Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma

Daniel Mosca, president of the Argentine Society for Psychotrauma, explains the dynamics of post-traumatic stress disorder to the Cabot workshop participants. Experts from Latin America and elsewhere agreed on the need for journalists to understand stress, trauma and techniques for resilience.

In the second public session of "Covering Violence: Trauma and Journalism in Latin America,” American photojournalist Donna DeCesare and Argentine psychiatrist Daniel Mosca gave different accounts of why Latin American journalists need to increase their awareness of psychological trauma. The workshop was held at the Columbia Journalism School in New York City on Oct.13 and14, 2009.

 Download or listen (in English) to Donna DeCesare, photojournalist and professor at the University of Texas School of Journalism: 

The first public panel posed the question: "What's trauma got to do with journalism?" Donna DeCesare's answer came in photographs — documenting war in Colombia, mudslides in Guatemala and gang violence in El Salvador — accompanied by a quotation from the New York journalist Pete Hamill: "We are all permanent citizens of the republic of trauma." In this republic, said DeCesare, reporters must navigate the tensions between the privacy and safety of their images' "protagonists" and the value of their stories to inform the public and give hope to other victims of violence. To properly weigh this knowledge requires both empathy and a depth of understanding about what it means to experience violence: In DeCesare’s words, "Learning about the science of trauma, its impact on brain function and the long term emotional impact need to be part of the editorial agenda in every news room." In her own work, DeCesare has developed an approach that seeks to go beyond the surface of wounds to convey the emotional aftermath and to go beyond getting permission to engage her subjects in empowering collaboration.

 Download or listen (in Spanish) to Daniel Mosca, president of the Argentine Society for Psychotrauma:

Argentine psychiatrist Daniel Mosca used near-death anecdotes of Latin American journalists' working lives as well as survey data to show how many journalists suffer the symptoms that, if they remain persistent, can amount to a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder: intrusion, hyperarousal and avoidant behavior triggered by a traumatic event. His presentation emphasized the need for journalists in Latin America to know how to distinguish between ordinary stress reactions and red flags that signal something deeper.