Inspired by Madison s observation, Mark Lloyd has crafted a complex and powerful assessment of the relationship between communications and democracy in the United States. In Prologue to a Farce, he argues that citizens political capabilities depend on broad public access to media technologies, but that the U.S. communications environment has become unfairly dominated by corporate interests.
Drawing on a wealth of historical sources, Lloyd demonstrates that despite the persistent hope that a new technology (from the telegraph to the Internet) will rise to serve the needs of the...
Inspired by Madison s observation, Mark Lloyd has crafted a complex and powerful assessment of the relationship between communications and democrac...
In Waves of Opposition, Elizabeth Fones-Wolf describes and analyzes the battles over the powerful new medium of radio, which helped spark the massive upsurge of organized labor during the Depression. She demonstrates its importance as a weapon in an ideological war between labor and business, where corporations used radio to sing the praises of individualism and consumerism, while unions emphasized equal rights, industrial democracy, and social justice. Organized chronologically, the work explores the advent of local labor radio stations such as WCFL and WEVD, labor's anti-censorship...
In Waves of Opposition, Elizabeth Fones-Wolf describes and analyzes the battles over the powerful new medium of radio, which helped spark the massive ...
Newspapers do more than provide information. They enter into the process of forming communities, from voluntary associations to cities to nation-states.
Widely acknowledged as one of our most insightful commentators on the history of American journalism, David Paul Nord offers a lively and wide-ranging discussion of journalism as a vital component of community. In settings ranging from the religion-infused towns of colonial America to the rapidly expanding urban metropolises of the late nineteenth century, Nord explores the cultural work of the press.
Nord perceives the daily press as an...
Newspapers do more than provide information. They enter into the process of forming communities, from voluntary associations to cities to nation-state...
Matthew C. Ehrlich's Journalism in the Movies is the story of Hollywood's depiction of American journalism from the start of the sound era to the present. Ehrlich argues that films have relentlessly played off the image of the journalist as someone who sees through lies and hypocrisy, sticks up for the little guy, and serves democracy. Focusing on films about key figures and events in journalism, including Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, All the President's Men, and The Insider, Journalism in the Movies presents a unique opportunity to reflect on how movies relate not only to journalism but...
Matthew C. Ehrlich's Journalism in the Movies is the story of Hollywood's depiction of American journalism from the start of the sound era to the pres...
In "How Free Can the Press Be?" Randall P. Bezanson explores contradictions embedded in understanding press freedom in America by discussing nine of the most pivotal and provocative First Amendment cases in U.S. judicial history.
In "How Free Can the Press Be?" Randall P. Bezanson explores contradictions embedded in understanding press freedom in America by discussing nine o...
As a counterpart to research on the 1930s that has focused on liberal and radical writers calling for social revolution, David Welky offers this eloquent study of how mainstream print culture shaped and disseminated a message affirming conservative middle-class values and assuring its readers that holding to these values would get them through hard times. Through analysis of the era's most popular newspaper stories, magazines, and books, Welky examines how voices both outside and within the media debated the purposes of literature and the meaning of cultural literacy in a mass democracy. He...
As a counterpart to research on the 1930s that has focused on liberal and radical writers calling for social revolution, David Welky offers this eloqu...
Why the First Amendment fails to protect speech rights and what to do about it
The First Amendment is the principle guarantor of speech rights in the United States, but the court's interpretations of it often privilege the interests of media owners over those of the broader citizenry. In Speech Rights in America, Laura Stein argues that such rulings prevent the First Amendment from performing its critical role as a protector of free speech, alienate citizens from their rights, and corrupt the essential workings of democracy.
Stein locates the source of clashes over First...
Why the First Amendment fails to protect speech rights and what to do about it
The First Amendment is the principle guarantor of speech right...
This wide-ranging study--hailed by American Journalism as one of the year's best books--provides a fresh and surprising view of the religious impulses at work in the typical newsroom by delving into the largely unexamined parallels between religion and journalism, from the "media" of antiquity to the electronic idolatry of the Internet. Focusing on how the history of religion in the United States has been entwined with the growth of the media, Doug Underwood argues that American journalists are rooted in the nation's moral and religious heritage and operate, in important ways, as...
This wide-ranging study--hailed by American Journalism as one of the year's best books--provides a fresh and surprising view of the religious i...
Drawing on a textual analysis of over five hundred news reports, Deepa Kumar presents a rare, in-depth study of media representation of the 1997 United Parcel Service (UPS) workers' strike. She delineates the history of the strike, how it coincided with the rise of globalization, and how the mainstream media were pressured to incorporate pro-labor arguments that challenged the dominant logic of neoliberalism.
Drawing on a textual analysis of over five hundred news reports, Deepa Kumar presents a rare, in-depth study of media representation of the 1997 Unite...
