Evaluation of General Sources

In this blog post, I will be discussing two of my sources that I am using for my 1st Project controversy on the Nightingale casting at La Jolla Playhouse.

Dan Morelle, "Nightingale." 9/12/2007. via flickr. Attribution 2.0 Generic.

The sources that I will be using for my controversy for Project 1 can be found here and here.

The URL for both sources ends with a ".com". This domain name infers that the information is intended for commercial purposes, and to be read and consumed by a large audience, preferably as big of an audience as possible. While these sources that end in ".com" are not always deemed credible, The Huffington Post and the Los Angeles Times have both established themselves as credible works of journalism.

The author for the first article is Lucas Kavner and the author for the second article is David Ng. Lucas Kavner has written and created content for The Huffington Post, The New York Times, Washington Post, Time Magazine, and many other pieces of reputable media outlets. David Ng works for the Los Angeles Times as an Arts Reporter after receiving his Journalism degree from New York University after serving on other newspapers such as The Chicago Tribune.

The first article was published and last edited on July 19, 2012 while the second article was last edited on July 23, 2012. This was within the last 3 years and the information is not out of date as it describes the event shortly after it had occurred and the outcries from the surrounding theatre community in California. There are no links on the first article, however the second gives links to other stories in the Los Angeles Times that further cover the story in the preceding days in July of 2012.

Both texts have the very specific purpose of trying to inform their audience on the controversy at La Jolla Playhouse regarding the casting of The Nightingale. Both of these articles come from reputable newspapers, where the purpose of news stories is always to inform their audience rather than persuade them to think a certain way. While there are opinion columns in newspapers as well, both of these stories are news stories and therefore do not offer opinions on the issue coming from the authors themselves but rather from the surrounding community.

Both articles include graphics. The article from The Huffington Post includes a slideshow of images showing the sort of miscasting in Hollywood that has generated so much controversy with white actors being cast to portray characters of another race. The article from The Los Angeles Times features an image of a director of this particular version of The Nightingale defending his decisions at a public forum. Both of these images offer context to the story, showing the cultural significance of this sort of casting and the alternative position of why the casting was done in the first place.

There is an unbiased perspective from both articles due to being news stories from reputable newspapers. Those that profit if the information is believed to be true is the newspapers themselves, because both of these newspapers strive to be shown as reputable to their audience or else no one would read or take their news seriously. Both of these stories are backed up by one another, as well as by the sources in which they use as well to gain credibility.

Both sources suggest links, in fact both articles suggest further reading of The Los Angeles Times due to their extensive coverage over the event as it happened, and the after effects and feeling of the theatre public as well. It cites other reputable newspapers and quotes directly from the sources effected in order to support themselves.