Immersion journalism

Immersion journalism or immersionism is a style of journalism similar to gonzo journalism. In the style, journalists immerse themselves in a situation and with the people involved. The final product tends to focus on the experience, not the writer.

Like Gonzo, immersionism details an individual's experiences from a deeply personal perspective. An individual will choose a situation, and immerse themselves in the events and people involved. Unlike Gonzo, however, it is less focused on the writer's life, and more about the writer's specific experiences. Proponents of immersion journalism claim this research strategy allows authors to describe the internal experience of external events and break away from the limiting pseudo-objectivity of traditional journalism.

Critics of immersionism (who sometimes call it "stunt journalism") argue by using such methods writers are just "playing tourist" in the lives (and often tragedies) of other people.

Book-length examples of immersion journalism include H.G. Bissinger's Friday Night Lights; John Howard Griffin's Black Like Me; Ted Conover's Rolling Nowhere, Coyotes and Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing; Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America (2001), Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream; (2005), A.J. Jacobs The Year of Living Biblically (2007) and Matthew Thompson's Running with the Blood God (2013) and My Colombian Death (2008). VICE Films champions an immersionist style of reporting, and Vice Magazine published several issues on the topic.

Examples of immersionist film include the documentary Supersize Me and Heavy Metal in Baghdad and Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead.

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