COMM 209: Profile of Chicago alderman / READ

Here's a story in today's Chicago Tribune on former Chicago Ald. Burt Natarus. Please read it. It demonstrates a couple of points that will help you in your writing.

1. Organization. See how the story begins by telling kind of an interesting little story-within-a-story? The bit about the 74-year-old guy hitting on the Trib reporter? Then it goes to the nut graf (or "billboard," as Newsweek magazine calls it in a *handout you'll be getting in class today). It says:

Natarus, who was the second-longest-serving member of the City Council, has always blithely stomped back and forth across the line that separates joker and joke. He's what's known in newspaper stories as colorful, eccentric, a real character.

But the man also has feelings.

OK, OK, the nut graf is actually a couple of grafs. This is journalism, not rocket science. It's not precise.

2. Profile. A "profile" isn't rocket science, either. It's just a story that "present[s] present a person, a place, or an activity vividly to their readers," according to the "St. Martin's Guide to Writing," a freshman English textbook that borrows the idea from journalism. There's more on a handout linked to my faculty page. Keep it in mind. Pretty soon you'll get to write some profiles of your own. When you're wondering how to do that, remember the Trib's profile of Ald. Naturus. It's a good example to follow.

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* This handout, from Newsweek Educational Programs, is important. If you weren't in class today, ask for it.