Rita Kohlmaier (2022): Kriegsreporterinnen. Im Einsatz für Wahrheit und Frieden. [Female war reporters. On active service for truth and peace.]

Reviewed by Martina Thiele

What particular characteristics do people who report on wars and crises have? How do they differ from other journalists who are not on the front line? And how do female war reporters differ from their male colleagues? In that they are still a minority? In that they still stand out, indeed because they are women? What are the reasons for devoting a book to »female war reporters« and their »active service for truth and peace« in 2022? One is indisputable: the depressing reality of the many wars and crises in the world.

Plenty of authors have written about the connection between the media, war, and gender, and about the way war both affirms and disrupts social orders (cf. Biron/Duchkowitsch/Lamprecht 2020; von der Lippe/Ottosen 2016; Klaus/Wischermann 2013; Thiele/Thomas/Virchow 2010). The theorizations of gender, heteronormativity, and (un)doing gender aim to counteract incorrect attributions of peaceableness and violence, courage and a sense of responsibility along lines of the two-gender construct or nationality. However, it is studies that argue based on difference theory, which states that women are different and (must) act differently from men, that have proved more popular and offered more opportunity for connection. Rita Kohlmaier, too, uses a different, female point of view and specific access to people as reasons for her focus on female war reporters: »Yet it is undisputed that the female view of the wars is a particular one. It is also a view of the silent victims, of the people who are so often referred to generally as ›the civilian population.‹ But every one of them, male or female, has their own fate that needs to be told« (8).

Kohlmaier profiles 30 female war reporters in a volume that immediately enchants the reader with its layout, density of information, choice of images, historical perspective, and distressing topicality. Why wars? Why do people put themselves in mortal danger in order to report on them? »The world needs to see this« is the reason that all female journalists ultimately give and justifies the book’s subtitle: »On active service for truth and peace.«

Although all are based on extensive research, the profiles differ widely in both length and form. There is an extensive profile of the photographer Anja Niedringhaus, who was killed in Afghanistan in 2014, yet only a small excerpt from a speech given by Antonia Rados to journalism studies students in Vienna in 2011. Kohlmaier’s profiles cover a period that extends from the First World War to Russia’s ongoing war of aggression against Ukraine – although she has chosen to order them by topic, rather than chronologically.

Each of the five chapters presents between four and seven female war reporters. Chapter 1 is entitled »Live from…« and depicts the work of Christiane Amanpour, Katrin Eigendorf, Catherine Jentile, Clarissa Ward, and Antonia Rados. Chapter 2 is about »The power of images,« profiling Margaret Bourke-White, Lynsey Addario, Lee Miller, and Nicole Tung. Entitled »Reports from the front and literature,« Chapter 3 uses profiles of Martha Gellhorn, Carolin Emcke, Oriana Fallaci, Marguerite Higgins, Janine di Giovanni, Erika Mann, and Åsne Seierstad to demonstrate the overlap between journalistic forms of presentation and literary genres, as well as the enormous extent to which journalism and literature complement and feed into one another when dealing with war. Chapter 4 is dedicated to those female journalists who have lost their lives in pursuing their profession: Anja Niedringhaus, Dicky Chapelle, Marie Colvin, Gerta Taro, and Anna Politkowskaja. Featuring profiles of Nataliya Gumenyuk, Alice Schalek, Yevgenia Belorusets, Anisa Shaheed, Gisèle Kahimbani, Lyliane Safi, and Judith Raupp, Chapter 5 reflects a particular level of involvement. It is entitled »My country under fire.«

Ordering the book in this way and presenting both well-known and (thus far) less well-known journalists offers up new insights and interconnections. It becomes clear how specific the respective circumstances of a war and regional conflict are, as well as what defines »war.« According to Nicole Tunc, war is »a place of extremes – it is about how humans lose their humanity, but also how they acquire it« (9).

Kohlmaier’s protagonists report on how the experience of war changes them and their view of people. They discuss what professionalism means and emphasize the particular role and responsibility of journalism. Christiane Amanpour attests to the increasing relevance of social media and social networking, for example, but also focuses attention on journalists as those who »have a duty to verify their sources, check facts, research interconnections, and pursue the stories themselves on the ground« (15). Without trained reporters who pursue a professional ethos and code of conduct, she continues, independent war reporting that fights for the truth would be impossible. But do female journalists worldwide have access to that training? Judith Raupp, who lives in the Democratic Republic of Congo and works as a freelance journalist, media coach, and media consultant in journalist training, impressively describes the adversity and the violence to which all women are constantly subjected, and the way their gender makes it all the more difficult for female journalists to learn and practice the profession.

The Elisabeth Sandmann Verlag, which has already published four other »women’s books« by Rita Kohlmaier, has come up with an appealing design for this work. Each profile contains at least one image of the protagonist, usually in her professional capacity, as well as meaningful quotes and information boxes with the key data on the person. The appendix brings together the sources used, most of which are press articles and biographical information. Kohlmaier has chosen not to review communication and media studies literature on the topic, even though – or perhaps because? – she studied Modern German Literature, Political Science and Communication Studies in Munich and is a graduate of the Deutsche Journalistenschule. Instead she takes a different approach: Although war is unfortunately always a topical theme, it appears to be attracting a particularly high level of attention from German readers at the moment due to the war in Ukraine. Topicality is crucial. Speed. And good contacts. The profile of Katrin Eigendorf, for example, is based on an interview that Kohlmaier herself conducted in June 2022 with the ZDF reporter, who had become more famous as a result of her dedicated reporting from Afghanistan and Ukraine.

Although Kohlmaier concentrates on women as war reporters, she takes a broad approach, presenting both historical and current female journalists and photographers working for an enormous range of media. She even includes a more global perspective, focusing not only on female reporters with »Western socialization« reporting on wars in far-off countries, but also hearing the voices of actors on the ground and younger female journalists. The writer does not reveal the criteria she used to choose the subjects of her profiles, nor why the profiles differ so widely in both their length and form.

Those looking for an examination of the professional self-image of war reporters based on gender theory, or of cultures of journalism from the objectivity standard to partiality, will not find it here. Yet those who want to know more about individual women who enable us to gain our own impression of war will be grateful for these thirty profiles of brave female journalists.

About the reviewer

Martina Thiele (*1967), Dr. disc. pol., is Professor of Media Studies at the University of Tübingen. Her research and teaching focuses on digitalization and social responsibility, media and public sphere theories, gender media studies, and stereotype and prejudice research.

Translation: Sophie Costella

This review first appeared in rezensionen:kommunikation:medien, 30 January 2023, accessible at https://www.rkm-journal.de/archives/23646

References

Biron, Bettina; Duchkowitsch, Wolfgang; Lamprecht, Wolfgang (eds.)(2020): Heimatfron_t! Frauen – Medien – Krieg. Über Rollenbilder und Mythen vom Ersten Weltkrieg bis heute. Vienna: Lit.

Klaus, Elisabeth; Wischermann, Ulla (eds.)(2013): Journalistinnen. Eine Geschichte in Biographien und Texten 1848-1990. Vienna: Lit.

Thiele, Martina; Thomas, Tanja; Virchow, Fabian (eds.)(2010): Medien – Krieg – Geschlecht. Affirmationen und Irritationen sozialer Ordnungen. Wiesbaden: Springer VS.

von der Lippe, Berit; Ottosen, Rune (eds.)(2016): Gendering War and Peace Reporting. Some Insights – some missing links. Gothenburg: Nordicom. Reviewed by Julia Lönnendonker in rezensionen:kommunikation:medien, 30 January 2018, online accessible at https://www.rkm-journal.de/archives/20893

About this book

Rita Kohlmaier (2022): Kriegsreporterinnen. Im Einsatz für Wahrheit und Frieden. [Female war reporters. On active service for truth and peace.] Munich: Elisabeth Sandmann Verlag, 176 pages, EUR 28.