Appendix C: Journalism: A Guide to Recent Literature - Notes to the User

Introduction

That journalism performs a central function within modern society is evident in the huge amount of book and online material that has been produced about the field and its practitioners. There is hardly a newspaper, magazine, or television program that (or a major journalist who) is not recorded in at least one book—and probably a webpage as well. This portion of the volume consists of a bibliography that comprehensively surveys English-language research and professional literature (defined as monographs and websites) on all aspects of journalism published since 1990. Many important earlier books are cited as well.

This bibliography is designed to organize and briefly describe the substantial number of scholarly and professional books and relevant websites about most aspects of journalism, past and present. As will be evident when perusing the preceding table of contents, it is arranged by subject, as that is how most of us seek out information. It is also designed to be a free-standing reference source that can be used either in conjunction with the rest of this encyclopedia or on its own.

Using this Bibliography

A number of editorial decisions have guided the assembly, ordering, annotating, and editing of these bibliographic entries. The best means of finding information on a given subject is to use the detailed table of contents, which is designed to help you hone in on topic(s) of interest quickly. The topical arrangement is “free standing” in that it does not directly parallel the material in other volumes in the encyclopedia.

The bibliography becomes more inclusive the more recent its entries are. Put another way, the emphasis here is on the most recent books and web materials. Selectivity increases the older the material is, especially prior to 1990. For older material, the emphasis is on works still considered of value, either as history (regardless of the book's original intent) or because they contribute something else to modern research needs. There isn't much point, for example, in listing a two-decade-old book on a topic of rapid change (say, libel law), unless that book offers a valuable snapshot or record of an earlier time.

Each book and website is listed only once, with some internal cross-referencing. This means a decision has to be made for each title as to where it fits best—and naturally my decision might be different than yours. As a rule, I've tried to place titles in the most obvious or relevant place. But not all histories are found in Section 2. For example, a book on press coverage of the immigration issue over a century could appear there or under news categories (Sections 5 and 6). In fact, because it is about a single type of news, it appears under the latter, with a number of similar books in a subcategory on ethnicity and minorities. So spending some time with the table of contents and getting the drift of its approach and organization will likely pay off in finding the material you seek.

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