Miss Botswana will go to Nigeria, Botswana Daily News

Date: January 1, 1970

The Botswana Council of Women confirms that Miss Botswana will participate in the Miss World pageant in spite of the proposed boycott against the pageant in protest of the death sentence on Amina Lawal.
The Botswana Council of Women confirms that Miss Botswana will participate in the Miss World pageant in spite of the proposed boycott against the pageant in protest of the death sentence on Amina Lawal.

This article may be used to:

Examine gender stereotypes and story construction.

Trainer’s notes

Sources

There are only two sources in the ‘Miss Botswana will go to Nigeria’ – the organising secretary of the Botswana Council of Women, and Nigeria’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs. The story is largely told through the voice and perspective of the Botswana Council of Women, which speaks on behalf of Miss Botswana, Lomaswati Dlamini.

The story does not tell the reader why, or on what authority, the Council of Women is issuing the statement concerning the attendance of Miss Botswana in the pageant, other than it is an organisation which represents women.

The voices and perspectives of the women directly involved, the contestants, are silent. The story convey the message that ‘beauty queens’ do not have to express their voice on political or human rights issues.

Gender Stereotypes

Beauty queens are portrayed as silent women whose only importance is their physical attributes, the mindless beauty that needs to be protected. The Botswana Council of Women is depicted as a conservative organisation(note their stance on women having children out of wedlock). It supports the continuation of the Miss World pageant, in spite of the Amina Lawal case. The group condemns the human rights violation against Lawal, but sees this as no reason for the beauty pageant not to take place.

Its statements, given through the organising secretary, are contradictory: it will stand in solidarity with those against Sharia law, but it will not decide not to participate in the Miss World contest because other countries(protesting against Sharia) have decided to do so.

The Council of Women therefore is portrayed as an organisation whose first concern is the beauty contest, and the violation of a woman’s rights is secondary. It does not come across as an organisation with a clear stance on women’s rights.

Story Construction

The basic rule for writing new stories is that they follow the inverted pyramid style – the most important information is put at the top of the story and the story is written in the order of starting with the most important facts and information, and ending with the least important. This style was adopted to facilitate copy editors cutting stories from the bottom during the page mock-up to fit, without destroying the key essence of the article.

The intro, or first paragraph of the news story answers the four W’s: Who, What When and Where.

Pointers on story construction

The main pointers to remember for constructing a story that flows and which presents the information to the readers in a clear style are:

Deal with each aspect of the story in one place.
All facts, data, sources and information that present an argument in one direction are written together and then followed with the sources, data and information that present a contrary or different view.
An intro can be a block of three or four paragraphs. If the main angle is put in the first paragraph, the second and third paragraphs can amplify the angle in the form of a quote, or highlights or summary of the story that follows.
If events have a chronological structure, the above intro format should be used.
Denials should follow accusations as closely as possible.
Never be afraid to spell things out.
Don’t put background in large indigestible chunks.
Use quotes to change the pace in long sections of reported speech.
Reported speech statements in the intro should be supported by quotes later in the story.

(Source: David Randall, The Universal Journalist, second edition, University of Cape Town Press, 2000)

In ‘Miss Botswana will go to Nigeria’, the background information is placed too soon after the intro and is given in a large chunk. It also follows immediately after the intro, and the quote from the organising secretary of the Botswana Council of Women which supports the intro, is far removed in the sixth paragraph. The reported speech in the intro should be immediately followed by the quote from the organising secretary, before the background to the Lawal case is given.

The reasons for Botswana’s decision to participate in the Miss World also are too far near the end and should be higher up in the story to support both the headline and the intro.

Training exercises

Exercise one: Read a copy of the article ‘Miss Botswana will go to Nigeria’ and discuss the following:

How are the beauty queens portrayed in the story?
How is the Botswana Council of Women depicted in the story, ‘Miss Botswana will go to Nigeria’? Use examples from the article to explain the answer.

Exercise two: Re-write the ‘Miss Botswana will go to Nigeria’ story so that the story flows smoothly and the main points of the story, Who, What When, Where and Why are closer to the beginning and intro, and the background (information on the Amina Lawal) case comes further down in the story. Number the existing paragraphs (1,2,3,4, etc) and re-order the story according to the numbers to indicate how the re-written story would read.

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