Using the gut feeling – making sense of practical knowledge in journalism education

Abstract

This article investigates and discusses how journalism students who have been working as journalists use this work experience in their education. The emphasis is on how students in a bachelor's programme in journalism utilize their work-life experiences and practical knowledge in learning activities, and how this knowledge is expressed. The article presents students who are still beginning practitioners of journalism. With the concept of tacit knowing as the backdrop, we will investigate how the students reflect on the basis of their decisions. Concepts from scientific research on practical knowledge by Donald Schön will serve as the analytical tools. Michael Polanyi's concepts of proximal and distal knowing will serve as guiding tools for an understanding of the specific actions (proximal) involved in the students' work with their assignments and how such actions contribute to the students' evaluations of the value of a news story.