Newspaper History

Wahl-Jorgensen, K., and Cole, B. (2008). Newspapers in Sierra Leone: A case study of conditions for print journalism in a post-conflict society. Ecquid Novi, 29(1), 1-20

by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen

Selected for topic guide on communication and governance and expert document library of the Governance and Social Development Resource Centre of the Department for International Development

In this article, we examine the conditions for newspaper production in Sierra Leone since the end of the civil war in... more In this article, we examine the conditions for newspaper production in Sierra Leone since the end of the civil war in 2002, as a case study in the difficulties of democratic communication under conditions of poverty and underdevelopment. Sierra Leone has a tradition of a vigorous press. However, journalism struggles for survival in the country, which is one of the world’s least developed. Problems include legal constraints, difficulties in distribution, lack of journalistic skills, a minuscule revenue base, and a lack of electricity, basic materials, technologies and resources. The scarcity of financial resources engenders the unethical practice of ‘coasting,’ or blackmailing, among journalists. However, resource problems haunt every layer of society, including government, business and civil society. As such, the case of Sierra Leone demonstrates a broader point about journalism: That it cannot be viewed in isolation from broader social contexts. Despite these constraints, journalism in Sierra Leone is emerging as a watchdog on concentrations of power.

London, Antwerp and Amsterdam: journalistic relations in the first half of the seventeenth century

by Paul Arblaster

Making an American Feminist Icon: Mary Wollstonecraft’s Reception in US Newspapers, 1800-1869

by Eileen Hunt Botting

History of Political Thought, forthcoming

This article examines Mary Wollstonecraft's public reception in American newspapers from 1800 to 1869. Wollstonecraft... more This article examines Mary Wollstonecraft's public reception in American newspapers from 1800 to 1869. Wollstonecraft was portrayed to the American public as a philosopher of women’s rights, a new model of femininity, and a pioneer of women’s political activism. Although these iconic uses of Wollstonecraft were regularly negative, they grew more positive as the women’s rights movement gained steam alongside the abolition movement. This study thus shows the significance of Wollstonecraft in early representations of women’s rights issues and debates in the US, and underscores the role of journalistic media in the spread and growth of feminism.

'Bomb back, and bomb hard': debating reprisals during the Blitz

by Brett Holman

Australian Journal of Politics and History (accepted; September 2012).

In Britain, popular memory of the Blitz celebrates civilian resistance to the German bombing of London and other... more In Britain, popular memory of the Blitz celebrates civilian resistance to the German bombing of London and other cities, emphasising positive values such as stoicism, humour and mutual aid. This 'Blitz spirit' is still called to mind during times of national crisis, for example in response to the July 2005 terrorist bombings in London. But the memory of such passive and defensive traits obscures the degree to which British civilian morale in 1940 depended on the belief that if Britain had to 'take it', then Germany was taking it as hard or harder. As the Blitz mounted in intensity, Home Intelligence reports and newspaper letter columns featured calls for heavier reprisals against German cities. That the RAF's bombing efforts over Germany at this time were in fact wildly inaccurate and largely ineffective is beside the point: nobody in Britain was aware of this yet. The reprisals debate was the logical legacy of prewar assumptions about the overwhelming power of bombing; it has been forgotten
because it contradicts the myth of the Blitz.

The Campus Iconoclast

by Ryan Ozawa

Reading the Newspaper in Colonial Otago

by Tony Ballantyne

Journal of New Zealand Studies- special issue, "Communicating Culture in Colonial New Zealand', 12 n.s. 2011.

A ciência ea tecnologia n'A Capital: da página de fait-divers à página de ciência

by Rui Brito Fonseca

A ciência ea tecnologia na imprensa escrita: um olhar sobre a produção sociológica portuguesa no contexto internacional

by Rui Brito Fonseca

Astronomy and Space Science in Portuguese Popular Newspapers at the End of the 20th Century

by Rui Brito Fonseca

Astronomy in Newspapers: Evaluation A Hands-on Guide

by Rui Brito Fonseca

Le Monde diplomatique" et Israël, 1954-2005: histoire moderne de l'Etat juif à travers un journal françai

by Samuel Ghiles-Meilhac

Sense of place in the daily newspaper

by Carrie Buchanan

The daily newspaper in North America has long been a locally based medium that offers an opportunity for media... more The daily newspaper in North America has long been a locally based medium that offers an opportunity for media geographers to explore concepts of place and locality. I explore how newspapers create a sense of place about the locality they serve. I review some of the major geographic theories of place and the local and also the work of communications scholars on how newspapers construct reality in their pages. I apply these ideas to the notion that newspapers construct a sense of place using both the form and the content of the newspaper. I also include a content analysis that examines how the newspaper’s constructed sense of place changed from the late 19th century to the early years of the 21st century.

A Changing Sense of Place in Canadian Daily Newspapers: 1894--2005

by Carrie Buchanan

With thanks to my supervisor, Christopher Dornan, Director of the Arthur Kroeger School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. Thanks also to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, which supplied a grant that funded my doctoral studies in part.

In the modern era, changing perceptions of space and place and external intrusions into local space and culture have... more In the modern era, changing perceptions of space and place and external intrusions into local space and culture have been theorized as weakening ties between people and the places they live in. Improvements in transportation and communication have enabled this process. Sociologist Anthony Giddens (1990, 1991) describes the phenomenon as “disembedding” and considers it a hallmark of modernity while geographer Doreen Massey (1994) describes an increasing “disruption” of local spaces occurring over time.
This dissertation provides empirical evidence to support those theories. It examines the changing “sense of place” from 1894 to 2005 in two Canadian metropolitan daily newspapers: the Toronto Star, independent for most of the period under study, and the Ottawa Citizen, owned by a series of national chains since 1897.
The results show a significant decline in local content and the priority it is given in both newspapers over the 112-year study period. Content analysis was used to compare articles from all sections of the newspaper between three time periods: the Victorian (1894-1929), the Professional (1930-1970), and the Corporate (1971-2005).
While the quantity and priority of local news declined significantly in both newspapers after 1970, the decline was much sharper in the chain-owned newspaper. Furthermore, disappearing local content was replaced almost entirely by national stories in both newspapers, with the chain newspaper displaying a much greater increase in national content. The phenomenon replaced many stories that imparted a local sense of place with ones whose sense of place was national.
Three possible reasons for this increase in national content after 1970–– which is the studyʼs major finding––are suggested in the conclusion: the threat of Quebec separatism, rising corporate influence on newspaper priorities, and a gradual process of spatialization that appears to favour the national and the global over the local.
This study relies heavily on Barnhurst and Neroneʼs (2001) theories about how the form of news structures its messages, and its results support their finding of increased corporate control of news since 1970. Other theories of representation are also examined in an effort to understand how newspapers create and shape a sense of place.

The Kohimarama Conference of 1860: A Contextual Reading

by Lachy Paterson

Journal of New Zealand Studies, NS12 (2011): 29-46.

Paradoxically, the Kohimarama Conference of 1860 stands in contemporary historiography as a shining example of Maori... more Paradoxically, the Kohimarama Conference of 1860 stands in contemporary historiography as a shining example of Maori interaction with the Crown and of what might have been possible if the government was not being so dastardly in its other pursuits. However, the month-long conference, attended by over 100 Māori chiefs, was not a “ratification” of the Treaty of Waitangi as argued by some historians, but an attempt by the government, then under extreme pressure during the first Taranaki war, to avert a more wide-spread conflict, and to advance its colonial project. Using both Maori and English-lnguage newspapers, the conference, the largest propaganda effort and political theatre directed towards Maori, was further projected out to the Maori and Pakeha reading publics.

I giornali on-line

by Francesca Pasquali

Published in Problemi dell’informazione, XXIII, 1, Marzo, 1998, pp. 109-123.

The Next War in the Air: Civilian Fears of Strategic Bombardment in Britain 1908-1941

by Brett Holman

PhD thesis, University of Melbourne, 2009

During the First World War, several writers began to argue that the main strategic risk to Britain was the possibility... more During the First World War, several writers began to argue that the main strategic risk to Britain was the possibility of a sudden, intense aerial bombardment of its cities, which would cause tremendous destruction and large numbers of casualties. The nation would be knocked-out of the war very quickly, in a matter of days or weeks, before it could fully realise its military potential. The theory of the knock-out blow solidified into a consensus during the 1920s and by the 1930s had almost become an orthodoxy, accepted by pacifists and militarists alike.

My thesis examines the concept of the knock-out blow as it was articulated in the public sphere, the reasons why it came to be so widely accepted in public life, and the way it shaped the responses of the British public to the great issues facing them in the 1930s: armaments and appeasement, war or peace. It mainly draws on published, but little examined, sources -- books, journals, newspapers -- produced in the period between 1908 (when aviation was first perceived as a threat to British security) and 1941 (when the Blitz ended, and it was obvious that no knock-out blow was coming). And it shows how, after having been taught to fear the bomber as the bringer of destruction to all they knew and held dear, the British people were instead taught to regard it as their best hope for victory.

The air panic of 1935: British press opinion between disarmament and rearmament

by Brett Holman

Journal of Contemporary History 46 (2011), 288-307.

The British fear of bombing in the early twentieth century has aptly been termed ‘the shadow of the bomber’. But the... more The British fear of bombing in the early twentieth century has aptly been termed ‘the shadow of the bomber’. But the processes by which the public learned about the danger of bombing are poorly understood. This paper proposes that the press was the primary source of information about the threat, and examines a formative period in the evolution of public concern about airpower — the so-called air panic of 1935 — during which German rearmament was revealed and large-scale RAF expansion undertaken in response. A proposed air pact between the Locarno powers enabled a shift from support of disarmament to rearmament by newspapers on the right, while simultaneously supporting collective security. Paradoxically, after initially supporting the air pact, the left-wing press and its readers began to have doubts, for the same reason: the need to support collective security. This episode sheds new light on Britain’s early rearmament, and how the government was able to undertake it, despite the widespread feelings in the electorate in favour of disarmament.

Etymology and Barangay History

by Historically Digitized

'Jonathan’s Jokes: American Humour in the late-Victorian Press’, Media History, 18:1, (2012), pp. 33-49.

by Bob Nicholson

During the final quarter of the nineteenth century, columns of American jokes became a regular feature of numerous... more During the final quarter of the nineteenth century, columns of American jokes became a regular feature of numerous British newspapers. The Newcastle Weekly Currant, for example, had a weekly column of ‘Yankee Snacks’; The North Wales Chronicle had ‘American Humour’; the Hampshire Telegraph its ‘Jonathan's Jokes’; and the Northern Weekly Gazette sported a ‘Stars and Stripes’ column. Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper introduced a regular column of ‘American Jokes’ in 1896, the same year it achieved an unprecedented circulation of one million readers. Almost half a century before Hollywood, here was a distinctively American form of popular culture which took Britain by storm. It has, however, received little academic attention. This article explores the development of the American humour column, considers the way in which it was consumed by British readers, and argues that these seemingly ephemeral jokes played a key role in shaping Victorian encounters with America.

Wild Nature and ‘Religious’ Readings of Events: Natural Disasters in Milanese Printed Reports (16th-17th Century)

by Massimo Petta

uploaded a new version of PDF including bibliographic info.

Despite of the title, this article focuses on the marginalization of any religious and scientific element in the... more Despite of the title, this article focuses on the marginalization of any religious and scientific element in the printed reports (avvisi) from 16th century, especially the ones about natural disasters or similar. Actually, the central matter of news texts was the pure fact: as a consequence, any interpretation (religious or scientific) is irrelevant or purely ornamental.