Homework Page, History of Journalism in America, Spring 2014 -- Mr Furr

History of Journalism in America Spring 2014 -- Mr Furr

Homework Page

New York Herald Headquarters, Civil War

Newspaper Wagon, Civil War

Back to Home Page for this course.

Introductory Remarks

Wikipedia's History of American Newspapers page gives a brief overview of the subject of this course.

It also illustrates the problem this or any similar course must face:

Which of the myriad facts, dates, and names should we study?
What principles of selection should we employ so that we study those "facts, dates, names" that are most important.
What hypothesis, question, or theory should we use in order to determine the principle of "importance" that will allow us to select the very small number of "facts, dates, and names" to study?

History is the study of change in human society and why change takes place.

What theory of historical causation should we use to explain the changes in newspaper journalism -- changes that are still very obviously continuing today?

In this course we will use a "problems" approach to journalism history. What are the origins of the issues, questions, and problems that exist in contemporary journalism? How can studying the origins and development of these issues or problems help us to (a) understand journalism today; (b) understand the history of journalism -- how and why it has evolved and changed?

Theoretically, we will use

Michael Schudson's social history approach. Schudson is tentative about causality, but does present some ideas about why journalism has evolved in this way.
Ben Bagdikian's economic or business history approach. Bagdikian sees the roots of the problems in today's journalism as being an inevitable result of the press as a for-profit business.

These considerations will guarantee that we do not simply "memorize names, dates, and facts". However, there are a great many fascinating people, events, and -- above all -- stories -- in the history of journalism in the US. We will take time to appreciate some of them as well. Stories add "color" -- interest, human drama -- the essential ingredients of any successful journalism.

I will post all writing assignments on this page.. You should create a 'bookmark' of your own to this page, or put it in your 'Favorites' file, so you can go to it without having to first go to the Home Page for the course.

NOTE: BE SURE TO USE THE PROPER SUBJECT LINE ON ALL YOUR EMAILS TO ME! SEE BOTTOM OF HOME PAGE FOR EXAMPLE!

NOTE: When printing out 'image PDF' documents on Adobe Acrobat Reader, check the little "Print as Image"towards the top of the "Print" menu.

Remember: if it's not linked, and not in one of our books, it's on our FTP server.

Be sure to "send a copy to yourself" of ALL your homework assignments!

IMPORTANT

We cannot have good in-class discussions unless each student has 1. the TEXT we are discussing that day; and 2. a copy of his/her HW assignment, to refresh your memory about what you have written.

Therefore, be sure to bring with you to class, every day:

The TEXT WE ARE DISCUSSING THAT DAY and on which you have written your HW assignment;
A PRINTED COPY OF YOUR HW ASSIGNMENT for that day.

If you have either or both of these on a laptop or tablet and bring that to class, you do not need to print them.

Be sure these items are clearly visible on your desk as I take attendance each day. I will take note.

HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENTS

NOTE: You CANNOT print out the readings for our course on MSU Computer Lab computers! This would tie up the computers and printers for hours, and consume tens of thousands of pages.
Print out the readings on your own computer. You will need to buy your own paper and ink cartridges. This is still far less expensive than buying the books.

Assignments on Bagdikian, The New Media Monopoly and The Media Monopoly.

Why not check up on Bagdikian a bit by reading the Wikipedia page on him, and then sampling some of his writings, which are linked at the bottom of that page?

Here is Bagdikian's Home Page. The "Questions and Answers", "Excerpts", and "Comments" sections are worth reading for important insights into the media.

For Thursday, January 23
- send me two emails, from different email servers. One of these servers MUST be the MSU 'mail' server. You must set up an email account for yourself on this server. THIS IS THE EMAIL ADDRESS I WILL SEND ALL EMAIL TO. The second one is only for emergency use.
  - See the full instructions for setting up your MSU mail account on this page.
  - Make sure that the Subject line of the email messages conforms to the model at the bottom of our Home Page.
  - THIS IS A REQUIRED ASSIGNMENT. If it is not sent in on time, you will get an "F" for this assignment.
- Do this assignment - on Bagdikian Chapter 1, F.A.I.R. 1987.
For Tuesday, January 28 - on Bagdikian, Chapter 9. Also, make certain you've done the email assignment for Jan. 23.
- Check out this article: "Olbermann Is Out" from F.A.I.R., a media watchdog group. It demonstrates owner's control over the news media and the kind of bias -- pro-employer, conservative -- owners can impose.
For Thursday, January 30- on Bagdikian, Chapter 11 and old edition, Ch. 7.
For Tuesday, February 4 - on Bagdikian, Chapter 12 and old edition, Chapter 8.
- Check out this ad by Dr. Brandreth from the Daily Pittsburgh Gazette September 5 1838: top part; bottom part

Please read this page: "Now that we have completed the first two weeks of the class..."

Assignments on Schudson, Discovering the News, Chs. 1 and 3.

Please note: These are complex chapters. Schudson's organization is very helpful. To every chapter there is an introductory section; several intermediate sections; and a concluding section. The main ideas are discussed in the first and last sections, but the evidence and examples are given mainly in the intermediate ones. Study the examples -- but make sure you grasp the main ideas.

You may want to do a little further reading about some of the fascinating people and events discussed in these two chapters. See the links and suggestions on this page.

For Thursday, February 6

For further reading on some of the topics Schudson mentions in Chapter One, see the following materials (all in our FTP folder): Frederick Hudson, "The New-York Herald"; "The Herald's Money Articles"; "The Moral War 1840-42".

For Tuesday, February 11
- For further reading I have put over 20 links to specific newspapers, people, and events discussed or mentioned by Schudson in Chapter Three on this links and suggestions page.
- For further reading on some of the topics Schudson mentions in Chapter Three, see the following materials (all in our FTP folder)::
  - Joseph Pulitzer and the New York World, fm Bleyer, Main Currents... (1927).pdf
  - William Randolph Hearst and the New York World, fm Bleyer, Main Currents ... (1927).pdf

Thursday, February 13 - Montclair State University closed because of snow storm. All classes cancelled.

The assignment for Thursday, February 13 is now due Tuesday, February 18.
If you have already sent it with the date of the 18th, that's fine. You do not have to email it again.
If you haven't sent it yet, please use the new class / due / date of February 18.

Assignments on Leonard, Chapter One, and Zenger Trial Materials

For Tuesday, February 18. This is on the Inoculation Controversy of 1721 involving James Franklin and The New-England Courant.
- If you are interested you may wish to read
  - Lawrence Farmer's article "The Smallpox Inoculation Controversy and the Boston Press 1721-2", from Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine 1958 (also PDF'd on our FTP server).
  - Margot Minardi, "The Boston Inoculation Controversy of 1721–1722: An Incident in the History of Race." William & Mary Quarterly 61,1 (January 2004), 47-76.
  - "Smallpox Controversy", from William Bleyer, Main Currents in the History of American Journalism (1927) - in our FTP folder.
For Thursday, February 20 This is on the John Peter Zenger case of 1735.
There are some great Internet resources now available on the Zenger case!
- Here is the main Zenger page at the University of Missouri - Kansas City School of Law, a treasure-trove of material. And here is the Wikipedia page -- good but of course far briefer.
- You may be interested in taking a look at Frederic Hudson's treatment of the Zenger case in his book Journalism in the United States from 1690 to 1872 (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1873). This book is the first history of American journalism ever published.
- Read this Wikipedia page on the famous court case N.Y. Times v. Sullivan (1964); and Westmoreland v. CBS (1985), which never went to trial.
- See also this Time magazine report of the case Ariel Sharon v. TIME (1984). The court found that TIME magazine had made false statements about Sharon but that they were not done "maliciously." Read commentary from the London Evening Independent / Boston Globe and the Gainesville Sun / New York Times (Anthony Lewis).
- How easy it is to be libelled because you can't afford to sue? Here are right-wing Star-Ledger columnist Paul Mulshine's columns attacking me: April 26 and May 3, 2005.

Assignments on Leonard, Chapter Two; Isaiah Thomas, Battle of Lexington

For Tuesday, February 25 Get the text of Thomas' 1775 article from our FTP server.
- See a copy of the original newspaper here! The story we are reading is on page 3 -- find it beginning in the first column.
- If you are interested in Isaiah Thomas, download and read Chapter 8 of Frederic Hudson's book Journalism in the United States from 1690 to 1872 (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1873).
- Take a look at the masthead and first page of a Revolutionary War issue of Thomas' paper The Massachusetts Spy.
- Read Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere." Several generations of Americans were taught this poem from the earliest grades in school as a kind of patriotic propaganda. I think you'll agree that it's very effective as such! Written as the Civil War approached, threatening to tear the country apart, and published during the Civil War, it is perhaps as much about the situation in the 1860s as about the 1770s.
- Here is Ralph Waldo Emerson's famous poem "Concord Hymn", an earlier patriotic paean about this battle. This is where you will read the words "...the rude bridge that arched the flood" and the famous lines: "Here once the embattled farmers stood / and fired the shot heard round the world."
- Here is what Isaiah Thomas himself wrote about his own paper, the 'Spy', in his pioneering book The History of Printing in America (1810). These pages are from the second volume, the 1874 edition. Why not take a look?

Assignment on Schudson, Introduction and Ch. 2

For Thursday, February 27 On Schudson, Introduction and Chapter 2.
- Frederic Remington's famous drawing for William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal, the one that caused Richard Harding Davis to resign, is here.
- See page from Edwin L. Schuman's book Practical Journalism (NY, 1903), p.104, allowing "imagination" in newswriting. Compare to the quotation from Schuman's 1894 edition on p.79 of Schudson, Discovering the News.
- See Jacob Riis' book How the Other Half Lives (1890 and later editions). This is a wonderful online edition, with all the text and all the photos.
  - Links to all the photographs. Look at some of them! They are great -- and horrifying!
  - Wikipedia page for How The Other Half Lives.

Assignment on Schudson, Ch. 4

For Tuesday, March 4

March 10 - 16 Spring Recess No Classes

Assignment on Upton Sinclair, The Brass Check, Chs. 1-9; 35

For Tuesday, March 18.
1. Take a look at the Wikipedia Page on The Brass Check.
2. Read the Wikipedia page on Upton Sinclair, a fascinating, very important figure in American journalism literature, and history.
3. Here is the full text of The Brass Check in Text format, free. I have made it available, paginated, in PDF here.

Optional Midterm Exam (really an extra credit project) here, due Friday March 28 at 11:59 p.m. by email to me; usual format.

Assignments on Will Irwin, "The American Newspaper" (1911)

For Thursday, March 20
- If you want to -- NOT required! -- download the whole series of articles from Collier's, 1911. I have PDF'd the whole series. It's on our FTP server, and is titled "Irwin, Will, The American Newspaper. Collier's, Ja-Jl 1911.pdf
.For Tuesday, March 25. Also, please read, print out, and bring to class, this little classic on "objectivity." It's fun -- and, true!

Assignments on Regier, Era of the Muckrakers; Knightley, The First Casualty.

For Thursday, March 27.
- You should also read the short Wikipedia page on the antitrust case Associated Press v. United States , decided by the Supreme Court in 1945. Only after this case was the A.P. no longer a monopoly, open to any newspaper who wished to subscribe.
- Read the Wikipedia page on "Muckraker" -- it is short and informative.
- "Nellie Bly" was a famous reformer, an early muckraker, and one of the most famous female journalists of that or any age. It did not hurt at all that she was very beautiful!
  - Here is an entire page on her: "Nellie Bly Online."
  - Here is the Wikipedia page on "Nellie Bly."

Assignment on Knightley, The First Casualty, Chapter 16

For Tuesday, April 1. NOTE: This is a pretty substantial, "meaty" assignment. It has to do with war propaganda, and is well worth spending the extra time on. That's what I want you to do

Assignments on Seldes, Freedom of the Press; Lundberg, Imperial Hearst.

For Thursday, April 3
For Tuesday, April 8 Don't forget to bring Chapter 11 of Seldes, Freedom of the Press, to class too. We'll spend the first 15-20 minutes on that before going on to Lundberg / Hearst.

Assignments on Schudson, Chapter 5; Liebling, The Press, selections

Take a look at this interesting historical page -- front page of the New-York Times for April 14, 1865, reporting end of the Civil War at Appomattox Court House VA on April 9, 1865. Pass your mouse over it to enlarge -- it's perfectly readable.

Assignment on Sociology of the Press, Press Analysis.

For Tuesday, April 22.

Assignments on Knightley, The First Casualty

Before doing any of these assignments, review Knightley's Chapter 16, which you read for the HW of April 1.

For Thursday, April 24
For Tuesday, April 29. This grisly photograph from the "Highway of Death" outside Kuwait City is the same one by photographer Kenneth Jarecke that is referred to at the bottom of page 494.
Please read Knightley, Chapter 21 as well. There is no HW for it, but it is vital to bring war reporting up to the present day.

Thursday, May 1: This is our last day of class (see the MSU Academic Calendar). We'll discuss end-of-semester matters. Please attend! There'll be some important things to talk about, and to do.

http://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/hj/hjhw14.html | Email.Me | Created 20 January 2014