Assignment #3:PR, News, and the Corporate-Friendly Worldview

Length: 2- 3 pages (double spaced)
Due Friday, April 11, 2003

In theory, the industry of public relations is understood as directly related to the worlds of business and economics, whereas journalism fulfills a different and distinct role in relation to public life. In practice, of course, there is much interaction between the two. As we have seen, PR experts score successes when their promotional material or staged news event appears as “news” in our papers, television or radio news programs, or in Internet outlets. The work of PR professionals, who now outnumber journalists, has in many ways been made easier as cutbacks in newsrooms make it appealing for journalists to rely increasingly upon outside sources and pre-packaged story ideas and materials. The growth of the public relations and advertising industries in recent years may give us all pause, as we question whether or not journalism, and its assumed relationship to an informed citizenry, has suffered as a result.

Throughout the semester, we have talked about the blurring of boundaries between journalism and corporate interests. The purpose of this assignment is to encourage you to consider one such instance of this blurring. You will be analyzing a news story from a local paper, television station, radio station, or web-based source, looking for evidence of how a PR department or firm has seemingly capitalized on one or more of the trends we’ve read about: the tendency toward self-censorship among journalists, the desire for news organizations to appear inoffensive to their advertisers, the tendency for elite leaders in news to benefit personally from a corporate-friendly worldview in their news outlets and hence to encourage positive stories about corporations in which their interests lie, etc.. In other words, you’ll be looking for, and constructing an argument about, how a story that appears to be largely promotional came to be presented as “news.”

For this assignment, you can choose to look at an event constructed specifically for news coverage. You can also analyze a news story that you believe may have come from a PR source, or one that you believe would have been viewed favorably by a corporation and/or groups with interests in it. Choose a story that appeared in the previous three months, identify where and when the story appeared (air date, time, station, reporter or voice-over narrator; paper name, page number, headline, byline, etc.), and bring a copy the story to class if at all possible.

Questions to address in your paper include: what evidence suggests that the news story originated as part of a promotional campaign? Do you think it demonstrates self-censorship or bias in any way (e.g., how is it related to other stories that have been told about the corporation or industry featured?) Finally, do you think your example represents something that should be of concern for what we assume to be the democratic role of journalism and free expression in the U.S.? If so, why, and if not, why not? Support your arguments with evidence as indicated on the next page, and include at least two cites from the readings (they can both be from the same readings, but different chapters: see especially Buckingham’s The Making of Citizens ch. 6 and 8, and Croteau and Hoynes’ The Business of Media ch. 5 and 6).

Guidelines for Analyzing News Stories:

This outline is intended to help you with the analysis of news stories. This is simply a list of features that are often worth looking at; you do not need to write about all of these features. You should choose to focus on at least a few instances as evidence that help to make your point.
1. Consider language:
a. Word choice: Which words suggest a favorable portrayal of the corporation (or product/service manufactured by the corporation) featured in the story?
b. “Balance:”
c. Overall message:
2. Consider the people involved:
a. Who wrote the story?
b. Sources cited: Who are they? Why might they want to portray the corporation favorably?
3. Consider visuals:
a. Favorable portrayals:
i. Consider lighting, grouping of people, facial expressions, depiction of product
ii. Who is in control? (e.g., the consumer of the product, the person making the purchase?)
b. Where did the photo come from?
4. Consider words and pictures together:
a. Go back and forth between words and pictures. How do the images reinforce the meaning of the text? How do the words and pictures work together to shape the interpretation for the reader?
5. What’s missing from this story?