Vol. 21, No.3/Spring 1999
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News research with an ethnic
touch By Thai Nguyen Strom "Its the little things that inspires me," writes Catherine Kitchell in her article "News Librarians Getting the Story" (News Library News, Fall 1998). While Catherines feature interests me and I even got a good laugh over her duck tale, that little and simple sentence does inspire me into sharing my tales. Thanks, Catherine. A former reporter and copy editor with no formal training in librarianship, I took over the management of The (Stockton, Calif.) Records news library some four years plus ago when its about to... disintegrate into a complete chaos like many of its decades-old clippings after the buyout of a chief librarian followed, shortly afterwards, by the illness-related death of his successor, and several months of neglect. Now looking back from a relatively organized and rather "compact" (as termed by a newly hired reporter) corner called news library sandwiched between the editor-in-chiefs office and the ... mens rooms, I couldnt help wondering how in the world I have managed to bringing the library out of its chaotic state; making sense of its unconventional filing system of clippings so I can locate the needed articles; improving its electronic library system and "forcing" even the most reluctant reporter to search for articles electronically while eliminating altogether the duplicate manual clipping (not without some hostile protest from at least one die-hard clipping user); making the Internet part of our research tools; and finally gaining some respect for the role of the news library. Its quite a challenge and I wouldnt be able to achieve all the above without our colleagues advice, support and encouragement via the SLA News Division and its most important tool, the NewsLib listserv. Beside that, I also like to believe theres something special I have brought to our newsroom, that is my ethnic background as Vietnamese-American, especially in a community such as Stockton where a large number of Southeast Asians have called home the last two decades or so. Allow me to brag a little, that without my assistance some articles wouldnt have the depth and scope as they appeared in the paper, or, in some cases, the reporter even got the story at all. Following are some examples to share with you. One day we got an extraordinary item from the police scanner: A 121-year-old man by a Vietnamese name fell and had to be rushed to a local hospital, which intrigued our columnist. Unable to get his relatives agreeing via the hospital staff to an interview, the columnist turned to me. He didnt even have a phone number. So I got on the phone calling some of my Vietnamese friends who recommended me to call another number and from there I got hold of the phone number of the mans daughter-in-law whom I interviewed for some preliminary information. Accordingly, the old man had been twice refugee, the first time when he fled the communist North Vietnam at age 81 and the second time after the fall of Saigon at age 103. From the daughter-in-law I got the phone number of the youngest son with whom the old man lived. I called the son, 70, who refused at first to an interview. I insisted on a visit, with the columnist, and he reluctantly gave in, said we could come the next couple days when the old man would be released from the hospital. That night I spent a couple hours researching the Vietnamese history since 1876 and e-mailed the highlights to the columnist for background information. The old man had no birth certificate being born a peasant in a small village in North Vietnam while kings still ruled the land and the only written language then was a clumsy, modified Chinese character system few could afford to learn or fathom. This very lack of document disinterested the columnist somewhat, so the story occupied just a modest place in his column among other items of the week. (A footnote: The columnist expressed his gratitude by offering me a box of candies, to which I declined, saying jokingly that I was not for sweet stuff.) Another example of an article with which I "accidentally" got involved and was able to provide some scope and depth: A reporter came by the library asking me how to pronounce the name of a Vietnamese woman author shes about to interview on the phone for a pre-story of her at a local university. I knew the author, having read about the controversy surrounding her and her book which was made into an equally controversial movie. I asked the reporter what has she got in terms of background information and whether she knew there has been a controversy about this woman. The reporter, who was then not yet familiar with the Internet, told me all she had was the PR materials faxed to her from the authors office. I went online and downloaded related articles, which helped the reporter to formulate her questions, giving her story some depth, thus better informing the reader. One of the by-products of it was the local Vietnamese community became aware of the authors talk scheduled by the university, out of ignorance, on the same day of the 23rd anniversary of the fall of Saigon. Several people from the local Vietnamese community showed up in force at her talk with banners and placards protesting her "cozy" relationship with the communist Vietnam, putting the local police and the campus security unit on alert. The confrontation provided another reporter of our newspaper a good story that made front page. (A footnote: The reporter of the pre-story had a bouquet of flowers sent to me, not so much because I helped her with the research, but because she had read, as part of her story backgrounding, an account of my last days in Saigon from which I had fled without even having the chance to say goodbye to my ailing mother, who died a year after the 1975 collapse of South Vietnam.) Just this week a reporter asked me to track down a young Vietnamese who grew up in Stockton and currently attended a college in Southern California, and as usually he needed it in the next couple hours. I was given a name, Loc Truong, with the last name spelled as "Troung," which is wrong -- I know it wrong because we dont have that kind of spelling in Vietnamese and unlike Western last names, the Vietnamese have just a handful of last names, with the most popular being Nguyen, followed by Tran and Le. I went online and got a few Loc Truongs in the same town hes said to live. Turned out the young man, representing Americorps, was in Washington D.C, invited by the White House for President Clintons State of Union address event to take place the next day. The reporter again turned to me to locate his family still in Stockton. I called around to no avail while the reporter decided to call every Truong in the phone book. He gave up after a few phone calls as he ran into Vietnamese-speaking respondents. Again, he asked me to make those calls. Having spent a considerable time on his case already, I reluctantly took over his low-tech task and started out on a list of 19 Truongs from the phone book. I almost screamed with joy when at the 18th call I hit the jackpot. Within the next hour, the reporter got his interview with the young mans parents, five sisters and nieces and the photographer got a happy three-generation family portrait holding a picture of their special son-brother-uncle. (A footnote: The reporter called me early in the morning to thank me, saying without my help he wouldnt have got the story at all. I told him I read the story first thing in the paper and enjoyed it and considered it a successful case of teamwork.) Sometimes, thanks to my language ability, I have been recruited occasionally to be ... a translator. Once, I was called to a crime scene where the victims mother, a simple woman with very limited English, talked to me in Vietnamese between sobs about her gunned-downed troubled teen-age son. (A footnote: This time I did get a credit line for the translated quotes used in the story.) Although I dont mind helping with the translation but I do wish this would happen as rarely as possible due to the news librarys usual workload. I used to have a clerk whos fluent in Spanish and who, like me, was recruited at times to do translation. Im glad my current clerk is ... English-only, if you know what I mean. ;-) Just a few tales to share with you on the topic of news research with an ethnic touch. Im happy to be useful, not just to our reporters but also to the local Vietnamese community in gaining some understanding of their plight and appreciation for their contributions. And many thanks again to Catherine for the inspiration without which these tales would never have been told. (Thai Nguyen Strom is manager of The Records new library. E-mail her at tnstrom@recordnet.com) |
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