Chapter 5 Media and Ideology - Mass media and society

ESSAY QUESTIONS – MASS MEDIA AND SOCIETY

WRITE AT LEAST 3-5 SENTENCES FOR EACH QUESTION

1. Media sociologists often say that the journalistic norm of “objectivity” is a set of socially constructed “routine practice.” What does it mean? Explain

Objective, can be seen as a set of practices or conventions that the professional journalist is trained to follow. News accounts have a tendency to look similar because reporters all follow the same basic routines. They talk to the same people, use the same formats, observe the same basic dos and don’ts.

3. What does it mean that advertising created a modern consumer culture? What value does advertising promote? Explain.

There are a wide range of specific messages in these ads, suggesting connections between products and lifestyles and between services and states of mind and presenting a host of information about prices, availability, and the like. Ads tell us that happiness and satisfaction can be purchased, that each of us is first and foremost an individual consumption unit, and that market relations buying and selling are the appropriate.

4. Think of popular Hollywood action films such as The Avengers, The Bourne Legacy, Skyfall. What are the common ideologies or values promoted in such movies?

Ultimately, the action-adventure genre, with its focus on the personal triumph of the hero, is a tale about the power of the rugged male individual, a mythic figure in the ideology of the American Dream

6. What is the relationship between news routines and the organization of newsgathering? Why do reporters and news organizations develop such news routines

Journalists and news organizations rely on and build their work around the routine and predictability of these established institution. The practice associated with objectivity are tilted in one direction; they give those in power enormous visibility in the media, while those outside are largely ignored.

7. What does it mean to say that objectivity in journalism is a “set of practices”? How do these practices shape the content of the news?

All news coverage is pretty much same. Journalist adhere to the same method, so they produce similar news. They see similarity in coverage as a confirmation that they lived up to the ideal of objectivity, that is, the separation of values from facts.

8. What are the differences in the roles of news photographer and ad photographer and what are the sources of these differences? How do the role expectations of photographers shape the definition of creativity?

Editors expect photographers to have good news judgment, to be willing to use initiative to get good pictures, and to produce pictures that can tell various aspects of the story. In contrast, ad photographers, take on the role of merchants as they must sell their services to an ad agency and an advertiser, follow the lead of the art director, and produce pictures that are generally prescripted. Thus, much ad photography is reduced to technical work.