Journalism and Intellect

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Michael McDevitt
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Moral Foundations ◽  
Core Beliefs ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Egalitarian Ethos

Journalism’s resentment toward intellect is tangled up with the profession’s democratic commitments: its egalitarian ethos, identification with “the public,” ambivalence toward experts, and pleasure in holding up the haughty and highbrow to ridicule. Chapter 1 illustrates the vexed orientation of news media to intellect in templates such as the ridicule of aging Marxists and the willingness of reporters to humiliate themselves in sciencey-sounding stories. Some of these tropes could be viewed as harmless eccentricities of newswork, but the introduction reveals journalism’s complicity in reification and rationalization of a punitive public. A tactical relationship to intellect is in some respects innate to journalism. Communication is constitutive of community, which is bound by core beliefs, which are inevitably dissected by intellect. A reticence to engage with intellect can veer into bouts of overt hostility, a dynamic shaped by the obligation of mainstream media to defend moral foundations of sanctity, loyalty, and authority.

Police and the News Media

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ted Gest
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
News Media ◽  
Raw Material ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Investigative Reporting ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Relationship

Police and the media have had a close relationship but it has become an increasingly uneasy one. For more than a century, the mainstream United States media—mainly newspapers, radio, television and magazines—have depended on the police for raw material for a steady diet of crime stories. For its part, law enforcement regards the media as something of an adversary. The relationship has changed because of the growth of investigative reporting and of the Internet. Both developments have increased the volume of material critical of the police. At the same time, law enforcement has used social media as a means to bypass the mainstream media to try getting its message directly to the public. However, the news media in all of its forms remains a powerful interpreter of how law enforcement does its job.

Can Indian journalism survive the onslaught of social media?

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 151-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Usha M Rodrigues
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
News Media ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Party Leaders ◽  
Online Networks ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Use Of Social Media ◽  
Effective Use

In recent times, researchers have examined the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s use of social media to directly connect with his followers, while largely shunning the mainstream media. This strategy of direct communication with their constituents has been adopted by other political parties too, with opposition party leaders hosting ‘Facebook Live’ sessions and tweeting their messages. A large proportion of Indian voters, who increasingly own mobile phones, are enjoying being part of the ‘like’ and ‘share’ online networks. What does this effective use of social media by Indian political parties mean for the public discourse in India? This article presents the view that this phenomenon is more than Modi’s ‘selfie nationalism’ or his attempt to marginalize the news media. The article argues that there is a structural shift in the Indian public sphere, which might prove to be the greatest challenge to Indian journalism.

scholarly journals You are fake news: political bias in perceptions of fake news

2020 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 460-470 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sander van der Linden ◽  
Costas Panagopoulos ◽  
Jon Roozenbeek
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
National Sample ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Fake News ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Fox News ◽  
The Us ◽  
News Effect

Although the rise of fake news is posing an increasing threat to societies worldwide, little is known about what associations the term ‘fake news’ activates in the public mind. Here, we report a psychological bias that we describe as the ‘fake news effect’: the tendency for partisans to use the term ‘fake news’ to discount and discredit ideologically uncongenial media sources. In a national sample of the US population ( N = 1000), we elicited top-of-mind associations with the term ‘fake news’. Consistent with our hypothesis, we find evidence that both liberals and conservatives freely associate traditionally left-wing (e.g. CNN) and right-wing (e.g. Fox News) media sources with the term fake news. Moreover, conservatives are especially likely to associate the mainstream media with the term fake news and these perceptions are generally linked to lower trust in media, voting for Trump, and higher belief in conspiracy theories.

scholarly journals The Māori public sphere

2005 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Stuart
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
News Media ◽  
Cultural Issues ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Dominant Culture ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
General Aspects

At this moment in New Zealand’s history there is a need for healthy political debate on a range of issues. Specifically, the foreshore and seabed issue has created division and fears between Māori and Pakeha and brought the Treaty of Waitangi to the fore again. As well, settlements of historic grievances with Māori have added to growing Pakeha unease. In this climate there is a need for wide-ranging public discussion of these issues, and the news media seem the obvious site for those discussions. But how well are the New Zealand news media fulfilling that role? This commentary takes the public sphere to be the sum total of all visible decision-making processes within a culture and uses this concept as an analytical tool to examine aspects of the health of New Zealand’s democracy. It uses discourse analysis approaches to show how the mainstream media are in fact isolating Māori from the general public sphere and, after outlining some general aspects of the Māori public sphere, argues that the news media’s methodologies, grounded in European-based techniques and approaches, are incapable of interacting with the Māori public sphere. I am arguing that while there is an appearance of an increased awareness and discussion of cultural issues, the mainstream media are, in reality, sidelining Māori voices and controlling the political discussion in favour of the dominant culture. They are therefore not fulfilling their self-assigned role of providing information for people to function within our democracy. Keywords: 

Imagining a “post-carbon” future? Climate change as represented by media and film industries

2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-62
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Molek-Kozakowska ◽  
Stankomir Nicieja
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
News Media ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Current Trends ◽  
The Media ◽  
Potential Failure ◽  
Media Narratives ◽  
Fictional Representations

This study explores current trends in representing and communicating climate change by media industries. It reviews the current literature on mainstream media narratives of climate change focusing on their naturalization of progress and their techno-optimism (e.g., as regards geoengineering). It provides insight on how the media industry’s commercial agenda is linked to the types of disseminated messages and dominant imaginaries. It compares respective codes inherent in news media and film/fictional representations of climate change on representative examples. It traces the evolution of disaster/dystopian genres that involve climate issues. It discusses the implications from such a comparative analysis in terms of the potential failure to mobilize the public – to first imagine the alternatives and then to act collectively for the sake of the “post-carbon” future.

Making Enemies: the Mainstream Media Spectacle and US Foreign Policy

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 138-156
Author(s):  
Gerald Sussman
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Public Affairs ◽  
Investigative Journalism ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
State Legitimacy ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
The Us ◽  
Media Spectacle

Abstract As Herbert Schiller long ago observed, the mainstream (corporate) media (MSM) in the US have long been instruments of state power. However, since the nineteenth century, the reading public has relied on the news media as a pillar, albeit flawed, of a liberal democratic society. While the public still regards a “free press” as essential to democracy, it no longer has confidence that the mainstream media deserve that status. Trust levels in the MSM have plummeted since the 1970s, reflecting a larger pattern of distrust of public and private institutions in general, including the US Congress. Even many media professionals themselves do not see the US as defending the freedom of investigative journalism. Moreover, the quality of corporate media, more owner-concentrated than ever, has declined, often to the level of tabloid spectacle, as profit-oriented news departments try to compete with a wide array of 24/7 news platforms, including those coming from social media. The era of neoliberalism has all but eliminated the public service ideology behind news and public affairs reporting, and concurrently there has emerged a crisis of state legitimacy that threatens the foundations of the liberal democratic order.

scholarly journals Tabloidization

Communication ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenn Burleson Mackay
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Grocery Store ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Societal Issues ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Tabloid Press ◽  
Dumbing Down

As the news market has become increasingly competitive, the mainstream news media have changed dramatically. The concept of tabloidization suggests that stories about politics and civic issues have been replaced by content that is intended to be entertaining. These stories might emphasize sensationalized or lewd details and celebrities rather than information that is designed to keep the public informed of government policies and societal issues. This type of news is similar to what one might expect to see in a tabloid publication at the checkout counter at a grocery store. The term tabloidization suggests that the mainstream media are borrowing the techniques used by the tabloid press to grab the attention of the audience. Much of the literature related to tabloidization suggests that the process has had a negative effect on the audience and journalistic values by dumbing down the news. There are those who argue that the process can have positive effects on consumers by making them attend more closely to the news. Scholars typically suggest the tabloidization has occurred as a response to competition.

Assessments of User Comments With “Alternative Views” as a Function of Media Trust

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Marlene Kunst
Keyword(s):  
Online Discussions ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Argument Quality ◽  
The Public ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
User Comments ◽  
Media Trust ◽  
Heuristic Information Processing

Abstract. Comments sections under news articles have become popular spaces for audience members to oppose the mainstream media’s perspective on political issues by expressing alternative views. This kind of challenge to mainstream discourses is a necessary element of proper deliberation. However, due to heuristic information processing and the public concern about disinformation online, readers of comments sections may be inherently skeptical about user comments that counter the views of mainstream media. Consequently, commenters with alternative views may participate in discussions from a position of disadvantage because their contributions are scrutinized particularly critically. Nevertheless, this effect has hitherto not been empirically established. To address this gap, a multifactorial, between-subjects experimental study ( N = 166) was conducted that investigated how participants assess the credibility and argument quality of media-dissonant user comments relative to media-congruent user comments. The findings revealed that media-dissonant user comments are, indeed, disadvantaged in online discussions, as they are assessed as less credible and more poorly argued than media-congruent user comments. Moreover, the findings showed that the higher the participants’ level of media trust, the worse the assessment of media-dissonant user comments relative to media-congruent user comments. Normative implications and avenues for future research are discussed.

How to Tell the Truth without Outraging the Press?

MedienJournal ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 37
Author(s):  
Li Xiguang
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Public Affairs ◽  
Chinese Government ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
The Public ◽  
News Stories ◽  
The Press ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Government ◽  
Chinese News Media

The commercialization of meclia in China has cultivated a new journalism business model characterized with scandalization, sensationalization, exaggeration, oversimplification, highly opinionated news stories, one-sidedly reporting, fabrication and hate reporting, which have clone more harm than good to the public affairs. Today the Chinese journalists are more prey to the manipu/ation of the emotions of the audiences than being a faithful messenger for the public. Une/er such a media environment, in case of news events, particularly, during crisis, it is not the media being scared by the government. but the media itself is scaring the government into silence. The Chinese news media have grown so negative and so cynica/ that it has produced growing popular clistrust of the government and the government officials. Entering a freer but fearful commercially mediated society, the Chinese government is totally tmprepared in engaging the Chinese press effectively and has lost its ability for setting public agenda and shaping public opinions. 

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