Nechama Brodie
Lecturer
Nechama Brodie joined Wits Journalism after completing her PhD in 2019. Her doctoral thesis looked at media reporting on femicide in South Africa, and formed the basis of the monograph Femicide in South Africa (Kwela, 2020). Nechama’s current research work is focused on building, integrating and analysing data about fatal violence in South Africa, including developing an open data tool (the Homicide Media Tracker) that will allow inter-disciplinary researchers to gather and build extensive datasets using press and other archives.
Nechama teaches journalism and media theory at honours and masters levels, and supervises a small number of postgraduate research students. She is also the department coordinator for the Safety Matters programme, a collaboration between scholars in South Africa, Norway, the United States and Brazil, on research and education about the safety of journalists.
Nechama has worked as a journalist for over 25 years, as a reporter, radio host, syndication manager, magazine editor and publisher, scriptwriter and TV director, and she continues to write for leading local and international platforms on issues ranging from public health and misinformation to urban history. Between 2013 and 2018 Nechama worked with independent fact-checking organisation Africa Check, and was head of the group’s research and training division TRI Facts.
Education
Bachelor of Arts in Dramatic Art, University of the Witwatersrand, 1999
PhD (Journalism and Media Studies), University of the Witwatersrand, 2019
Publications
Chapters in peer-reviewed books:
Brodie, N. and Balliah, D. (2025). ‘Digital pathways for citizen health reporting in South Africa’ in Skare-Orgeret, K. and Mutsvairo, B. (eds). Palgrave Handbook in Digital Journalism
Brodie, N. 2024. ‘Guidance in the communication of DNA evidence in the news media’. In: Amankwaa, A. (ed). UNDOC Handbook on DNA Evidence Processing in Gender-Based Violence Cases for Criminal Justice Practitioners.
Brodie, N., Mathews, S. and Abrahams, N. 2023. “Femicide in South Africa”. In the Routledge International Handbook of Femicide and Feminicide (Dawson, M. and Mobayed, S. eds).
Brodie, N., Bowman, B., Ncube, V., and Day, S. 2023. “Context matters: The role of social sciences in advancing a public health approach to violence in South Africa”. In: The Springer Handbook of Social Sciences and Global Public Health.
Brodie, N. 2022. “South Africa’s own ‘Delhi moment’: news coverage of the murders of Jyoti Singh and Anene Booysen” in Intimacy and injury: In the wake of #MeToo in India and South Africa (Falkof, Phadke, Roy eds). Manchester University Press.
Peer-reviewed journal articles:
Brodie, N. 2024. Femicide: A Need for Orientation. Sociology Compass, 18: e70017.
Brodie, N. 2021. “Ideal Victims and Familiar Strangers: Non-Intimate Femicide in South African News Media”. African Journalism Studies, 42:3, 82-99, DOI: 10.1080/23743670.2021.1933559
Other institutional texts:
Brodie, N. 2024. “Navigating Journalism’s Unsafe Spaces”. State of the Newsroom 2024. Wits Centre for Journalism.
Brodie, N. 2021. “Our persistent media monopoly: What do media monopolies mean for diversity and democracy in South Africa?” State of the Newsroom 2019/20. Wits Centre for Journalism.
Books (non-fiction):
Brodie, N. 2023. Domestic Terror: Intimate partner violence in South Africa. Kwela Books, ISBN: 9780795710858
Brodie, N. 2022. Farm Killings in South Africa. Kwela Books, ISBN: 9780795709081
Brodie, N. 2020. Femicide in South Africa. Kwela Books, ISBN: 9780795709388
Breytenbach, G. and Brodie, N. 2017. Rule of Law (Pan Macmillan)
Brodie, N. 2015. The Cape Town Book (Struik Heritage)
Mabelane, K. and Brodie, N. 2015. I Ran for My Life. (Pan Macmillan)
Beukes, L. and Brodie, N. 2015. Maverick: Extraordinary Women from South Africa’s Past (2nd edition) (Umuzi)
Brodie, N. 2010. Inside Joburg (Pan Macmillan and Sharp Sharp Media)
Brodie, N (ed). 2008. The Joburg Book (Pan Macmillan and Sharp Sharp Media)
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