Roaming in the Garden of Freedom:' Constructions of U.S
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Syracuse University SURFACE Dissertations - ALL SURFACE 8-2014 `ROAMING IN THE GARDEN OF FREEDOM:' CONSTRUCTIONS OF U.S. IDEOLOGY, IDENTITY, AND THE PAST IN TELEVISION NEWS'S ANNIVERSARY COVERAGE ABOUT THE BERLIN WALL Rachel Eve Somerstein Syracuse University Follow this and additional works at: https://surface.syr.edu/etd Part of the Journalism Studies Commons Recommended Citation Somerstein, Rachel Eve, "`ROAMING IN THE GARDEN OF FREEDOM:' CONSTRUCTIONS OF U.S. IDEOLOGY, IDENTITY, AND THE PAST IN TELEVISION NEWS'S ANNIVERSARY COVERAGE ABOUT THE BERLIN WALL" (2014). Dissertations - ALL. 130. https://surface.syr.edu/etd/130 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the SURFACE at SURFACE. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations - ALL by an authorized administrator of SURFACE. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract This study employs a multimodal close reading to examine and compare how NBC’s Nightly News and various primetime CNN news shows construct the story of the Berlin Wall’s opening from 1990 through 2009. It does so first by examining the networks’ 1989 coverage and assessing the themes and ideologies circulated when the Berlin Wall’s opening was breaking news. These themes and ideologies are used as a baseline to assess anniversary coverage that aired from 1990 through 2009. In the process of this close reading, special attention is paid to silences and omissions amid images and spoken discourses; the circulation of World War II and Holocaust-related discourses; and the influence of hypermediacy and liveness on the programming. The results show that the coverage coheres into two distinct typologies: anniversary-as-process and anniversary-as-spectacle, two new concepts introduced by this dissertation. The implications for anniversary journalism, public memory of the Berlin Wall and collective memory of World War II are discussed. ‘ROAMING IN THE GARDEN OF FREEDOM:’ CONSTRUCTIONS OF U.S. IDEOLOGY, IDENTITY, AND THE PAST IN TELEVISION NEWS’S ANNIVERSARY COVERAGE ABOUT THE BERLIN WALL By Rachel Eve Somerstein B.A., cum laude, Cornell University, 2004 M.F.A., New York University, 2009 DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Mass Communications in the Graduate School of Syracuse University August 2014 Copyright 2014 Rachel Eve Somerstein All Rights Reserved Acknowledgments So many teachers to thank, starting with my committee. Dennis Kinsey gave me the support and the space to be my own person in the doctoral program. I am so grateful for his ceaseless encouragement, which endured throughout the many intellectual and personal events that took place during graduate school. Anne Demo’s course in visual culture gave me the concepts and vocabulary that transformed how I think, write, and speak about images. Anne, you have helped me to bring my scholarship and criticism to a much deeper level. Bob Thompson showed me how to speak passionately and eloquently about television. Very early in this process, reader Brad Gorham asked thoughtful and direct questions that helped me to clarify my ideas. Shannon Novak, also a reader, taught a class in materiality that opened an array of new methodological and intellectual tools and inspired me to think about ‘doing’ history beyond the word and image. In her course on memory, my chair, Ann Gold, exposed me to key ideas about remembering and forgetting that inform this dissertation. Finally, other faculty at Syracuse have supported me on the doctoral journey, especially Barbara Fought, the teacher’s teacher, and Richard Breyer, whose insights have made my work overall conceptually stronger and more personally meaningful. At Cornell, professors Mary Roldan and Michael Kammen got me started on collective memory. They also taught me to do interdisciplinary, archival work, skills that have served me well ever since. Jon Jucovy, my history teacher at Ramaz, first showed me how fascinating, fun, and in- your-eye provocative studying history could be. iv My fellow students at Newhouse have also been important teachers. I could not have finished the program without the time, energy, and graciousness of Greg Munno, Linda Daley, Laura Osur, Dan Amernick, Alicia Wright, Molly Kalan, Sherri Williams, or Kristi Gilmore. You have all taught me how to do research by example. Laura’s insights in particular greatly improved this project, particularly the chapter on NBC News. Dan’s thesis on the Muppet Show was an excellent model of how to do multimodal analysis. People outside of the carrels also helped me through this dissertation with advice, great cooking, good humor, patience, support, and ice cream, most notably Briana and Jason Kohlbrenner, Mark Povinelli, Brendan Rose, Meghan Holtan, Charlotte Nunes, Rebecca Wester, Rachel Margolis, Laura Rowntree, Erica Tunick, and Rebecca Gordon. Thank you for helping me to remember how much there is to do beyond the computer and for your extremely loyal and loving friendship. Thank you to my loving families: David, Debbie, Ben, Sam, Abby, and Josh Tyler; Tom, Karen, Ben, and Ehrin Lingeman; and Marianne and Mildred Mason. My parents, Mark and Lynn Somerstein, fielded complaints and frustrations, but also rejoiced in my successes, and reminded me to do so as well. Dad: I especially appreciate that you told me to “just write” when I felt lost, and for your historical metaphors for making it through when I felt most at sea (“Build a navy”). I wouldn’t have stumbled onto this topic, or continued to see it through, without you. Mom: I cannot put into words how much your compassion, high standards, and sharp editor’s eye improved this project. To say nothing of how watching you complete your doctorate inspired me v to do the same. Your calm and support in the face of my many manic Mondays have meant the world. Thanks to my husband, Joe Lingeman. His influence is evident throughout this study. In particular, the idea of investigating the qualities inherent to television was inspired by the Transmedia seminar Joe taught in fall 2013 and our conversations about Clement Greenberg’s essay On Modernism. Joe, thank you for your unshakeable belief that I could accomplish what often seemed impossible, impractical, and crazy, and for inspiring me to take a walk, get on the bike, and generally be less of a workaholic. In short: “How lucky I ran into you / When everything was possible!” Lastly, this project would not have been possible without the support of John Lynch and his colleagues at the Vanderbilt Television Archive, who digitized and reproduced many, many hours of television news programming. vi Table of contents Abstract............................................................................................................................................i Acknowledgements.........................................................................................................................iv Table of Contents...........................................................................................................................vii Chapter 1: Introduction....................................................................................................................8 Chapter 2: Television, images, and research questions.................................................................26 Chapter 3: Methods........................................................................................................................44 Chapter 4: NBC Nightly News......................................................................................................55 1989 coverage....................................................................................................................56 Anniversary-as-process......................................................................................................68 Anniversary-as-spectacle...................................................................................................79 Chapter 5: CNN...........................................................................................................................102 1989 coverage..................................................................................................................104 Anniversary-as-process....................................................................................................109 Anniversary-as-spectacle.................................................................................................115 Chapter 6: Discussion..................................................................................................................139 Implications......................................................................................................................140 Study limitations..............................................................................................................148 Future research.................................................................................................................149 References....................................................................................................................................150 Biographical information.............................................................................................................166 vii Chapter 1: Introduction “It is easy to see the beginnings of things, and harder to see the ends.” Joan Didion, Goodbye to All That Tom Brokaw got lucky. On 9 November 1989, the NBC News anchor