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Habits of Mind
Unit 2
 
GET IT IN WRITING
 

Examples

Exercises

 

FRAMING

 

The ways journalists frame news stories have real consequences for their audiences.  For instance, Media Matters reports that "only seven of 20 major newspapers in top agricultural producing states featured the [2019 United Nations climate and land] report on their print front pages...," resulting in that story being left outside the frame.

Frame Lab's newsletter talks about language and framing, like in this post, "The Power of Unconscious Thought," which covers how frames operate in our brains without our being conscious that it's happening. 

 

Margaret Sullivan's Washington Post column explores how the news media can report and frame mass shootings differently to better fulfill journalism's public service duty.  

 

Journalists often choose the frames for their news stories unconsciously.  Media scholar Keith Somerville looks at two specific international cases where those unexamined choices reinforce stereotypes and make it easy for people to ignore serious issues.

HORSE-RACE COVERAGE

 

For a good discussion of what horse-race coverage is, why it came about and when, see this article by Matthew C. Nisbet. 

 

NEWS VALUES

 

Here's a helpful discussion of news values that takes into account both the research about what audiences see as newsworthy and what journalists believe should be newsworthy (from journalist Owen Spencer-Thomas).

ARCHIVES

 

When Trayvon Martin, an unarmed African-American was shot by an armed white man, the news story soon became framed in terms of race.  Here's a thoughtful discussion about issues raised by some of those frames (from Eric Deggans and the Poynter Institute).

 

Featured

Election Coverage

Going into the election season of 2024, The Citizens Agenda collaborative ˚again called for an audience-centered approach to election coverage—asking people what they want reporters to cover in the election and then focusing on those, moving away from typical horserace coverage. Jay Rosen, an NYU journalism professor, calls it focusing on the “stakes” not the “odds.” Here’s how The Durango Herald puts it in practice, and this piece in The Colorado Sun shows the types of responses that people provide.

 

As they describe their election coverage process to readers, editors are providing both transparency and a good description of what they see as their public duty, including their approach to accuracy, mis/disinformation and “both-sides-ism.” Jon Ralston, editor and CEO of The Nevada Independent, says his team is “guided by accountability journalism.”  Chris Quinn, editor of cleveland.com/The Plain Dealer, says of his newsroom, “The north star here is truth. We tell the truth even when it offends some of the people who pay us for information.” An update to the column links to a sample of the thousands of reader responses to it.

 

In response to critics who say the media aren’t adequately covering the stakes of the election, Erik Wemple, the Washington Post media critic has compiled a lengthy list of news stories and commentary that illustrates the breadth of media organizations’ coverage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What if Civil Rights Stories Included White Allies More Often?

This short, thought-provoking video asks how framing civil rights stories differently might affect how people respond to those stories (from the Media Education Foundation).

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