Fall 2002

Inside:

• Hogtown Gators
• National Winners
• recent developments
• special persons
• world experience
• research agenda
• alumni profiles

Related:

• Archive
• Contact Us
• communigator staff
• College of Journalism and Communications

CNN's Larry Woods new Freedom Forum professor

Freedom Forum prof Larry Woods (l) with interim Telecommunication chair David Ostroff (Photo by James Leslie)

by David Payne

Fidel Castro, William Westmoreland, Jimmy Carter and University of Florida telecommunication students.

What do they all have in common?

Woods, who interviewed many celebrities and average people alike during his 37-year career in journalism, has come back to the College as the Freedom Forum Distinguished Visiting Professor this fall.

He is teaching Advanced Writing for Electronic Media and a special topics course. He said he’s “thrilled” to be back at UF.

“Dean Hynes asked me to come back saying she wanted ‘hands-on’ people, and I was flattered,” he said. “This is coming home for me.”

Woods said the College has changed since his graduation. It used to be just a “reporter’s school” but now he is “awed by the staff, opportunities and expertise” the College offers.

Woods began his career at The Gainesville Sun in 1961 as a sports reporter. After graduation, he became a reporter for the Fort Lauderdale News. His career has included Florida Today, The Atlanta Journal, Time magazine and, most recently, CNN.

During his 18 years at CNN, Woods spent 10 years as a national correspondent. He produced and reported his own show, “Across America,” short segments on interesting people, places and things across the United States.

He said he was pleased he could deliver such a show to viewers.

“At the end of the day, the news can be filled with a lot of harsh and unfortunate news, but we (news reporters) have to do those things,” he said. “But here we had something we could do, and at the end of the day, smile about.”

Woods has watched the news media change over the years. He said he’s “disturbed by the inordinate amount of time that is spent on stories that titillate rather than inform.”

“I’m frustrated and disheartened about the emphasis on entertainment rather than reporting, which is a terribly easy out.”

Woods also said he was afraid there would eventually be further consolidation of the ownership of media, causing companies to worry more about their ‘investment” rather than informing society.

He said the competition between FOX and CNN is an example of two networks competing to be the “glitziest” and beat each other in breaking a story. He said they are also trying to be see who can command more attention on a given day, on a given subject, with the least amount of journalistic talent.”

“There are too many mirrors, clangs, bells and hootin’ and hollerin’,” Woods said. “If this is the new journalism, then I fear for the wave of viewers and audiences that will be subjected to this over the long haul.”

Woods said journalists still need backbone.

“You’ve got to have a Socratic curiosity of what makes us tick, why we do the things we do, and what our aspiration, fears and ambitions are,” he said. “You need a love and desire to know about your fellow man.”