Karin Wahl-Jorgensen | Cardiff University (original) (raw)
Books by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen
This Handbook charts the growing area of journalism studies, exploring the current state of the... more This Handbook charts the growing area of journalism studies, exploring the current state of theory and setting an agenda for future research in an international context. The volume is structured around theoretical and empirical approaches, and covers scholarship on news production and organizations; news content; journalism and society; and journalism in a global context. Emphasizing comparative and global perspectives, each chapter explores:
* Key elements, thinkers, and texts
* Historical context
* Current state of the art
* Methodological issues
* Merits and advantages of the approach/area of studies
* Limitations and critical issues of the approach/area of studies
* Directions for future research
Offering broad international coverage from top-tier contributors, this volume ranks among the first publications to serve as a comprehensive resource addressing theory and scholarship in journalism studies. As such, the Handbook of Journalism Studies is a must-have resource for scholars and graduate students working in journalism, media studies, and communication around the globe.
About the Author
Karin Wahl-Jorgensen is Reader in the Cardiff School of Journalism, Media, and Cultural Studies, Cardiff University, Wales. Her work on media, democracy, and citizenship has been published in more than 20 international journals as well as in numerous books.
Thomas Hanitzsch is Assistant Professor in the Institute of Mass Communication and Media Research at the University of Zurich. He founded the ICA’s Journalism Studies Division and has published four books and more than 50 articles and chapters on journalism, comparative communication research, online media and war coverage.
This book grapples with such questions as: What does it mean to be a citizen in contemporary soci... more This book grapples with such questions as: What does it mean to be a citizen in contemporary societies? What role do mass media play in the making of citizenship?
Drawing on ground-breaking work from scholars around the world known for their contributions to the study of media and politics, this volume covers a range of practices of mediated citizenship, with chapters studying the mourning after the deaths of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh in the Netherlands and notions of authenticity in letters written to British Conservative politician Boris Johnson. The authors explore discourses of nationalism in the English and Scottish Press, and examine struggles over definitions of the public in Australian public service broadcasting and the US Medicare debate. Emerging possibilities for mediated citizenship are assessed in three studies of online activism and participation in the US and China. The book builds on conventional understandings of citizenship and the public sphere, calling attention to the need for understanding affective attachments to politics. Finally, it demonstrates that we cannot fully understand citizenship without looking at the concrete workings of power in and through mediated discourse.
From review by Brian Thornton in *International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics*: It's ha... more From review by Brian Thornton in *International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics*:
It's hard to describe how satisfying it is now, at last, to find a book-length study of letters to the editor. And thus, since a complete book now focuses solely on letters to the editor, there is a convenient, central location to find a good bibliography of the subject. The book also includes a brief history of letters to the editor from colonial times. Exciting as it may be for scholars to find validation of this whole new subject for discourse in this book, however, another response can be sadness. Karin Wahl-Jorgensen's main points are distressing: that although newspaper editors give lip service to the value of letters to the editor as "wide open forums" for free speech, the reality is quite different. Many editors she interviewed at a San Francisco weekly newspaper and elsewhere really don't like either letters or letter writers. Unfortunately, these editors often regard printing letters to the editor as grunt work, "getting the pages out." They also often see letter writers as "cranks, nuts," or "crazy bastards." Editorial staffers assign code letters to letters, Wahl-Jorgensen writes. For instance, O3 means a writer is "way out in the Ozone." Unfortunately, "the idiom of insanity was one of the rallying points of the editorial page staff's community of interpretation," Wahl-Jorgensen continues. What this boils down to is that the editorial page staff who publish the letters often "laugh in the face of public discourse, of democracy; letter writers are rarely discussed in a language other than the idiom of insanity."
Journalists and the Public is a solidly researched, germinal book. It offers concrete evidence of poor treatment of letters to the editor. The author's findings are important in so many ways that many people will use this book as a solid foundation - and much can be built on it.
Based on the largest study of the media coverage of public opinion and citizenship in Britain and... more Based on the largest study of the media coverage of public opinion and citizenship in Britain and the United States, this book argues that while most of us learn about politics and public affairs from the news media, we rarely see or read about examples of an active, engaged citizenry.
Papers by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen
Probably the biggest election story of recent times is the transformation of Ed Miliband from Wei... more Probably the biggest election story of recent times is the transformation of Ed Miliband from Weird Ed to teenage heartthrob. Throughout the election, the Labour leader has been the target of negative campaigning from the Conservative Party and right-leaning newspapers; he has suffered with unfavourable comparisons with his brother and has been ridiculed for his two kitchens. But now, the tune has changed. Step aside, Robot Ed. The time has come for Ed Miliband the sex symbol.
The transformation of Ed has little to do with the Labour Party’s attempt at rebranding him, and everything to do with the power of social media.
Mass media have always served as central institutions of the public sphere, providing opportuniti... more Mass media have always served as central institutions of the public sphere, providing opportunities for public debate and opinion formation. This chapter addresses the historical development of mediated forums for public participation, paying particular attention to the relationship between technological change and transformations in the role of media professionals as gatekeepers in mediated communities of opinion. It argues that successive waves of technological change have had profound consequences in terms of broadening access as well as diversifying forms, platforms and genres through which communities of opinion have taken shape. In the process, journalists and media organizations have been compelled to loosen their grip on editorial control over the mediated expression of public opinion. This shift has taken place alongside -and in part as a result ofdevelopments through which the ideal of interactivity and the valorization of participation have gained ever more purchase. The early history of communities of opinion: tracing the development of letters to the editor Early print publications, by most measures the first mass media, made little distinction between opinion and news content, or, correspondingly, between opinion pieces in the form of letters to the editor and reports on current events. In the prominent account of Jürgen Habermas in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (1989), for example, the first newspapers emerged as the organic 1 continuation of private newsletters. Before the advent of the steam train and the telegraph, printers relied on news arriving by postal coach or ship, and stories
Technologies, Media and Journalism, 2014
This chapter focuses on how new media technologies, in generating new participatory opportunities... more This chapter focuses on how new media technologies, in generating new participatory opportunities, might challenge journalistic paradigms, self-understandings, and epistemologies. It takes a particular interest in how long-standing notions of journalistic objectivity might be under fire at a time of shifting relationships between journalists and, as Rosen (2007) put it, "the people formerly known as the audience." The chapter seeks to position the study of journalism with respect to arguments around an "affective turn" across social sciences and humanities disciplines. It argues that despite the historical denigration of emotion in public discourse, ordinary people's personal and emotional stories have always been valued in participatory formats. But what is changing now is that with the increased prevalence of user-generated or amateur content, these emotional stories, told in new and non-objective forms, are no longer physically and spatially marked off as exceptional through their location in specific sections or pages of a newspaper, and hence "ghettoized" or "segregated" (Coward 2013; Wahl-Jorgensen 2008). Instead, they have become part and parcel of news content, challenging epistemologies of journalism.
Copyright © 2014 (Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, wahl-jorgensenk@cf.ac.uk). Licensed under the Creative Co... more Copyright © 2014 (Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, wahl-jorgensenk@cf.ac.uk). Licensed under the Creative
Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives (by-nc-nd). Available at http://ijoc.org.
Is WikiLeaks Challenging the Paradigm of Journalism?
Boundary Work and Beyond
KARIN WAHL-JORGENSEN
Cardiff University, Wales
Introduction
WikiLeaks exists in a peculiar and illustrative tension with journalism that dramatizes larger unfolding debates about the authority, status, and future of journalism. This article explores what the WikiLeaks saga can tell us, in a broader sense, about pressing anxieties of the journalism profession and, relatedly, the discipline of journalism studies. The article explores how journalists and journalism scholars have discussed the revelations of WikiLeaks as well as the organization itself. I suggest that, whereas some observers have argued that WikiLeaks heralds a radical transformation in understandings of journalism, others are keen to see it as just another source—a phenomenon easily subsumed under existing definitions of journalism and deployed in its service. The article investigates the ways in which WikiLeaks challenges conventional paradigms of news coverage insofar as it provides—and publishes—the investigative materials that journalists themselves usually take pride in uncovering. Through this activity, the organization’s emergence reflects larger developments representing a shake-up in conventional hierarchies of voice and access to the public sphere. At the same time, WikiLeaks has also served as a novel and unique type of news source, and the ambiguous figure of Julian Assange has been variously appropriated in news narratives as a heroic defender of free expression—described as a courageous whistleblower willing to speak truth to power on the one hand, and an autistic renegade, recluse, and alleged rapist on the other (e.g., Rusbridger, 2011, p. 6). These conflicting and ever-evolving accounts of the organization and its shape-shifting front man coexist in media coverage and scholarly debates and reflect a more profound set of questions about the changing nature of journalism and, hence, the need to refine understandings of the profession and our conceptual tools for studying it.
This chapter discusses the journalistic practices shaping the reporting of politics. It is argued... more This chapter discusses the journalistic practices shaping the reporting of politics. It is argued to conceive of political journalism as a subspace within the journalistic field that interacts intensively with the political field, because this theoretical approach highlights the power relations and world views produced by the insider culture of journalists and political actors. Moreover, the chapter suggests that this insider culture affords political journalists privileged access to information, but may also hamper their autonomy and the transparency of their actions. Further, the chapter argues that the routines and constraints of news production only strengthen this reliance on authoritative sources. Technological change and commercial pressures, however, may represent a challenge to this relationship and the practices which govern it. The chapter closes with a call for studies on political journalism in non-Western contexts, on non-elite, local media and for more comparative research efforts in order to broaden the rather partial and limited picture of political journalism we have so far.
Javnost/The Public, 2013
This paper looks at how British political elites discuss the European public sphere and citizens... more This paper looks at how British political elites discuss the
European public sphere and citizens’ participation within
it. Drawing on 41 in-depth interviews with political elites
– including politicians at national and European levels, journalists,
political activists, and think-tank professionals – the
paper explores interviewees’ understandings of the European
public sphere, and their perceptions about its vitality. Our
research reveals a great deal of scepticism about the idea
of a European public sphere, in part rooted in conventional
British Euro-sceptic approaches, and in part fostered by a
perception of the remoteness and democratic defi cit of the
European Union.
Media History and the Foundations of Media Studies (John Nerone, Ed), 2013
While the Chicago School has subtly but profoundly shaped and influenced the direction of scholar... more While the Chicago School has subtly but profoundly shaped and influenced the direction of scholarship on mass media, the history of its engagement with mass communication researchers is also a history of missed connections and opportunities.
At least two different stories can be told in tracing the legacies of the Chicago School on work in media studies. One is a tale of triumph: The Chicago School has had a significant impact on scholarship in the field, in its normative assessment of the media’s role in society and its empirical work in understanding
it. Another is a tale of loss and marginalization, witnessed by the decline of the socially engaged and often qualitative approach of the school and its diminishing presence within the collective conscience of the discipline today. Both of these
stories are true. The Chicago School arose out of a particular moment, with its companion preoccupations and anxieties, but its contributions subsequently fell to the wayside in the face of profound epistemological shifts. The Chicago School gave voice to the idea that media and communication have a central role
to play in shaping individual and collective lives, and in cementing identities and communities. This idea has helped to justify and solidify the notion that we cannot understand society without understanding how we communicate with
each other and how the media shape our social bonds and social worlds.
BBC Breadth of Opinion Review Content Analysis
This paper studies the role of subjectivity in the language of award-winning journalism. The pape... more This paper studies the role of subjectivity in the language of award-winning journalism. The paper draws on a content analysis of Pulitzer Prize-winning articles in a range of news categories between 1995 and 2011. The analysis indicates that despite the continued prominence of the ideal of objectivity in scholarly and journalistic debates, award-winning journalistic stories are in fact pervaded by subjective language in the form of what linguists refer to as ‘‘appraisals,’’ as well as the narrative construction of emotive appeals. The subjective language use of award-winning stories, however, does not straightforwardly or consistently undermine claims to objectivity. On
that basis, the paper concludes that any binary oppositions between objectivity and subjectivity and, relatedly, emotionality and rationality, may be overly simplistic and obscure the complexities of journalistic story-telling.
Taking as its vantage point Gaye Tuchman’s (1972) notion of the strategic ritual of objectivity, ... more Taking as its vantage point Gaye Tuchman’s (1972) notion of the strategic ritual of objectivity, this paper argues that there is also a strategic ritual of emotionality in journalism -- an institutionalized and systematic practice of journalists infusing their reporting with emotion. To examine the strategic ritual of emotionality, the paper considers Pulitzer Prize-winning articles between 1995 and 2011, taking the prize as a marker of cultural capital in the journalistic field. A coding scheme for a basic content analysis was developed on the basis of scholarly insights into journalistic narratives, as well as discourse analytic approaches associated with appraisal theory.
The analysis indicates that the analyzed stories rely heavily on emotional story-telling. The strategic ritual of emotionality manifests itself in the overwhelming use of anecdotal leads, personalized story-telling and expressions of affect. Journalists ‘outsource’ emotional labor by describing the emotions of others, and drawing on sources to discuss their emotions.
This Handbook charts the growing area of journalism studies, exploring the current state of the... more This Handbook charts the growing area of journalism studies, exploring the current state of theory and setting an agenda for future research in an international context. The volume is structured around theoretical and empirical approaches, and covers scholarship on news production and organizations; news content; journalism and society; and journalism in a global context. Emphasizing comparative and global perspectives, each chapter explores:
* Key elements, thinkers, and texts
* Historical context
* Current state of the art
* Methodological issues
* Merits and advantages of the approach/area of studies
* Limitations and critical issues of the approach/area of studies
* Directions for future research
Offering broad international coverage from top-tier contributors, this volume ranks among the first publications to serve as a comprehensive resource addressing theory and scholarship in journalism studies. As such, the Handbook of Journalism Studies is a must-have resource for scholars and graduate students working in journalism, media studies, and communication around the globe.
About the Author
Karin Wahl-Jorgensen is Reader in the Cardiff School of Journalism, Media, and Cultural Studies, Cardiff University, Wales. Her work on media, democracy, and citizenship has been published in more than 20 international journals as well as in numerous books.
Thomas Hanitzsch is Assistant Professor in the Institute of Mass Communication and Media Research at the University of Zurich. He founded the ICA’s Journalism Studies Division and has published four books and more than 50 articles and chapters on journalism, comparative communication research, online media and war coverage.
This book grapples with such questions as: What does it mean to be a citizen in contemporary soci... more This book grapples with such questions as: What does it mean to be a citizen in contemporary societies? What role do mass media play in the making of citizenship?
Drawing on ground-breaking work from scholars around the world known for their contributions to the study of media and politics, this volume covers a range of practices of mediated citizenship, with chapters studying the mourning after the deaths of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh in the Netherlands and notions of authenticity in letters written to British Conservative politician Boris Johnson. The authors explore discourses of nationalism in the English and Scottish Press, and examine struggles over definitions of the public in Australian public service broadcasting and the US Medicare debate. Emerging possibilities for mediated citizenship are assessed in three studies of online activism and participation in the US and China. The book builds on conventional understandings of citizenship and the public sphere, calling attention to the need for understanding affective attachments to politics. Finally, it demonstrates that we cannot fully understand citizenship without looking at the concrete workings of power in and through mediated discourse.
From review by Brian Thornton in *International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics*: It's ha... more From review by Brian Thornton in *International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics*:
It's hard to describe how satisfying it is now, at last, to find a book-length study of letters to the editor. And thus, since a complete book now focuses solely on letters to the editor, there is a convenient, central location to find a good bibliography of the subject. The book also includes a brief history of letters to the editor from colonial times. Exciting as it may be for scholars to find validation of this whole new subject for discourse in this book, however, another response can be sadness. Karin Wahl-Jorgensen's main points are distressing: that although newspaper editors give lip service to the value of letters to the editor as "wide open forums" for free speech, the reality is quite different. Many editors she interviewed at a San Francisco weekly newspaper and elsewhere really don't like either letters or letter writers. Unfortunately, these editors often regard printing letters to the editor as grunt work, "getting the pages out." They also often see letter writers as "cranks, nuts," or "crazy bastards." Editorial staffers assign code letters to letters, Wahl-Jorgensen writes. For instance, O3 means a writer is "way out in the Ozone." Unfortunately, "the idiom of insanity was one of the rallying points of the editorial page staff's community of interpretation," Wahl-Jorgensen continues. What this boils down to is that the editorial page staff who publish the letters often "laugh in the face of public discourse, of democracy; letter writers are rarely discussed in a language other than the idiom of insanity."
Journalists and the Public is a solidly researched, germinal book. It offers concrete evidence of poor treatment of letters to the editor. The author's findings are important in so many ways that many people will use this book as a solid foundation - and much can be built on it.
Based on the largest study of the media coverage of public opinion and citizenship in Britain and... more Based on the largest study of the media coverage of public opinion and citizenship in Britain and the United States, this book argues that while most of us learn about politics and public affairs from the news media, we rarely see or read about examples of an active, engaged citizenry.
Probably the biggest election story of recent times is the transformation of Ed Miliband from Wei... more Probably the biggest election story of recent times is the transformation of Ed Miliband from Weird Ed to teenage heartthrob. Throughout the election, the Labour leader has been the target of negative campaigning from the Conservative Party and right-leaning newspapers; he has suffered with unfavourable comparisons with his brother and has been ridiculed for his two kitchens. But now, the tune has changed. Step aside, Robot Ed. The time has come for Ed Miliband the sex symbol.
The transformation of Ed has little to do with the Labour Party’s attempt at rebranding him, and everything to do with the power of social media.
Mass media have always served as central institutions of the public sphere, providing opportuniti... more Mass media have always served as central institutions of the public sphere, providing opportunities for public debate and opinion formation. This chapter addresses the historical development of mediated forums for public participation, paying particular attention to the relationship between technological change and transformations in the role of media professionals as gatekeepers in mediated communities of opinion. It argues that successive waves of technological change have had profound consequences in terms of broadening access as well as diversifying forms, platforms and genres through which communities of opinion have taken shape. In the process, journalists and media organizations have been compelled to loosen their grip on editorial control over the mediated expression of public opinion. This shift has taken place alongside -and in part as a result ofdevelopments through which the ideal of interactivity and the valorization of participation have gained ever more purchase. The early history of communities of opinion: tracing the development of letters to the editor Early print publications, by most measures the first mass media, made little distinction between opinion and news content, or, correspondingly, between opinion pieces in the form of letters to the editor and reports on current events. In the prominent account of Jürgen Habermas in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (1989), for example, the first newspapers emerged as the organic 1 continuation of private newsletters. Before the advent of the steam train and the telegraph, printers relied on news arriving by postal coach or ship, and stories
Technologies, Media and Journalism, 2014
This chapter focuses on how new media technologies, in generating new participatory opportunities... more This chapter focuses on how new media technologies, in generating new participatory opportunities, might challenge journalistic paradigms, self-understandings, and epistemologies. It takes a particular interest in how long-standing notions of journalistic objectivity might be under fire at a time of shifting relationships between journalists and, as Rosen (2007) put it, "the people formerly known as the audience." The chapter seeks to position the study of journalism with respect to arguments around an "affective turn" across social sciences and humanities disciplines. It argues that despite the historical denigration of emotion in public discourse, ordinary people's personal and emotional stories have always been valued in participatory formats. But what is changing now is that with the increased prevalence of user-generated or amateur content, these emotional stories, told in new and non-objective forms, are no longer physically and spatially marked off as exceptional through their location in specific sections or pages of a newspaper, and hence "ghettoized" or "segregated" (Coward 2013; Wahl-Jorgensen 2008). Instead, they have become part and parcel of news content, challenging epistemologies of journalism.
Copyright © 2014 (Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, wahl-jorgensenk@cf.ac.uk). Licensed under the Creative Co... more Copyright © 2014 (Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, wahl-jorgensenk@cf.ac.uk). Licensed under the Creative
Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives (by-nc-nd). Available at http://ijoc.org.
Is WikiLeaks Challenging the Paradigm of Journalism?
Boundary Work and Beyond
KARIN WAHL-JORGENSEN
Cardiff University, Wales
Introduction
WikiLeaks exists in a peculiar and illustrative tension with journalism that dramatizes larger unfolding debates about the authority, status, and future of journalism. This article explores what the WikiLeaks saga can tell us, in a broader sense, about pressing anxieties of the journalism profession and, relatedly, the discipline of journalism studies. The article explores how journalists and journalism scholars have discussed the revelations of WikiLeaks as well as the organization itself. I suggest that, whereas some observers have argued that WikiLeaks heralds a radical transformation in understandings of journalism, others are keen to see it as just another source—a phenomenon easily subsumed under existing definitions of journalism and deployed in its service. The article investigates the ways in which WikiLeaks challenges conventional paradigms of news coverage insofar as it provides—and publishes—the investigative materials that journalists themselves usually take pride in uncovering. Through this activity, the organization’s emergence reflects larger developments representing a shake-up in conventional hierarchies of voice and access to the public sphere. At the same time, WikiLeaks has also served as a novel and unique type of news source, and the ambiguous figure of Julian Assange has been variously appropriated in news narratives as a heroic defender of free expression—described as a courageous whistleblower willing to speak truth to power on the one hand, and an autistic renegade, recluse, and alleged rapist on the other (e.g., Rusbridger, 2011, p. 6). These conflicting and ever-evolving accounts of the organization and its shape-shifting front man coexist in media coverage and scholarly debates and reflect a more profound set of questions about the changing nature of journalism and, hence, the need to refine understandings of the profession and our conceptual tools for studying it.
This chapter discusses the journalistic practices shaping the reporting of politics. It is argued... more This chapter discusses the journalistic practices shaping the reporting of politics. It is argued to conceive of political journalism as a subspace within the journalistic field that interacts intensively with the political field, because this theoretical approach highlights the power relations and world views produced by the insider culture of journalists and political actors. Moreover, the chapter suggests that this insider culture affords political journalists privileged access to information, but may also hamper their autonomy and the transparency of their actions. Further, the chapter argues that the routines and constraints of news production only strengthen this reliance on authoritative sources. Technological change and commercial pressures, however, may represent a challenge to this relationship and the practices which govern it. The chapter closes with a call for studies on political journalism in non-Western contexts, on non-elite, local media and for more comparative research efforts in order to broaden the rather partial and limited picture of political journalism we have so far.
Javnost/The Public, 2013
This paper looks at how British political elites discuss the European public sphere and citizens... more This paper looks at how British political elites discuss the
European public sphere and citizens’ participation within
it. Drawing on 41 in-depth interviews with political elites
– including politicians at national and European levels, journalists,
political activists, and think-tank professionals – the
paper explores interviewees’ understandings of the European
public sphere, and their perceptions about its vitality. Our
research reveals a great deal of scepticism about the idea
of a European public sphere, in part rooted in conventional
British Euro-sceptic approaches, and in part fostered by a
perception of the remoteness and democratic defi cit of the
European Union.
Media History and the Foundations of Media Studies (John Nerone, Ed), 2013
While the Chicago School has subtly but profoundly shaped and influenced the direction of scholar... more While the Chicago School has subtly but profoundly shaped and influenced the direction of scholarship on mass media, the history of its engagement with mass communication researchers is also a history of missed connections and opportunities.
At least two different stories can be told in tracing the legacies of the Chicago School on work in media studies. One is a tale of triumph: The Chicago School has had a significant impact on scholarship in the field, in its normative assessment of the media’s role in society and its empirical work in understanding
it. Another is a tale of loss and marginalization, witnessed by the decline of the socially engaged and often qualitative approach of the school and its diminishing presence within the collective conscience of the discipline today. Both of these
stories are true. The Chicago School arose out of a particular moment, with its companion preoccupations and anxieties, but its contributions subsequently fell to the wayside in the face of profound epistemological shifts. The Chicago School gave voice to the idea that media and communication have a central role
to play in shaping individual and collective lives, and in cementing identities and communities. This idea has helped to justify and solidify the notion that we cannot understand society without understanding how we communicate with
each other and how the media shape our social bonds and social worlds.
BBC Breadth of Opinion Review Content Analysis
This paper studies the role of subjectivity in the language of award-winning journalism. The pape... more This paper studies the role of subjectivity in the language of award-winning journalism. The paper draws on a content analysis of Pulitzer Prize-winning articles in a range of news categories between 1995 and 2011. The analysis indicates that despite the continued prominence of the ideal of objectivity in scholarly and journalistic debates, award-winning journalistic stories are in fact pervaded by subjective language in the form of what linguists refer to as ‘‘appraisals,’’ as well as the narrative construction of emotive appeals. The subjective language use of award-winning stories, however, does not straightforwardly or consistently undermine claims to objectivity. On
that basis, the paper concludes that any binary oppositions between objectivity and subjectivity and, relatedly, emotionality and rationality, may be overly simplistic and obscure the complexities of journalistic story-telling.
Taking as its vantage point Gaye Tuchman’s (1972) notion of the strategic ritual of objectivity, ... more Taking as its vantage point Gaye Tuchman’s (1972) notion of the strategic ritual of objectivity, this paper argues that there is also a strategic ritual of emotionality in journalism -- an institutionalized and systematic practice of journalists infusing their reporting with emotion. To examine the strategic ritual of emotionality, the paper considers Pulitzer Prize-winning articles between 1995 and 2011, taking the prize as a marker of cultural capital in the journalistic field. A coding scheme for a basic content analysis was developed on the basis of scholarly insights into journalistic narratives, as well as discourse analytic approaches associated with appraisal theory.
The analysis indicates that the analyzed stories rely heavily on emotional story-telling. The strategic ritual of emotionality manifests itself in the overwhelming use of anecdotal leads, personalized story-telling and expressions of affect. Journalists ‘outsource’ emotional labor by describing the emotions of others, and drawing on sources to discuss their emotions.
The BBC elicits and uses a number of different types of audience material, but the corporation ha... more The BBC elicits and uses a number of different types of audience material, but the corporation has most wholeheartedly embraced what we call Audience Content (eyewitness footage or photos, accounts of experiences, and story tip-offs). Indeed, when the term user-generated content (UGC) is used by BBC news journalists it usually denotes only this kind of material. Audience material is often described by commentators and practitioners as having revolutionised journalism by disrupting the traditional relationships between producers and consumers of the news. In the main journalists and editors see material from the audience as just another news source, a formulation which is perpetuated by the institutional frameworks set up to elicit and process audience material as well as the content of the corporation’s UGC training. Our data suggest that,
with the exception of some marginal collaborative projects, rather than changing the way most news journalists at the BBC work, audience material is firmly embedded within the long-standing routines of traditional journalism practice.
Anger motivates people to engage in political action, fuelling collective struggles for justice a... more Anger motivates people to engage in political action, fuelling collective struggles for justice and recognition. However, because of its close association with irrationality and aggression, the public expression of anger has historically been discouraged. This article focuses on expressions of anger in British disaster coverage between 1952 and 1999. In particular, we look at the relationship between anger, journalistic practices and opportunities for ordinary people to express themselves politically. Our article concludes that anger opens up a space for ordinary people to critique power holders, allowing victims and those affected by disasters to raise questions of systemic failure and blame. And such questions, it appears, are increasingly part of the emotional management style of disaster journalism.
News organisations increasingly view user-generated content as a vital resource for audience enga... more News organisations increasingly view user-generated content as a vital resource for audience engagement and empowerment. Researchers have investigated the production practices and journalistic cultures surrounding user-generated content but have paid less attention to the audiences who produce and consume the content. This paper seeks to fill this gap in knowledge, drawing on a series of focus groups to understand why audiences value particular forms of user-generated content and renounce others. Further, by comparing focus group findings to data from in-depth interviews with BBC producers and journalists, it explores how audience perceptions differ from those of producers. In particular, the paper focuses on why and how audiences value news-based user-generated content (in the form of images, footages and eyewitness accounts), which is perceived as authentic, immediate and “real.” This is contrasted with a dislike for audience comment, or opinion-based contributions, seen as ill-informed, repetitive and extremist. By contrast, BBC producers and journalists are more concerned with the UGC as a tool to supplement traditional news-gathering practices.
The Conversation, Mar 18, 2015
On Labour's attempt at rebranding Ed Miliband - an uphill battle in the face of media war against... more On Labour's attempt at rebranding Ed Miliband - an uphill battle in the face of media war against him.
The Conversation, Mar 11, 2015
The Conversation, Mar 4, 2015
Election campaign coverage is an odd genre, made up of game show, satire and soap opera in equal ... more Election campaign coverage is an odd genre, made up of game show, satire and soap opera in equal measures. It tends to be about one of three topics: the election horse race; slinging mud and poking fun at the leaders, their gaffes and the weaknesses they imply; and the campaign stunts that succeed and those that fail.
So far, 2015 is no exception. [...]