Posted by: David Maxon on November 3, 2007 02:11 PM | Comments (1)

I’m sitting in “Documenter and Documentee” (moderated by Joe Richman with Michele Norris and Katrina survivor Sharon White) right now. This is the day's first session and conference goers seems mellow after yesterday’s intensity. Many were likely out late at the PRX/Vocalo party at Chicago Public Radio offices on Chicago’s Navy Pier.

We are listening to a clip from a documentary about Ms. White. After a clip is played we find out that she was reluctant to talk with Ms. Norris at first. White had, in fact, never heard of NPR (a fact that conference attendees seem to think is pretty funny). But she was convinced by the opportunity to tell her story. She seems to think just telling about her struggles helped her to stay motivated.

There is a discussion of the support that flooded in from listeners and the assistance that NPR gave her. After her initial interview was aired NPR received an outpouring of support from listeners. That, Ms. Norris says, lead to a “difficult conversation” about how to handle money that comes in from listeners. In the end they had an outsider handle the money but Ms. Norris does not feel it was inappropriate to hand over the assistance to White because she had “come to the conclusion that [seeking aid was] not why she talked to us.”

Speaking to the general power of radio Ms. White mentions her mother who was missing was after Katrina.

"The Red Cross didn’t find her but NPR found her” with listener help, White says.

“People had this amazing collective experience when they listened to the piece. It helped me realize radio is a very different and very intimate medium,” the television veteran Norris says.

Moderator Joe Richman attributes the strong response, in part, to the fact that “people know when someone is saying something for the first time… without any filters.”

Toward the end of the session, the question of whether being a public figure sets certain expectations for White is raised. Norris asks whether audience expectations make her “feel like [she has] to give them that version of Sharon White.” Norris wonders whether White would feel free to do so if she had to “share something the listener did not expect.”

It’s an interesting session about the age old dilemma of an interviewer's effect on her subject. The relatively loaded topic of Katrina makes that all the more poignant.

(left to right): Sharon White, Michele Norris, Joe Richman

More from Third Coast Festival 2007 :
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Posted by: Gale Petersen on November 5, 2007 10:29 AM