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Staff Profile

Dr Murray Dick

Senior Lecturer In Multimedia Journalism

  • Email: murray.dick@ncl.ac.uk
  • Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 4640
  • Address: Media Culture and Heritage
    School of Arts and Cultures
    Room 2.86
    2nd Floor Armstrong Building
    Newcastle University
    Newcastle upon Tyne
    NE1 7RU

    Consultation & feedback hours 2020-21: email me for an appointment
Background

Introduction

I lecture in Multimedia Journalism in the department of Media, Culture, Heritage.

Before moving permanently into academia (in 2009), I was a trainer in online research at the BBC, and latterly at the Centre for Investigative Journalism. I was also an occasional freelance technology journalist.

During my time at the BBC (2004-2008) I established a training praxis that involved applying theories from the field of Information Science to the practices of professional journalism, 

This knowledge informed much of my early research, including my first monograph: Search: Theory and Practice in Journalism Online (Palgrave 2013).

Today, my approach to teaching and learning at Newcastle involves challenging the conventional ways in which journalism is often understood within the academy; compromised between vocational and liberal arts perspectives.

Qualifications

  • PhD ('News Values in Online and Data-visual Journalism') (Brunel University, London)
  • Postgraduate Diploma in Academic Practice (Brunel University, London)
  • MSc in Information Science, with distinction (City University, London)
  • BA(Hons) in English (University of York)

Membership of scholarly societies

Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (2012-present).

Academic activities

Editorial Board member: Journalism Practice

Research

Summary

My PhD by publication ('News Values in Online and Data-visual Journalism' [2015]) was concerned with how news values are operationalized in online journalism and in visual data journalism. This early phase in my research was informed by reflexive and ethnographic methods with a particular focus on newsroom ethnography.

More recently my research has shifted towards visual methods. Over the last few years I have devised and developed a new (multilevel discursive) theoretical framework for exploring data visualizations.

I have written a number of articles, chapters and reference works on this topic, and, in 2020, a monograph: The Infographic: A history of data graphics in news and communications, which is published by MIT Press.

An excerpt from this book has been re-published by TIME magazine, and by Popular Science.

I am currently developing a range of literary methods for analysing (and improving) data visualizations.

My other research interests concern media hoaxes, and investigative journalism.

Teaching

Teaching roles

I lead on the following modules:

I also contribute to teaching, and supervise students on the following modules:

Administrative roles

I am currently acting Degree Program Director for our International Multimedia Journalism MA programme.

Publications