PhD Ceremony K.S.P. Smeenk (CMJS), Reliable and relatable journalists: A digital humanities analysis of ethos in personal journalism

K.S.P. (Kim) Smeenk will defend their doctoral thesis on Wednesday 19 November 2025.

Reliable and relatable journalists

A digital humanities analysis of ethos in personal journalism

Promotores:

• prof. dr. M. Broersma
• dr. F. Harbers

The University Library publishes the thesis digitally after the defence ceremony

Abstract:

This dissertation presents a digital humanities analysis of how journalists legitimize their epistemic authority in personal journalism in Dutch newspaper journalism between 1991 and 2021. Personal journalism is all journalism in which journalists foreground their subjectivity by using first-person pronouns. Understanding how the growing relevance of personal experience and authenticity has impacted and developed within journalism is especially urgent, since journalism is a knowledge-producing practice. To enable the systematic analysis of personal journalism, this dissertation employs a digital humanities approach - a mixed-methods approach that integrates computational methods with quantitative and qualitative text analysis methods. It offers reflections on the benefits and pitfalls of such an approach.  The analyses show that personal journalism has increased in Dutch journalism between 1991 and 2021 and that this rise is particularly driven by quality newspapers. Moreover, they show that journalists present themselves as both reliable and relatable to convince the audience of their epistemic authority. They do so by highlighting their lived experience, their conscious and continuous commitment to gathering knowledge, and by creating a vicarious experience for their audience. As such, they invoke affective communities that unite journalists and their audiences. This not only reformulates the role of the journalist, but also that of the audience and gives them, more so than before, an active role in journalists’ communities. The overarching findings encourage us to consider personal journalism as an inherent part of journalism and question whose lived experiences are represented and which audiences are included.