Abstract
As a timely and significant academic book concerning digital journalism studies, What is Digital Journalism Studies? probes into the nature of this emerging field of research, which has become an increasingly prominent area of study within media communication during the last decade. One of the arguments the authors make is that digital journalism studies makes the demarcations in traditional journalism regarding media, journalism and public spheres seem less valid. It systematically delves into ‘the technologies, platforms, devices, and audience relations that constitute central objects of study’ (p. 3), the principal theories, the normative underpinnings, the innovative research methodologies and the possible directions for its future development in the academic field. Steen Steensen is Professor of Journalism and former (2016–2020) Head of the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Oslo Metropolitan University. He is associate editor of Journalism Practice and has a background as a journalist. Oscar Westlund is a Professor at the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Oslo Metropolitan University and the editor-in-chief of Digital Journalism.
The book consists of eight chapters. Chapter 1, serving as an introductory part, outlines four key structural premises for digital journalism studies in terms of a massive shift in revenue streams, an increased emphasis on audience metrics and analytics, shifting patterns of distribution and more vulnerability to manipulation and disinformation resulting in a lack of public trust for journalism. Based on a meta-analysis of the five most influential journalism journals internationally, Steensen and Westlund argue that digital journalism studies is an interdisciplinary field and should be of global diversity, though it is still relatively western-centric and with a strong dependence on sociology and communication. An analytical framework for understanding the relationship between digital journalism and its object of inquiry is introduced in Chapter 2, encompassing three core dimensions: society, sector and scholarship. The authors then employ four key mechanisms to analyse the interplay between these three dimensions, namely issue (in)visibility, pro-innovation bias, path dependency and addressability.
Chapter 3 focuses on the technological aspects of digital journalism studies and discusses the key themes arising from the thematic clusters of the keywords used in the 343 original articles published in Digital Journalism from its inaugural issue in 2013 until issue 4 in 2019: data journalism, analytics and metrics, as well as algorithms and automation. The authors argue that ‘throughout the 2010s there has been enormous activity in the journalism sector associated with the developments of mobile ecosystems and global platforms’ (p. 41). Chapter 4 focuses on platforms as well as digital devices. A wealth of research has been conducted into the roles that platform companies and emerging technologies play in the production, distribution and consumption of news and journalism. Steensen and Westlund also point out that the study of Western social media platforms and Twitter in particular attracts more academic research than Facebook or WhatsApp.
Theories, assumptions and methodologies are then discussed in the following chapters. Chapter 5 argues that there are two theoretical blind spots in digital journalism studies, namely that it has a social science bias as well as ‘a lack of connection with findings from the past and a preoccupation with the present and the future’ (p. 69) in itself. An imagined case is used as an example in Chapter 6 to discuss the underlying normativity of digital journalism studies, which is considered as ‘a problem if it is hidden, unproblematised, and masked as apparent neutrality’ (p. 72). It then analyses three discourses that dominate much of the research field, namely the discourses of crisis, technological optimism and innovation, respectively. Chapter 7 then explores a multitude of methods in digital journalism studies, some of which originate from computer science and information science. The authors advocate for the advancements in big data methods on the one hand and warn about the risk of going way beyond what the new methods actually can achieve, on the other hand. The concluding chapter offers five directions for future research.
On the whole, the book is, to a large extent, valuable, practical and well-organised with several merits. On one level, it includes a systematic review of original articles published in the five most influential journalism journals, thus providing readers with the latest as well as a relatively comprehensive academic assessment of the development of digital journalism studies. On another level, it offers an overview of multifaceted theoretical perspectives (e.g. Luhmann's theory of social systems, Bourdieu's field theory, actor-network theory – ANT, agenda-setting theory, organisational development theory, critical theory, discourse theory, etc.) as well as various research methods (e.g. interviews, surveys, ethnographic fieldwork, Q-methodology, critical discourse analysis, genre analysis, network analysis, etc.), which further validates the highly cross- and interdisciplinary characteristics of the field. Nonetheless, there is still a small regret that it only covers the literature review of the five journalism journals in the field. It would be more persuasive and globally diverse if more international journals, especially non-western ones, such as African Journalism Studies, Asian Journal of Communication, Brazilian Journalism Research, and so forth could be explored as well since ‘digital journalism scholars produce more than 1000 journal articles per year’ (p. 26).
All in all, the book What is Digital Journalism Studies? is quite insightful. It not only provides multidimensional perspectives on how digital journalism studies comes into being but also shares the authors’ own normative directions for how the field of digital journalism studies should evolve in the 2020s. It will be of interest to academics, researchers, journalism practitioners, PhD students and others in journalism and communication, especially in the field of digital journalism studies.