93495 - Sociology of Journalism (LM)

Learning outcomes

The class offers methods and conceptual tools to understand journalism as an institution and an occupation. The aim is to give students the critical competence to reflexively think at the social and cultural conditions in which the production of news occurs. 

At the end the student is supposed to

- know the main sociological methods useful for studying journalism empirically  and even doing journalism as a kind of social investigation

- know the major professional models and the typical institutional dilemmas of journalism as an historically situated field of practice

- be able to analyze conditions and situations in which the journalistic occupation is exerted in contemporary societies;

- is able to extend the range of her skils through the creative use of concepts, models and methods illustrated in class.

Course contents

- The sociological perspective: methods, concepts, approaches

- the history of sociology and the history of journalism (from Marx to the Chicago School and beyond)

- social research as method of journalistic investigation (techniques and exemplars)

- journalism as an occupation or a profession (criticism of the professional model, with reference to the Italian ordinamento)

- the practices of journalism: an inquiry into the tricks of the journalistic trade

- the journalistic field: what we gain in thinking at journalism through field theory

(the last two with applications to the Italian case, especially mafia, corruption, and other crimes)

Readings/Bibliography

Hallin, D. C. e P. Mancini, Comparing Media Systems, chps. 1-5.

*Gans H.J. (2018) Sociology and Journalism: A Comparative Analysis. Contemporary Sociology. 47(1):3-10.

*Zelizer, B. (2004), Taking Journalism Seriously: News and the Academy, London: Sage, solo chapter 3 “Sociology and Journalism” pp. 45-80.

*Weber, Max (1998) Preliminary report on a proposed survey for a sociology of the press (1910). "History of the Human Sciences". 11(2):111-120.

*Dickinson, R. (2013). Weber's sociology of the press and journalism: Continuities in contemporary sociologies of journalists and the media. "Max Weber Studies", 13(2), 197-215. Retrieved July 22, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/24579868

* Dickinson, R. (2007) ‘Accomplishing Journalism. Towards a Revived Sociology of a Media Occupation.’ Cultural Sociology 1: 189–208

*M. Deuze (2005) “What is journalism? Professional identity and ideology of journalists reconsidered,” Journalism, volume 6, number 4, pp. 442–464.http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1464884905056815

*Deuze, M. and Witschge, T. (2018) ‘Beyond journalism: Theorizing the transformation of journalism’, Journalism, 19(2), pp. 165–181. doi: 10.1177/1464884916688550.

*Dickinson, R. (2008), Studying the Sociology of Journalists: The Journalistic Field and the News World. Sociology Compass, 2: 1383-1399.

*Benson, R. (1999) Field Theory in Comparative Context: A New Paradigm for Media Studies. Theory and Society, 28(3), 463–498. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3108557

*Splendore, S. (2021) The Discursive Constitution of Mafia Journalism as a Network Beat, Journalism Practice, 15:9, 1344-1360, DOI: 10.1080/17512786.2021.1997337S.

Warning:  texts with *  available for download on Virtual Learning platform

• Suggested readings (not compulsory):

The Handbook of Journalism Studies, a cura di Karin Wahl-Jorgensen e Thomas Hanitzsch, London, Routledge 2009.

G. Bechelloni, 'Giornalismo’, in Enciclopedia delle scienze sociali (1994) disponibile all'indirizzo https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giornalismo_%28Enciclopedia-delle-scienze-sociali%29/

Santoro, M. (1999) Professione, in Rassegna Italiana di Sociologia, 1/1999, pp. 115-128,al link: https://www.rivisteweb.it/doi/10.1423/2510

Vincent Goulet et Philippe Ponet, « Journalists and Sociologists », Questions de communication [En ligne], 16 | 2009 (English translation online http://journals.openedition.org/questionsdecommunication/8882 )

Revers, M. (2017) Contemporary Journalism in the US and Germany. Agents of Accountability. Palgrave Macmillan.

Deuze, M. e Tamara Witschge (2020) Beyond Journalism. Cambridge, UK, Polity Press.

Park, Robert E. (1940). News as a form of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology 45(5). 669-686.

Bourdieu, P., On television, Stanford UP 1998.

Bourdieu and the Journalistic Field, a cura di di R. Benson e E. Neveu, Cambridge, Polity 2005.

Schudson, M. La scoperta della notizia Storia sociale della stampa americana, Napoli, Liguori 2007.

Schudson, M. Sociology of News, NY, Norton, 2011 (2 ed.)

Cottle, Simon 2007. ‘Ethnography and News Production: New(s) Developments in the Field.’ Sociology Compass 1/1 (2007): 1–16.

Willig, Ida, 2012, 'Newsroom ethnography in a field perspective', Journalism: Theory, Practice & Criticism, 14, 3, 372-387.

Marchetti D., Ruellan D., 2001, Devenir journalistes. Sociologie de l’entrée dans le monde du travail, Paris, Éd. La Documentation française.

Marco Solaroli,(2016) The rules of a middle-brow art: Digital production and cultural consecration in the global field of professional photojournalism, Poetics,59: 50-66.

On Italy:

Mancini, P. (2000) ‘Political Complexity and Alternative Models of Journalism: The Italian Case’, in J. Curran and M.J. Park (eds) De-Westernizing Media Studies, pp. 265–78. London: Routledge.

• On journalism and the mafia:

Santoro, M. Mafia Politics Cambridge, Polity 2022.

Mirone, L. Gli Insabbiati. Storie di giornalisti uccisi dalla mafia e sepolti dall'indifferenza, Roma, Castelvecchi, 1999, 2008.

Ossigeno per l'informazione (OSservatorio Su Informazioni Giornalistiche E Notizie Oscurate), see website at https://www.ossigeno.info/

Rawlinson, P. (1998), ‘Mafia, Media and Myth: Representations of Russian Organised Crime.’ The Howard Journal of Criminal Justice, 37: 346-358. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2311.00105

Federica Sarno, ‘Italian mafias in Europe: between perception and reality. A comparison of press articles in Spain, Germany and the Netherlands’, Trends in Organized Crime 17, 4, (313-341), (2014).

Adam Edwards, Pete Gill, The Politics of ‘Transnational Organized Crime’: Discourse, Reflexivity and the Narration of ‘Threat’, The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 4, 2, (245), (2002).

Paula M. Salvio, ‘Reconstructing memory through the archives: public pedagogy, citizenship and Letizia Battaglia’s photographic record of mafia violence’ Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 2014 Vol. 22, No. 1, 97–116

 

Teaching methods

Lectures with PowerPoint and video; participatory approach; teaching material uploaded to Virtual learning environment.

Assessment methods

Oral exam, with the possibility, in exceptional cases and for attending students, to discuss a research paper (min 5,000 words) on a subject/topic previously agreed upon with the teacher

Teaching tools

slides and syllabus

Office hours

See the website of Marco Santoro