Career advice

[Lenina Rosenweg]

This is sort of a continuation of a thread Explosive Situation started in the other chit chat. I am actually thinking along similar terms. I am currently working as an ESL and Business English teacher. Its interesting and (at times) I've become very attached to my students.This is not really what I want to do though.

I love travelling, writing and doing research. I have long thought of segueing into a career as a travelling leftist journalist/activist/teacher. I would like to do something roughly along the lines of what people like Jed Brandt, Arundhati Roy, or John Pilger are doing.(I may or may not agree with their politics, but that is another matter). I think I have good writing skills. I have traveled extensively and worked outside my country.I have had several of my articles picked up by online left media (I didn't get paid for this, but that's okay).

Does this sound at all realistic? I know it is difficult to break into journalism and especially free lance journalism. The "market" for leftist writing/research etc. is pretty small.

Alternatively I've sort of toyed with starting some sort of geopolitical consulting, a leftist Stratfor. There's probably no real market for this though.

Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated.

[MarxSchmarx]

It sounds like being an itinerant english language teacher in developing countries isn't an option?

I don't know if they still do it, but several progressive religious groups routinely organize and help pay for newsletters to circulate among their missions. Excellent social justice authors like luis urrea and bart jones (who wrote a chavez biography and also worked for the AP) got their start working as reporters for lefty catholic groups in Latin America.

Geopolitical consulting is really tough as a start-up and as an outsider; most people transition into those things after working for years as government aid workers and the like.

A third option you should seriously consider is grant writing.

For example, getting involved in community radio, especially with making them financially viable, is one area where I think your talents would be valuable. The investment needed for these things in third world countries isn't exactly minimal, but a lot of the equipment can be brought in from china for a comparatively cheaper price. If you can help communities make their case to obtain funding for such a thing, then you can take a percentage of the proceeds for your trouble when the petition is successful. This is a bit risky but no worse really than freelancing.

[El Chuncho]

Difficult? Yes. Impossble? No.

If being a geopolitical journalist is what you really would love, then you should try to go for it. An old adage states ''If you find a job you like, you will not have to do a day of work in your life''. It will be hard to break into directly, but you could potentially work your way there. Becoming a journalist for a far-leftist paper is not as hard as becoming a journalist for a big tabloid, so maybe you can start there. A good way of doing this is trying to submit articles to papers that allow that.

[ellipsis]

Depends on how much potatoes, rice and beans and PB&J you want to eat. But yes its possible.