Perspectives on American Journalism

Catalog description

The course examines a number of current issues and topics surrounding journalism including: ethics, state of the industry, and news vs. entertainment. COMM 407B Perspectives on American Journalism (3) Journalism is a unique occupation. News editors, reporters, producers, anchors, and other media professionals have a special responsibility to the public - the responsibility to provide their readers and audience members with the information they need in order to make choices about how to vote, what issues to get involved with, how to live their daily lives. While journalists - unlike members of other professions - have very few laws that exist specifically to govern their work, their duty to the public carries with it a number of important ethical burdens and responsibilities to the public and to society as a whole. The course examines a number of current issues and topics surrounding journalism. While there will be new themes and topics for each week's class, nearly all of the topics are interrelated, and each class will build on what has gone before. Among the topics that will be covered are the current state of the news industry, the ethical guidelines that journalists are supposed to follow, the blurring of lines between news and entertainment, and the news media's role in making people famous or infamous. The issues that we examine in this course will be most directly related to the practice of journalism, although we may touch on other aspects of communications (e.g. advertising or public relations) from time to time. Our goal will be to examine news coverage with a critical eye - to think about the reasoning and decision-making that shape the final products that we read or view. The class meetings themselves will center on discussion of the readings and presentation of real-world examples drawing from current news stories and issues involving the news industry.