SHAPING MODERNITY THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER
SHAPING MODERNITY THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY HISTORY THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
BEGINNINGS: IMPERIAL BULLETINS
▸ Before the advent of the newspaper, there were two major kinds of periodical news publications: the handwritten news sheet, and single item news publications. Both existed simultaneously. ▸ The Roman Empire published Acta Diurna ("Daily Acts"), or government announcement bulletins, around 59 BC. Their medium: metal or stone. Publication form: They were posted in public places. ▸ In China, the government produced news sheets called Dibao. („reports from the residences“). They were commonly used among court officials during the late Han dynasty (2nd and 3rd centuries AD). Their medium: silk. Publication form: They were read out by government officials. ▸ During the Tang Dynasty (618–906), the „Kai Yuan Za Bao" published the government news. The medium: paper. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
BEGINNINGS: IMPERIAL BULLETINS
▸ In early modern Europe (1500-1700), the rising need for information was met by concise handwritten news-sheets, called avvisi (notice, warning, advice or announcement). They were similar to letters written from one dignitary to another. Their function: convey political, military, and economic news quickly and efficiently to Italian cities. Two categories: public and secret avvisi. ▸ In 1556, the government of Venice first published the monthly Notizie scritte, which cost one gazetta, a small coin. ▸ Due to restrictions from censorship on printed works and a desire for personalization, hand-written news-sheets were not replaced by the printing press until the middle of the 17th century.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
FUN FACT: THE „TÜRKENKALENDER“
▸ When the Turks attacked Constantinopel in 1453 - shortly before the printing press was invented - it was seen as a threat to the whole Western or Christian society. The „Türkenkalender“ is a reaction to this attack.
▸ It had a headline - just like newspapers today. It offered an amazing mixture of different types of information - a wild, new mix that did not follow the conventions of public announcements in the Middle Ages. It combined several older forms of text processing: letter, sermon or prayer, and - as strange as it may sound - calendar.
▸ The calendar consisted of past and future (!) atrocities of the Turks to the Christians.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
THE FIRST NEWSPAPERS
▸ The emergence of the new media in the 17th century has to be seen in close connection with the printing press from which the publishing press derives its name.
▸ „Relation aller Fürnemmen und gedenckwürdigen Historien“ is often recognized as the first newspaper. ▸ It was printed from 1605 in Strasbourg by Johan Carolus.
▸ In 1609, „Avisa Relation oder Zeitung“ followed („Was sich begeben und zugetragen hat“). It was published in Wolfenbüttel and consisted of a news collection from various countries. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
THE CAROLUS PETITION: THE NEWSPAPER’S BIRTH CERTIFICATE
▸ „Whereas I have hitherto been in receipt of the weekly news advice [handwritten news reports] and, in recompense for some of the expenses incurred yearly, have informed yourselves every week regarding an annual allowance; Since, however, the copying has been slow and has necessarily taken much time, and since, moreover, I have recently purchased at a high and costly price the former printing workshop of the late Thomas Jobin and placed and installed the same in my house at no little expense, albeit only for the sake of gaining time, and since for several weeks, and now for the twelfth occasion, I have set, printed and published the said advice in my printing workshop, likewise not without much effort, inasmuch as on each occasion I have had to remove the formes from the presses … „ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
CHRONOLOGY: EUROPE
▸ 1618: The Dutch Courante uyt Italien, Duytslandt, &c. (Courant from Italy, Germany, etc.) is the first newspaper to appear in folio rather than quarto-size. ▸ 1620: The first English-language newspaper, Corrant out of Italy, Germany, etc. is published in Amsterdam. A year and a half later, Corante, or weekely newes from Italy, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Bohemia, France and the Low Countreys is published in England.
▸ 1631: The first newspaper in France is published in 1631, La Gazette (originally titled as „Gazette de France“). ▸ 1641: The first newspaper in Portugal, A Gazeta da Restauracao, is published in Lisbon. ▸ 1645: Post- och Inrikes Tidningar - founded as Ordinari Post Tijdender is published in Sweden. It is the oldest newspaper still in existence, though it now publishes solely online. ▸ 1661: The first Spanish newspaper, Gaceta de Madrid, and the first Polish newspaper, Merkuriusz Polski Ordynaryiny, are published.
▸ 1702: The first successful English daily, The Daily Courant, is published.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
CHRONOLOGY: AMERICA
▸ 1690: Only one edition of Publick Occurrences Both Foreign and Domestick is published, the first newspaper in the American colonies. The paper was suppressed by the government. ▸ 1704: The Boston News-Letter becomes the first continuously published newspaper in the colonies. Soon after, weekly papers began publishing in New York and Philadelphia. These early newspapers followed the British format and were usually four pages long. They mostly carried news from Britain. ▸ 1752: The Halifax Gazette is published, which claims to be "Canada's first newspaper." Its official descendant, The Royal Gazette, is a government publication for legal notices and proclamations rather than a proper newspaper. ▸ 1783: The Pennsylvania Evening Post becomes America’s first daily. THE PRESS IS THE CHILD AND THE FATHER OF THE REVOLUTION. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
HAD A FREE PRESS EXISTED IN FRANCE BEFORE 1789, THE REVOLUTION WOULD NEVER HAVE TAKEN PLACE.
James Mill THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
JEAN-PAUL MARAT (1743-1793)
▸ Political theorist, journalist, and scientist; one of the most radical voices of the French Revolution.
▸ He published his views in pamphlets and newspapers, notably his periodical „L’ami du peuple“ (Friend of the people).
▸ His journalism became renowned for its fierce tone, uncompromising stance towards the new leaders and institutions of the revolution, and advocacy of basic human rights. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
THIS PERJURER OF A KING, WITHOUT FAITH, WITHOUT SHAME, WITHOUT REMORSE, THIS MONARCH UNWORTHY OF A THRONE, HAS BEEN RESTRAINED ONLY BY THE FEAR OF BEING SHOWN UP AS AN INFAMOUS BEAST. THE THIRST FOR ABSOLUTE POWER THAT CONSUMES HIS SOUL WILL SOON TURN HIM INTO A FEROCIOUS MURDERER, SOON HE WILL BE SWIMMING IN THE BLOOD OF HIS FELLOW CITIZENS WHO WILL REFUSE TO SUBMIT TO HIS TYRANNOUS YOKE. MEANWHILE HE IS LAUGHING AT THE FOLLY OF THE PARISIANS WHO STUPIDLY TOOK HIM AT HIS WORD.
Jean-Paul Marat
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
CAMILLE DESMOULINS (1760-1794)
▸ Journalist and politician; childhood friend of Robespierre, friend and ally of Georges Danton;
▸ In 1789, he published two radical pamphlets. „La France Libre“ calls for a republic: „Popular and democratic government is the only constitution which suits France, and all those who are worthy of the name of men.“ He criticizes in detail the role and rights of kings, the nobility, and the Roman Catholic clergy. The „Discourse de la lanterne Parisiens“ celebrates political violence and attributes qualities of loyalty and patriotism to the revolutionaries; as a result, he became famous as the ‚Lanterne Attorney/Prosecutor‘.
▸ From 1789 to 1791 he issued a weekly publication, „Histoire des Revolutions de France et de Brabant“, combining political reportage, revolutionary polemics, satire, and cultural commentary: „The universe and all its follies shall be included in the jurisdiction of this hypercritical journal.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
CAMILLE DESMOULINS (1760-1794)
▸ His 1792 pamphlet „Jean Pierre Brissot demasqué“ contributed to the arrest and execution of many Girondist leaders, including Brissot himself. Desmoulins intensely regretted his role in the death of the Girondists. At the trial, he was heard to lament: „Oh my God, my God! It is I who killed them!“
▸ From 1793 to 1794 he published the journal for which he would be best known: „Le Vieux Cordelier“. In the seven issues of that journal, he condemned the brutality, suspicion and fear that had come to characterize the revolution, comparing the ongoing revolutionary terror to the oppressive reign of Roman emperor Tiberius. He even addressed Robespierre directly: „My dear Robespierre, my old school friend. Remember the lessons of history and philosophy: love is stronger, more lasting than fear.“
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
I SHALL DIE IN THE BELIEF THAT TO MAKE FRANCE FREE, REPUBLICAN AND PROSPEROUS, A LITTLE INK WOULD HAVE SUFFICED - AND ONLY ONE GUILLOTINE.
Camille Desmoulins
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
MILTON’S AREOPAGITICIA
▸ In 1644, the English poet and scholar John Milton wrote a polemical tract opposing licensing and censorship. Its title refers to a speech written by the Athenian orator Socrates in the 5th century BC, „Areopagitikos“.
▸ „Areopagiticia“ is regarded as the most influential and impassioned philosophical defenses of press freedom ever written. Many of its expressed principles - for instance the idea of a society in which decisions are reached by open discussion - have formed the basis for modern justifications.
▸ Fun fact: It was distributed via pamphlet, defying the same publication censorship which Milton argued against. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
AMERICA WAS THE FIRST COUNTRY IN THE WORLD TO TAKE THE STEP WHICH IS NECESSARY FOR MEDIA GROWTH OF DETACHING ITS PRESS FROM THE OFFICIAL MACHINERY OF GOVERNMENT.
Mary Chapman THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
FORMS OF CENSORSHIP
▸ The term sedition in its modern meaning first appeared in the Elizabethan Era as „the notion of inciting by words or writings disaffection towards the state or constituted authority“.
▸ Sedition and seditious libel were criminal offences under English common law, and are still criminal offences in Canada. Sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that is deemed by the legal authority to tend toward insurrection against the established order: if the statement is in writing or some other permanent form it is seditious libel. ▸ A statement is seditious if it "brings into hatred or contempt" either the Queen or her heirs, the government and constitution, either House of Parliament, the administration of justice, if it incites people to attempt to change any matter of Church or state established by law (except by lawful means), or if it promotes discontent among or hostility between British subjects. A person is only guilty of the offence if they have printed words or images and intend any of the above outcomes. Proving that the statement is true is not a defence.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
THE FIRST MAGAZINE: „DIE GARTENLAUBE“ (1853)
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
ROLE MODEL: THE TIMES
▸ „The Times (of London)“ became the most technically advanced, businesslike and influential newspaper. Mary Chapman calls it „the articulate mouthpiece of British imperialism.“ ▸ The press became dependent for its profits upon commercial advertising rather than political subvention (or a high cover price). ▸ „The Times“ was the role model for journalistic independence, The „Frankfurter Zeitung“ followed in Germany (1856), „Le Temps“ in France (1861). Nine years later „Il Courier della Serra“ in Spain. ▸ They all adopted the model of serious independent journalism of „The Times“, consisting of information and opinion.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
PENNY PAPERS
▸ The shift from hand-crafted to steam-powered printing made inexpensive newspapers possible.
▸ In 1830, the first penny press newspaper came to the market: Lynde M. Walter’s „Boston Transcript“. Famous for costing one cent while other newspapers cost around 6 cents, penny press papers were revolutionary in making the news accessible to middle class citizens and workers.
▸ Publisher Benjamin H. Day founded „The New York Sun“ in 1833. Slogan: „It shines for all.“
▸ Penny press papers were no only cheap, but also innovative. They presented the 1st moon hoax, describing life on the moon. Crime reporting became part of the repertoire, as well as interviews.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
SCANDALISM: THE HELEN JEWETT CASE
▸ Helen Jewett was an upscale New York prostitute. Her murder, along with the subsequent trial and acquittal of her alleged killer, Richard P. Robinson, generated an unprecedented amount of media coverage.
▸ Her body was discovered by the matron of the brothel; Jewett was struck on the head three times with a sharp object. The murderer then set fire to Jewett’s bed.
▸ Based on the testimony of the women who lived in the brothel, the police arrested Richard P. Robinson, a repeat customer of the victim.
▸ As most of the witnesses were other prostitutes, the judge ordered his jury to disregard their testimony. The jury returned a verdict of not guilty.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
SCANDALISM: THE HELEN JEWETT CASE
▸ Jewett’s murder excited the press and the public. The coverage of the murder was highly polarized.
▸ The New York Herald provided the most complete coverage; the newspaper insisted that Robinson was the innocent victim of a vicious conspiracy. It also worked to exploit the sexual, violent details of Jewett’s death.
▸ The New York Sun argued that Robinson was guilty and that he was able to use money and the influence of wealthy relatives and his employer to buy an acquittal.
▸ The trial was responsible for nationwide changes in the approach to sex and scandal coverage by American journalists. Prior to the case, coverage of such topics by major newspapers did not exist.
▸ Personal letters of Robinson’s that became public after the trial showed him to be capable of vicious and deviant sexual behavior. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
NEWS AGENCIES
▸ News agencies joined the game since 1848. The success story of the news agencies starts with the telegraph.
▸ Agencies like Reuters started marketing news as a commodity.
▸ The first big success was Lincoln's assassination. It is a story in itself, with a journalist throwing a canister containing the news aboard on a steamboat that was just leaving New York - as yet there were no transatlantic cables in place.
▸ Punch Magazine rhymed in 1869: „England believes his telegrams/Whether they please or fright her/Other electric sparks are right/ But he is aways right-er“. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
GLOBALIZATION OF COMMUNICATION
▸ The telegraph was the first communication medium that benefitted from the potential of electricity.
▸ Charles Dickens: „Of all our modern wonders it is the most wonderful.“
▸ The telegraph speeded up the transmission of information - economical, political, private or public information. The world became a smaller place.
▸ The transmission of information was - for the first time - separated from the physical act of delivery.
▸ James Carey: „The telegraph broke the identity of transportation and communication.“
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: HISTORY
CHRONOLOGY: ASIA
▸ In British-India, two revolutions took place at the same time: printing press and newspaper.
▸ The first newspaper in English came out 1780 in Calcutta, the first in Bengali 1818. The 1830 founded paper Bombay Samachar in Gujarati is still being published.
▸ In 1836, the first Urdu-language newspaper came out, The Delhi Urdu Akhbar.
▸ Soon English newspapers were produced by Indians. They all used the technique of lithography which rapidly spread and also arrived in smaller towns.
▸ One of the reasons why newspapers were accepted so fast was the rich local tradition of written reports.
▸ After the uprising in 1857, newspapers became more strict. But no matter how strict they were, they never arrived at a gagging of the public opinion.
▸ This was not only pragmatism, as the press could be both used to inform the people, as well as to be informed about them. It also had to do with the strong liberal tradition in England.
▸ Which is why India in the 19th century was a country with a highly developed press. This can hardly be said about the other colonies. The Dutch for instance were not at all interested in a liberalization of the press. SHAPING MODERNITY THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY THEORY
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
WHAT ‚IS’ A NEWSPAPER?
▸ Classical criteria: 1) intended for the general public; 2) not restricted to a certain range of topics; 3) regular frequency of publication; 4) arrangement or design into different sections. ▸ Other criteria: 1) they are the product of a team, the editorial staff; 2) the integration of news that are beyond the regional social world knowledge the reader lived in, the presentation of news from far away; 3) the increasing actuality or up-to-date-ness, the currentness or timeliness of the news; 4) the industrial mode of production. ▸ What else was new about the newspaper? A certain vehemence of expression that was not to be found in the impersonal decrees (‚imperial bulletins’) of the governments. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
NEWSPAPER VS. NEWSBOOK
▸ If a newspaper is defined by the functional criteria of publicity, seriality, periodicity, and currency or actuality, then the Relation was the first European newspaper. ▸ Using a single criterion of "format" rather than frequency and function, English historian of printing Stanley Morison held that the Relation should be classified as a newsbook, on the grounds that it still employed the format and most of the conventions of a book: it was printed in quarto size and the text was set in a single wide column. By Morison's definition, the world's first newspaper would be the Dutch Courante uyt Italien, Duytsladt &c. ▸ By the same definition no German, English, French, or Italian weekly or daily news publications from the first half of the seventeenth century could be considered newspapers either. The World Association of Newspapers and many authorities have not adopted his definition. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
THEORIZING NEWNESS: INFORMATION THEORY
▸ Claude Shannon, The Mathematical Theory of Communication (1948)
▸ In his text, Shannon looks at the various ways of transmitting information long-distance (telegraphy, telephones, radio, television). His question: How to measure the amount of information that can be transmitted? His answer: redundancy. Whether or not we find a message informative or not depends on whether it is news to us. Information is related to surprise. ▸ „Meaning is irrelevant - to the engineering problem.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
THE PRESS AS THE FOURTH ESTATE
▸ Newspapers as a watchdog on government, shaping public opinion. Public argument became an instrument of social transformation. ▸ An additional centre of power together with the existing three: 1. monarchy, 2. church, 3. aristocracy. ▸ Three major themes: 1. the right to freedom of expression; 2. the difficult relationship between media and politicians; 3. the impact of industrialization and technology. ▸ The French revolution as caesura. Freedom of expression was short-lived, but influential - the first ever modern revolutionary papers inspired a political press elsewhere. The idea that newspapers can act as a force for change was highlighted during the English civil war and the American war of independence. ▸ Mary Chapman: „Reading a newspaper was participating in politics.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
PUBLIC OPINION IS MANUFACTURED IN PARIS, IT IS MADE WITH INK AND PAPER.
Honoré de Balzac THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
PUBLIC SPHERE: CONDITIONS
▸ 1) The formation of public opinion; ▸ 2) All citizens have access; ▸ 3) Conference in unrestricted fashion (based on the freedom of assembly, the freedom of association, the freedom to expression and publication of opinions) about matters of general interest, which implies freedom from economic and political control; ▸ 4) Debate over the general rules governing relations. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ Jürgen Habermas: „We call events and occasions ‚public’ when they are open to all, in contrast to closed or exclusive affairs.“ ▸ Gerard Hauser: „The public sphere is a discursive space in which individuals and groups associate to discuss matters of mutual interest and, where possible, to reach a common judgment about them.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ The new - ‚authentic’ - public sphere spanned public and private realms. Through „the vehicle of public opinion it put the state in touch with the needs of society“. ▸ The public sphere is distinct from the state; it can be critical of the state. ▸ The public sphere is also distinct from the (official) economy, as it is not an area of market relations but of discursive relations. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ The traditional form of public declaration usually combined two different media: a hand-written text was read out loud by specifically authorized persons. In Europe, they happened mostly before or after the sermon. ▸ Other forms of news transmission: a concatenation of private dialogues. A tells B, B tells C. A chain of communication emerges - and dies. ▸ Habermas stipulates that, due to specific historical circumstances, a new civic society emerged in the 18th century. Driven by a need for open commercial arenas where news and matters of common concern could be freely exchanged and discussed — accompanied by growing rates of literacy, accessibility to literature, and a new kind of critical journalism — a separate domain from ruling authorities started to evolve across Europe. "In its clash with the arcane and bureaucratic practices of the absolutist state, the emergent bourgeoisie gradually replaced a public sphere in which the ruler’s power was merely represented before the people with a sphere in which state authority was publicly monitored through informed and critical discourse by the people.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
RISE OF THE BOURGEOIS PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ The public sphere was well established in various locations including coffee shops and salons, areas of society where various people could gather and discuss matters that concerned them. The coffee houses in London society at this time became the centers of art and literary criticism, which gradually widened to include even the economic and the political disputes as matters of discussion. In French salons, as Habermas says, "opinion became emancipated from the bonds of economic dependence". Any new work, or a book or a musical composition had to get its legitimacy in these places. It not only paved a forum for self-expression, but in fact had become a platform for airing one’s opinions and agendas for public discussion. ▸ The emergence of bourgeois public sphere was particularly supported by the 18th century liberal democracy making resources available to this new political class to establish a network of institutions like publishing enterprises, newspapers and discussion forums, and the democratic press was a main tool to execute this. The key feature of this public sphere was its separation from the power of both the church and the government due to its access to a
variety of resources, both economic and social. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
FALL OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ The public sphere of rational politics, free from both the economy and the State, was destroyed by the same forces that initially established it. This collapse was due to the consumeristic drive that infiltrated society, so citizens became more concerned about consumption than political actions. ▸ Furthermore, the growth of capitalistic economy led to an uneven distribution of wealth, thus widening economic polarity. Suddenly the media became a tool of political forces and a medium for advertising rather than the medium from which the public got their information on political matters. This resulted in limiting access to the public sphere and the political control of the public sphere was inevitable for the modern capitalistic forces to operate and thrive in the competitive economy. ▸ Therewith emerged a new sort of influence, i.e., media power, which, used for purposes of manipulation, once and for all took care of the innocence of the principle of publicity. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
REVISING THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ Nancy Fraser: „This network of clubs and associations – philanthropic, civic, professional, and cultural – was anything but accessible to everyone. On the contrary, it was the arena, the training ground and eventually the power base of a stratum of bourgeois men who were coming to see themselves as a ‚universal class‘ and preparing to assert their fitness to govern.“ ▸ Fraser stipulates a hegemonic tendency of the male bourgeois public sphere, which dominated at the cost of alternative publics (for example by gender, social status, ethnicity and property ownership), thereby averting other groups from articulating their particular concerns. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
REDEFINING THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ Lisa Gitelman: „As Jürgen Habermas first proposed and subsequent scholars have elaborated, the extrinsic or cultural logics of print media and public speech are particularly important historically because beginning sometime in the seventeenth century, they doubled as the cultural logic of the bourgeois public sphere. That is, the same assumptions that lay behind the commonsense intelligibility of publication and public speaking as such also helped to ‚determine how the political arena operates,’ locating an abstract social space for public discussion and opinion, in which some voices, some expressions, were legitimate — and legitimated — while others were constrained.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
REDEFINING THE PUBLIC SPHERE
▸ „Edison’s phonograph stumbled hard against this public sphere: by intruding on experiences of printedness and public speaking, the phonograph records of 1878 and 1889–1893 abruptly called its commonsense parameters into question, begging a mutual redefinition of print, speech, and public.“
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
THEORIZING NEWSPAPER SUCCESS: CONSUMER DEMOCRACY
▸ Industrialization caused more wealth, more leisure, more lending libraries, cheaper publication of novels. ▸ The result was what Mary Chapman calls a "consumer democracy“. ▸ It was mainly education that generated this huge market - through mass literacy. ▸ Industrialization, education and nationalism all form a cluster.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
BENEDICT ANDERSON: READING IS MAKING (NATIONS)
▸ According to Anderson, reading a newspaper was not just a pastime. It was the making of a new order by means of a powerful technology. ▸ Along with maps, schools, health services, museums and other trappings of modernity, newspapers lead people to adopt shared national identities — even if it means identifying with strangers miles away. Newspapers, in short, helped explain nations. ▸ Nations may seem normal. But Anderson saw them as new and weird — "the shrunken imaginings of recent history.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
FREEDOM OF SPEECH?
▸ Erdogan poem: Court bans German comedian Jan Böhmermann from repeating controversial verses. Judges found that verses referencing sexual habits and race were ‚unacceptable‘. ▸ A German comedian has been banned from repeating parts of a controversial poem he wrote about the Turkish President. Jan Böhmermann’s poem about Recep Tayyip Erdogan has already threatened a diplomatic row between Ankara and Berlin and resulted in calls for him to be prosecuted. ▸ Judges ruled that the Turkish President “does not have to accept” Mr Böhmermann reading out his work due to its “abusive and libellous content” – particularly parts making sexual references, suggesting he likes fornicating with goats.
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
MASS MEDIA THEORY
▸ Three dimensions: 1) factual, 2) temporal, 3) social.
▸ Factual: quantity.
▸ Temporal: information.
▸ Social: conflict.
▸ Function: self- description of society. THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
NIETZSCHE’S CRITIQUE OF JOURNALISM
▸ “It is precisely in journalism that the two tendencies combine and become one. The expansion and the diminution of education here join hands. The newspaper actually steps into the place of culture, and he who, even as a scholar, wishes to voice any claim for education, must avail himself of this viscous stratum of communication which cements the seams between all forms of life, all classes, all arts, and all sciences, and which is as firm and reliable as news paper is, as a rule. In the newspaper the peculiar educational aims of the present culminate, just as the journalist, the servant of the moment, has stepped into the place of the genius, of the leader for all time, of the deliverer from the tyranny of the moment. Now, tell me, distinguished master, what hopes could I still have in a struggle against the general topsy-turvification of all genuine aims for education; with what courage can I, a single teacher, step forward, when I know that the moment any seeds of real culture are sown, they will be mercilessly crushed by the roller of this pseudo-culture? Imagine how useless the most energetic work on the part of the individual teacher must be, who would fain lead a pupil back into the distant and evasive Hellenic world and to the real home of culture, when in less than an hour, that same pupil will have recourse to a newspaper, the latest novel, or one of those learned books, the very style of which already bears the revolting impress of modern barbaric culture --” THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
JOURNALISM IS THE VILEST AND MOST DEGRADING OF ALL TRADES, BECAUSE MORE OF AFFECTATION AND HYPOCRISY, AND MORE SUBSERVIENCE TO THE BASER FEELINGS OF OTHERS, ARE NECESSARY FOR CARRYING IT ON, THAN FOR ANY OTHER TRADE, FROM THAT OF A BROTHEL KEEPER UPWARDS.
John Stuart Mill
THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
TRANSFORMATION OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE 3.0
▸ Manuel Castells: „All over the world, Internet users under 30 years of age primarily read newspapers on-line. So, although the newspaper remains a mass medium, its delivery platform changes. There is still no clear business model for on-line journalism. Yet, the Internet and digital technologies have transformed the work process of newspapers and the mass media at large. Newspapers have become internally networked organizations globally connected to networks of information on the Internet. In addition, the on-line components of newspapers have induced networking and synergy with other news and media organizations. Newsrooms in the newspaper, television, and radio industries have been transformed by the digitization of news and its relentless global/local processing. So, mass communication in the traditional sense is now also Internet-based communication in both its production and its delivery. Furthermore, the combination of on-line news with interactive blogging and email, as well as Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds from other documents on the Web, have transformed newspapers into a component of a different form of communication: mass self- communication.“ THE RISE OF THE NEWSPAPER: THEORY
TRANSFORMATION OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE 3.0