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Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (82Nd, New Orleans, Louisiana, August 3-8, 1999) DOCUMENT RESUME ED 433 571 CS 510 152 TITLE Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (82nd, New Orleans, Louisiana, August 3-8, 1999). Civic Journalism. INSTITUTION Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. PUB DATE 1999-08-00 NOTE 193p.; For other sections of this proceedings, see CS 510 132-153. PUB TYPE Collected Works Proceedings (021) EDRS PRICE MF01/PC08 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Athletics; Credibility; *Critical Theory; Higher Education; *Journalism; Journalism Education; Journalism Research; News Writing IDENTIFIERS Local News; *Media Coverage ABSTRACT The Civic Journalism section of the Proceedings contains the following 7 papers: "Resurrecting Critical Theory: Public Journalism" (Gregory Selber); "Constructing Meaning: The Role of the Audience in News Writing" (Jack Morris); "Media Coverage of Sports and Politics: An Examination of the Press' Role in Campaigns for Professional Sports Stadium Construction" (Robert Trumpbour); "Being a Better Neighbor: A Look at How the Syracuse Newspapers Listened to Readers To Improve Neighborhood News Coverage" (Carla V. Lloyd and Jan S. Slater); "Civic Journalism and Community Policing: Potential for Partnership" (Kathryn B. Campbell); "Following in Their First Steps: A Lesson in Launching Public Journalism" (Rebecca A. Payne); "Civic Journalism and Gender Diversity in News-Story Sourcing" (Brian L. Massey). (RS) ******************************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * ******************************************************************************** Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. (82nd, New Orleans, Louisiana, August 3-8, 1999): Civic Journalism. Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. 1999-08 NJ U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS CENTER (ERIC) BEEN GRANTED BY 63This document has been reproduced as C.) received from the person or organization originating it. BESTCOPY AVAILABLE J6ACGil 1:n Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. ke) TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES Points of view or opinions stated in this INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) 1/43 document do not necessarily represent 4 official OERI position or policy. 1 . u,)( 3owL0 RESURRECTING CRITICAL THEORY: PUBLIC JOURNALISM Gregory Selber University of Texas at Austin 3011 Whitis Ave. #202 Austin, Tx. 78705 (512) 476-7201 [email protected] 1 RESURRECTING CRITICAL THEORY: PUBLIC JOURNALISM INTRODUCTION As the constant parade of change unfolds, it becomes necessary for social theorists to take their dynamic perceptions of the world and make additions and subtractions in seeking to explain how the world works and what the human actor's place in it is. From this view the most obvious companion to theory is action. Scholars must also retool and rethink the intersection between theory and practice, and the impact that this praxis has upon conditions of social life. The purpose of this essay shall be to take the concept of public journalism, a progressive movement within the newspaper business seeking to reconnect the citizenry at large with the process of news, and flesh out its potential as a plan of action. Specifically, the intent is to frame public journalism as a modified critical theory project -- critical theory here referring to the line of reasoning put forth by the scholars of the Frankfurt School in the 1930s. Two bodies of thought will be employed in attempting to make public journalism a modern day critical theory project. The first is the American philosophical tradition of pragmatism, dating approximately from the last decade of the 19th century. The second is the work of Jurgen Habermas, the eminent German who has forged a prominent place in the theory world as a post-critical theory scholar concerned with the redemption of the public sphere specifically and of the positive aspects of modernity in general. His idea of communicative action takes as one major point of departure the tradition of pragmatism. It is the view here that although public journalism has been criticized for being only slightly more progressive than mainstream traditional journalism, if that, it shows potential for rejuvenating some semblance of public participation and responsibility for the 4 2 RESURRECTING CRITICAL THEORY administration of local, small-scale democratic participation. With reflexivity as its critical edge, public journalism could be the mechanism through which the proactive, progress- oriented direction of pragmatism can be realized to some extent within the modern mass media framework. In the past five years, there have been several attempts at combining the work of Habermas and public journalism. This paper comes from a perspective seeking to integrate history, philosophy, journalism and sociology. The proximity of pragmatism to sociology, and to communication research, has provided a philosophical context for examining modernity's celebration of instrumental values, according to Hanno Hardt. In its finest moments, pragmatism called for making everyday life better after a recognition of the inevitability of change. This is to be done by introducing the idea of social criticism as a sort of self-discovery. In Dialectic of Enlightenment, Adorno and Horkheimer stress that a simplistic, blind pragmatism soon loses its relation to the truth. Thus the Enlightenment must consider itself, if humankind is not to be totally betrayed. This essay seeks then to use the pragmatist work of James, Dewey, Mead and others in tandem with the positive aspects of the Frankfurt School critical theorists including Habermas in an attempt to build practical legitimacy for public journalism as an action-based method to improve understanding and management of the dialectical relations between Americans, their mass media and social change. PUBLIC JOURNALISM The official beginnings of public journalism can be traced to the aftermath of the 1988 national elections, when negative campaigning had reached a zenith. The press coverage of the campaigns, in particular was 5 3 RESURRECTING CRITICAL THEORY distressing to observers, who claimed that the media had become plagued by the "disease model" where conflict, not resolution, was the modus operandi. Critics charged that coverage had begun to stress political gamesmanship, mudslinging and winners and losers, instead of substantive issues involving real people. Jay Rosen, a professor at Columbia University, along with Midwestern newspaper editor Buzz Merritt and national columnist David Broder, all surfaced with criticisms of how the modern newspaper had devolved into what one wag called "horse-race journalism" fixated on sports-style, winner-loser coverage. Rosen became the philosophical and intellectual engine behind a new movement, one designed to reconnect the citizens with the process of news, from conceptualizing to newsgathering and from gatekeeping to feedback. Merritt served as an expert "in the trenches" and writers like Broder contributed editorials and speaking engagements, all toward bringing about a change in the way the country thought about its media. Rosen's doctoral dissertation had fashioned a dialogue between Dewey and Walter Lippmann, two luminaries of the early 20th century who held divergent opinions about the potential for citizens to take part in the workings of a democracy. Lippmann, following Plato's work in the Republic, called for a small cadre of trained intellectuals to carry forward the intricacies of the modern state. He insisted that people were not capable of handling the tasks of government and statecraft, that they were scarcely able to assimilate the information created in a second-hand fashion by the "pictures in their heads" supplied by mass media. Conversely, Dewey believed that the ability for all members of a human society to take part in democracy was inchoate, still forming, and that society and its media must continue to build to the point where an inclusive participatory democracy was possible. 6 4 RESURRECTING CRITICAL THEORY The public journalism movement picked up speed in 1993 when Rosen and the Pew Center formed the Project on Public Life and the Press. With the funding of a major institution, public journalism collected momentum. Five years after its birth, over 170 newspapers around the country were attempting some sort of public-type project. Typical early public journalism efforts sought to use focus group and survey data to find out what people wanted from their news, and actually, what their conception of news was in the first place. News organizations sought to use citizen input to inform their practice of gathering and giving the news, including editorials by citizens and town meetings from time to time to check the pulse of the community. A highly publicized program in Charlotte, N.C. called "Taking Back Our Neighborhoods" organized the citizens of the city into task forces which met to discuss civic problems and ways to help fight crime. In Merritt's home of Wichita, Ks., the paper published a voter's guide designed to define the issues of the upcoming 1990 campaigns from the perspective of the people. The reporters and editors pressed candidates to stop the negative discourse and engage with
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