By Kang Shin-who, Park Si-soo
Staff Reporters
A CNN anchor has pointed out sexism in the Korean broadcasting process. Kristie Lu Stout, 33, an American journalist and correspondent in Hong Kong, said Korean female news presenters should play a greater role in news production beyond merely reading news reports on television, in an interview with The Korea Times, last week.
``I think the same opportunities should be offered to both sexes. If male anchors have opportunities to be a reporter, female anchors should have the same opportunity,’’ she said.
``At CNN, all of us are involved in reporting, researching, writing and putting together stories in addition to being news anchors who are also required to do their own interviews, research, and prepare a lot of items,’’ she added.
Stout, who has many fans in Korea, came to Seoul to air the weeklong special program ``Eye on South Korea,’’ which covered the country’s IT sector as well as Korean celebrities.
Regarding the activities of Korean news presenters in the non-news arena, especially in entertainment, Stout sees the trend as okay but says her interests do not extend beyond the news business. ``Someone who makes the decision is given the freedom to jump from one part of the industry to another. That’s fine. But I am not interested in that field. I am a reporter and I work in the news business,’’ she said.
Graduating from Stanford University where she got a master’s degree in media studies, she started out as a reporter at ``Wired Magazine’’ in San Francisco and also worked at the Beijing-based Internet portal ``Sohu.com’’ as well as Reuters’ new media division in China. Since 2001, she has been at CNN, where she currently co-hosts ``CNN Today,’’ for which she was honored as the ``Best News Presenter or Anchor,’’ at the Asian Television Awards.
Stout praised the English skills of Koreans saying ``In Hong Kong and Japan, when I interview people on the street in English, most of the people can’t really understand what I am saying. But in South Korea, more people understand what I am asking in English and respond.’’
She went on to stress the importance of English-language media in Korea. ``They are reporting on what is happening in South Korea in English not just for foreigners living in Korea but also Koreans interested in improving their English skills. And it is what makes Koreans more competitive global players. By having something like The Korea Times in place, South Koreans can improve their English and Korea can be more competitive and it helps boost its GDP,’’ she said.
Lastly, she gave tips to those who are dreaming of being world journalists, ``If you want to be a reporter, you have to report, go out and write stories. The good thing is because of technology, like blogging or video blogging, anyone really can be a TV news reporter or a print journalist,’’ she said.
``A lot of people say `I really want to be a news anchor one day or a news reporter,’ so I would say, `show me your portfolio,’ ’’ she added.