Introduction

In this chapter, we explore the ways in which implicit norms affect the conceptualization of ‘work’ in entrepreneurial journalism. What it means to work in journalism is not simply a sum of activities conducted by journalists, but is rather formed by an interplay between implicit and explicit norms, definitions, everyday activities, emotions and experiences, to name a few of the elements. Here, we highlight a specific aspect of how understandings about work come into being: implicit norms.

Traditional approaches to researching journalism generally regard journalism from a top-down perspective as a coherent set of practices, in which norms govern routines, and routines direct the characteristics of the output (Witschge & Harbers, 2018). This fails to acknowledge the non-coherent and, at times, arbitrary nature of practices, in which strategic claims and everyday practices interact with each other and are not necessarily aligned. Moreover, it foregoes how implicit norms, routines, and tacit knowing inform practices and self-understandings as much as the codified knowledge that is present in journalism.

We focus in particular on the norm that relates to working hours. We do not speak simply about the actual practices – how many hours entrepreneurial journalists actually work on an average day – but rather about the emotional experience and the discourse that exist around work long hours. Starting from auto-ethnographic data from Amanda Brouwers, who works as a startup journalist as well as a PhD researcher, we explore how the norm of working long hours impacts everyday conceptualizations as well as actual practices of work in entrepreneurial journalism.

Amanda, a classically trained, now entrepreneurial journalist, engages with her struggles with working hours through reflections in her daily audio recordings of her practices, discourses, and emotions. These highlight how implicit norms can be located in affect and embodied knowledge, and how long working hours may become a problematic aspect of entrepreneurial journalism.