Examines the strategies and histories of activist employees at 18 large city newspapers in the United States. Discusses activism as it relates to race and ethnicity issues, gender issues, sexual orientation issues, unions, the perceived impact of activism on newsrooms, and the personal dimensions of activism. (SR)

Uses a new cultural framework for the analysis of science popularization for textual analysis of the "Scientist at Work" column of the "New York Times." Shows that, although the journalists try to demystify the scientific enterprise, they juxtapose "pure" science against other dimensions of scientific work, thus…

Traces historical evidence of the critical ambivalence toward American literary journalism not only by "belles lettres" and the literature academy, but also by the journalism community and the journalism/mass communications academy. Suggests that since at least the latter part of the 19th century, literary journalism has fallen from…

Examines how journalists use three narrative strategies (synecdoche, omission, and personalization) to assert their authority in their retellings of the John F. Kennedy assassination. Finds that, by giving themselves a central position within the story, journalists make the assassination story as much about American journalists as about Kennedy's…

Contributes to rhetoric, moral reasonings scholarship, and journalism scholarship by examining public rhetoric on abortion and American popular media coverage (1940s to 1990s). Finds that the feminine means of moral reasoning has emerged into the foreground of discourse on abortion. Compares emergence of a common-ground rhetoric on abortion with a…

Analyzes how Hollywood's journalism movie genre has portrayed the news media over the years. Suggests that the movies' relationship to the press reflects a fundamentally ambivalent relationship between the press and the broader culture and that Hollywood explicitly portrays institutional and cultural tensions within journalism which the news media…

Notes that news media use has declined in recent years, particularly among young people. Offers a critical review of research on the changing role of journalism in political socialization. Evaluates calls for popular alternatives to conventional forms of news and for a postmodern conception of citizenship and the public sphere. Concludes that more…

Presents a reply to the critics of his essay (this issue). Indicates that recent histories have strengthened the monopoly that the penny press has achieved in the discussion of journalism history in the 1830s and beyond, often while reasserting questionable claims about market structure, readership, political stance, and national and historical…

Discusses current themes in communication research. Claims that this research offers an increasingly sophisticated view of journalism as a reflection not of an objective reality, but of political-economic power and sociocultural conflict. Includes an example of an imaginary symposium and a strategy for reframing the journalistic quest for truth.…

Argues that morality is a form of reality construction requiring a socially negotiated sensibility. Notes that this view is harmonious with the essential interpretive task of journalism. Stresses the importance of moral imagination as an aspect of moral reasoning, and claims that ethical action depends on an ethics of vision, a "seeing"…

Discusses the responsibilities of mass media scholars to the public sphere. Describes a number of experiments now being conducted to redefine journalism in the spirit of and on behalf of the public. Discusses the work of the Project on Public Life and the Press, a model for embracing a civic professionalism and taking on a civic identity. (SR)

Examines how public discourse engages and redirects the constitutive powers of human communication. (JK)

Proposes viewing journalists as members of an interpretive community (not a profession) united by its shared discourse and collective interpretations of key public events. Applies the frame of the interpretive community to journalistic discourse about two events central for American journalists--Watergate and McCarthyism. (SR)

Schudson, Dan Schiller, Donald L. Shaw, and John J. Pauly discuss John C. Nerone's article (this issue) and suggest other approaches to the study of the penny press. (JK)

Discusses the tradition of rhetorical theory and scholarship to sketch the chief characteristics of public communication. Suggests some implications for the study and criticism of contemporary media discourses of a rhetorical nature. (JK)