can imagine that's just given a green light to so many listeners who've wanted to jump in and try something meatier or, or slower, as we talked about earlier . I mean, why not? Why not? Don't wait for permission, right?
Dr Caroline Graham:Absolutely. And, you know, find ways of just, I've got this, this wonderful friend who's also a writer and she always says,'You've gotta pay yourself first'. And like, not financially, but, that your life will kind of fill up with all these little things that you have to do. And, you've gotta kind of carve out the time for the things that really like make, you wanna get out of bed in the morning, at the beginning of the week or the beginning of the day or whatever it is. But you've gotta like, you've gotta prioritize and fight for that time. Otherwise it gets chewed up by other things. So, yeah, I find that really helpful as well.
Rachel Westbury:You've got some excellent friends — great advice!
Dr Caroline Graham:I do, very lucky.
Rachel Westbury:So Caroline, what's been the most interesting or fascinating change that you've seen in the industry to date?
Dr Caroline Graham:I think there's so much change and so much of it is, it's difficult for industry, but so much of it is really exciting for industry as well. I think maybe one of the things as someone who works with young people wanting to get into the industry, but also as someone who, who values content and values, really diverse content — I think journalism used to be really hierarchy driven. You know, there was only a certain number of ways that you could come into the industry, and when you did, you really had to... and the phrase that was used all the time was, 'do your time', in what, whatever kind of area that wasn't really your passion. And I think in all sincerity, there were a lot of good things about that as well. I think it is worth honing your craft and I think it does take some time for you to kind of adjust and get experience and, and to get life experience. But I also think that one of the really exciting things about the industry now is that even people who are relatively inexperienced or come from a different kind of experience, can actually break through and find quite big audiences quite quickly. So I think there's like a lot of space, particularly in digital platforms for people with kind of fresh voices who have, and again, there's no substitute for quality. They, they have to be good stories. They have to be well told. They have to, you know, be important and meaningful. But those people can find audiences and get traction really quickly. And that makes me really excited for young people coming into the industry. But also I think the sort of flow and effect of that is that we now have access to much more diverse storytellers, to much more diverse stories, to people asking different and unexpected questions. You know, and that can be from a range of whether it's kind of different language groups or gender identities or sexualities or, ethnic backgrounds, cultural backgrounds, like whatever it might be. I think that's really important, and particularly maybe at, you know, at a time now the world's really divided and I think we need to hear other people's stories. So, um, yeah, we're seeing lots more representation as a result. And that also means we've got access to kind of these deeper, more careful, more nuanced, more informed stories about a bigger range of issues.
Rachel Westbury:Amazing. So Caroline, what excites you then about the future of the industry?
Dr Caroline Graham:I get really excited about digital platforms. I think it just offers you so many different ways to tell stories, to find stories. I love podcasting and it's been so lovely to kind of have stories in parts of my day where they wouldn't have been when I'm walking my dog or when I'm cooking dinner or those sorts of things when I'm commuting. So I think having so many different formats to tell stories is wonderful and they're also getting easier and easier to use. I think Shorthand a great example of that. I've got students who are using it now and, you know, just being able to tell these beautiful, immersive, long form stories without needing to also kind of have years of coding experience and, I think that's really powerful. And it just means that, you know, people who have those stories can get them out into the world that much sooner. Podcasting is similar as well, and I'm not kind of, again, undervaluing being able to, you know, absolutely. You can go deep in audio and you can, you know, you can get beautiful equipment and you can, you know, really get into the nuance of editing and there's absolutely a place for that and it's a really valuable place. But there are also so many free tools where you can get a really pretty good sounding podcast out really quickly, and I think that's really exciting too. So yeah, I think it's getting easier and easier to tell deep immersive stories, and that's particularly important in an industry where people don't always have the time to do slow journalism. It makes one of those steps much, much easier. And it's also so much easier to find audiences for them, and that's really powerful too, because again, it gets those stories out and hopefully, you know, start, um, affecting change that much sooner as well.
Rachel Westbury:So on the topic of innovation and change in storytelling, I did wanna ask Caroline, so you are, you are set to return as a guest judge for the seventh annual Shorthand Awards, which I'm so excited about. I love the awards and I always love seeing the submissions we get in from all around the world. What makes a story stand out from the crowd for you, Caroline?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, I loved being part of the awards last year and it was so great to see the sort of breadth of the stories that were submitted. And there are so many like really robust discussions amongst the judges. We would like go into bat for stories and they'd be like, not arguments, but um, yeah, robust discussions. And that's what you want, right? Is a story that's gonna, you know, inspire some sort of passion in people that they wanna go into bat for it. Like I say, I'm really passionate about digital platforms, but I think where I see that work being done best is where you have stories that kind of marry the technology with what is at its heart a really good yarn. A story that is, that is well told, that has a substantial reason for being told, that is important in some way. And that includes some of those tech and multimedia elements, but that it includes those in service of a good story. I think sometimes where it can kind of feel artificial is where the, the multimedia elements have kind of been wheeled in as bells and whistles. But I think when they're really integrated into the intention of the story, I love seeing that.
Rachel Westbury:Oh, absolutely. There's some incredible, just the most incredible immersives I see come in for the awards every year and it feels so seamless. The way some of the, you know, the journalists, the editors, the designers bring these pieces together, it feels like... how, how do I put it? It feels like it was made almost by magic. Like you, it's so good you almost can't see the effort that goes into it, you know?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, absolutely.
Rachel Westbury:Ugh. I just love good, good digital stories. So this next question then I think is a nice flow on because everyone's got that one piece that lights them up. What's your favourite piece of content on the web?
Dr Caroline Graham:This is such a mean question because, it's so hard to pick one. Um, look, how does anyone choose? I think for me it would definitely be audio. I love podcasts. I really, really do. And it's so hard to choose one. But I think one that I often give people who haven't listened to many podcasts is like a gateway podcast where it's like, I'm like the drug dealer of podcasts, but just try this one, I think you'd like it. But there's a beautiful Invisibilia episode, it's called The Last Sound, and it's... It's just, it's a powerful story. It's a lovely story. The soundscape is beautiful. It's really immersive. It's just a great piece of content and I think it shows a lot of the power of what audio can do. But it, like you say, it doesn't feel like it's trying too hard. It's just... yeah, I love it. It's, it's gorgeous.
Rachel Westbury:Amazing. Well, I'll be sure to drop a link to that particular podcast episode in the show notes so our listeners can jump on in and enjoy your favourite. So, if you had a captive audience of a hundred thousand people and a microphone in your hand, speaking of audio, what would you want that audience to know about you, your work, or your approach to storytelling?
Dr Caroline Graham:Yeah, this is such a good question. I think I said earlier, like, we live in these really divisive times, and the world feels quite fractured and, it's gonna sound a little bit naive, but I, I stand by it and I do really just believe that stories are important and that they are this sort of way that we can slip inside, even if it's just for a couple of minutes or a couple of hours. But at least for a little while to kind of, move inside the life of someone, and particularly someone who might be really different to you as well. I think there's a lot of research that connects story and consuming of stories with empathy. And I think that process, certainly for me as a reporter, like I think one, one of the things, you know, one of the great gifts of what I get to do is that I get to, to meet people who are really different to me, in lives that look really different to mine and to try and understand what makes them work and to reflect on kind of what my position is in all of that as well. And yeah, also then I get to teach students to do that as well. So I feel like it's a huge honour and a huge responsibility, but yeah, I hope there is something in the process of listening, and I'm using that broadly, whether that's reading or, or watching or actually listening to other people's stories that might make us kinder and more empathic and a little bit more tolerant of, of difference.
Rachel Westbury:That's a beautiful reflection, Caroline. And so true. So, so true. Stories do have power and it, it did make me think back to what you said earlier about the importance of having more voices being highlighted as part, as part of that process of the web becoming a more accessible place for diverse voices and really democratising storytelling on the web, right? Like we're seeing more of that, which is lovely. And it means that more people are having their voices heard and more audiences, they're getting to gain some insights into what life is like for different people. And I mean, how can that not be a good thing? Right. So important. And it's, it's lovely that that's, that's a space you are working in too.
Dr Caroline Graham:I think it's also like, for me, I think it's what's particularly exciting about digital as well, that there are lots of things like in the structures of media that media has, doesn't serve well, certain communities. But digital platforms, they're kind of this uncolonised space at the moment and because it's in its early stages. And what that means is we, we all get to kind of have a say in what that culture looks like. And I think it's really important we fight in these early stages for that to be a, a place that is inclusive and reflective of a huge range of people.
Rachel Westbury:Yeah. Reflecting the world at large, right? The communities we all share and live in. And that's what I love about, you know, this, this idea of like Web 3.0 and the future of storytelling and commun- uh, community online. It's just, it's really exciting to think about what's next, isn't it?
Dr Caroline Graham:It really is. Yeah.
Rachel Westbury:Well, Caroline, it's gone really quickly, but you know, we're almost at our time for our episode today, which is wild. So look, of course it wouldn't be an episode of The Craft if we didn't issue a bit of a listener challenge. So, to finish off our chat today, what challenge would you like to give listeners for this episode?
Dr Caroline Graham:Sure. This one's like kind of a two parter, but I think you could do it quite quickly. And I think one of the keys to telling a good story is making sure that it has a sense of place or bringing, you know, that setting to life. But it's also really difficult to kind of write about places that you don't know very well, and you can really easily kind of fall into the trap of just kind of giving the, the sort of Wikipedia summary of what a place might be. So the first thing that I'd like to ask listeners to do is to try and embrace a sense of intimacy and familiarity by writing about your childhood home. Spend a couple of minutes, write about it, try to capture it in rich detail. But then go back and have a look at what are the kind of descriptions that you're using, what things are you focusing on? What language are you using to describe them? And I think chances are, you won't be giving any of the sort of big details that a real estate agent might give about your childhood home. You probably haven't told us how many bedrooms it is, or what, what direction it faces on their compass point, or how many square meters your kitchen is. Probably you're gonna talk about, you know, maybe the squeaky step or the way the shadows dance on the wall, those sorts of details. And I think then you can kind of get a sense of, of what connection to place might look like. I think intimacy needs specific detail, but it also needs imperfection. And once you've kind of gone through that process, the second part of that challenge is then to try writing about other places through that lens. Through a much more intimate lens, even if they're places that you don't know well yet.
Rachel Westbury:Brilliant. So for any of our listeners, if you do give Caroline's challenge a try and pop on that lens of an intimate observation of place and a connection of place, please do keep us updated on your progress. You know, if you, if you write something up and you wanna share it with us, tag us on socials. I'd really love to see your description of place, even if it is about your childhood home. Tell me about that squeaky step.
Dr Caroline Graham:Yes. I love hearing about people's childhood homes!
Rachel Westbury:Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well Caroline, thank you so much for joining me today for this chat and sharing a really close look at how your projects with Larrimah and, and other slow journalism stories have really shaped your approach to modern storytelling. I really, really appreciate your time.
Dr Caroline Graham:Thank you so much. I've loved being here.
Rachel Westbury:Well, what an episode of The Craft. Caroline provided some excellent advice on helping to infuse your next piece of storytelling with a little bit more empathy and a little bit more intimacy as well. We have lots of amazing guests lined up for future episodes, but if you'd like to come on and have a chat about your approach to storytelling and content on the web, please do get in touch. You can find all the details you need listed in the show notes. Thank you again for tuning into this episode of The Craft, and until next time, happy storytelling.
Outro:Thank you for checking out this episode of The Craft. This show is brought to you by Shorthand, a platform that helps professional content creators produce beautiful stories without writing a single line of code. If you enjoyed what you learned in this episode, make sure to follow The Craft wherever you listen to your favorite podcast, or visit Shorthand dot com slash podcast to get immediate access to all the latest episodes.