Summary
Contents
The SAGE Key Concepts series provide students with accessible and authoritative knowledge of the essential topics in a variety of disciplines. Cross-referenced throughout, the format encourages critical evaluation through understanding. Written by experienced and respected academics, the books are indispensable study aids and guides to comprehension. Key Concepts in Journalism offers a systematic and accessible introduction to the terms, processes, and effects of journalism;a combination of practical considerations with theoretical issues; and further reading suggestions. The authors bring an enormous range of experience in newspaper and broadcast journalism, at national and regional level, as well as their teaching expertise. This book will be essential reading for students in journalism, and an invaluable reference tool for their professional careers.
Primary Definition
Primary Definition
The process by which powerful sources succeed in influencing the news agenda setting in accordance with their own version of events. Coined by Hall et al. (1978), primary definition predicts that ‘those in powerful or in high status positions who offer opinions about controversial topics will have their definitions accepted, because such spokesmen are understood to have access to more accurate or specialized information on particular topics than the majority of the population’. The inclusion of sources is based on a ‘hierarchy of credibility’ in which the opinions of establishment institutions – the government, leaders and key members of mainstream political parties, the judiciary, the police and other agencies of law and security – are given primacy, while the opinions of the ...