Journalism and Popular Culture

Peter Dahlgren is Principal Lecturer in the Department of Journalism, Media and Communications at the University of Stockholm. He is the author or editor of numerous works in Swedish and of two books in English, both of which he edited with Colin Sparks: Communication and Citizenship (Sage, 1991) and Journalism and Popular Culture (Sage, 1992). Colin Sparks is a professor at the Centre for Communication and Information Studies at the Univeristy of Westminster and Co-Editor of Media, Culture and Society. Anna Reading is a lecturer at Southbank University and Assistant Editor of Media, Culture and Society.

PART ONE: JOURNALISM AS POPULAR CULTURE Introduction - Peter Dahlgren Popular Journalism - Colin Sparks Theories and Practice Popularity and the Politics of Information - John Fiske PART TWO: ASPECTS OF THE POPULAR MEDIA Personalities in the Popular Media - Ian Connell The Aesthetics and Politics of Melodrama - Jostein Gripsrud Modes of Sports Writing - David Rowe Truly Awful News on Television - John Langer Photojournalism and the Tabloid Press - Karin E Becker PART THREE: POPULAR JOURNALISM IN PRACTICE How US News Media Represent Sexual Minorities - Marguerite J Moritz Oliver North and the News - Robin Andersen The San Francisco Earthquake and the 1989 World Series - Roberta E Pearson

`Fine collection' - Choice `In the staid world of journalism research, it is a delight to see an attempt to open that focus of inquiry to new interpretive frames. Such is the case with Journalism and Popular Culture , which spends a good portion of its 214 pages debunking existing frames for considering journalism and suggesting alternative ways of thinking about what we commonly call news. From sports television to practices of photographic documentary, this collection provides an impressive range of relevant research. In doing so, it underscores the rigidity of existing categories with which we have come to think about news and points to the need for rethinking them.... Particularly valuable is the introduction by Peter Dahlgren.... Most of these papers were originally given at a 1990 cultural studies colloquium. In the vein of that symposium, the collection's authors argue that we need to allow a variety of people - and not only journalists - their say in determining what journalism is and could be. Through its analyses of topics as wide-ranging as celebrity coverage, tabloid practices, and coverage of marginalized groups, this volume takes definitive steps toward achieving that aim' - Popular Communication `The authors concentrate on non-fictional journalism in popular culture, to remedy a previous bias in popular culture studies which have emphasized fiction.... Several of the writers develop serious theoretical approaches which go beyond the mere description of examples from popular journalism' - Communication Research Trends