Abstract
Journalism has endured a myriad of challenges around the world while celebrating considerable successes amidst tyrannical regimes, underperforming economies, and hegemonic sociopolitical cultures. Journalism across Cultures: An Introduction illuminates little-known facts – around the world – about the evolution of media systems from a professional and educational environment in this important craft. It is a thorough discussion of a number of tribulations and opportunities that mass communication technology presents to the world and to many facets of journalism.
Obijiofor and Hanusch discuss journalism practice, its quality, and its future. In this easy-to-read text, the authors reintroduce press theories and media models drawing from disciplines such as anthropology, sociology, and cross-cultural and international political theories. They theorize the roles or role perceptions of journalists, journalism education, foreign news reporting, conflict and peace reporting, and commercialization, as well as the impact of new technologies on the profession.
Chapter two embarks on some seminal but underdeveloped media models through which the authors explain and critique how journalism is practiced and how media function in areas such as Africa, Latin America, the Arab world, China and the Middle East. The third chapter deals with what makes news and how it is created, from factors that include personal, societal, political, cultural and technological systems. The analysis from chapters two through four is somewhat methodologically startling due to the shortage of cross-cultural comparative perspectives, but those chapters generally underline the importance of the book as they reveal an important link between cultural, political, and ideological factors that shape news processes and influence news.
The fourth chapter discusses journalism education across cultures and its history in the world. The book mentions that the first journalism school was established in the University of Missouri in 1908 (p. 63), but a page later the authors disclose that a journalism school was established in Paris in 1899 (p. 64). The chapter highlights the manner in which values in the American and European journalism practice shaped journalism education elsewhere. The conflict between academia and practice is explicated with insightful analysis about the strengths and shortcomings of both stances. What makes this a compelling chapter are propositions for the best models of education and the possibility of developing a standardized global journalism education curriculum in light of the many divergent curricula used around the world.
Arguably, gender is an important factor in news reporting and production, but it does not get the adequate analysis that I believe it deserves in this exploration. Having said that, the book has incisive analysis of the historical role of women in journalism, their shifting roles and struggle to get into the top ranks. It discusses ways feminine discourse changes the news and the ways it is reported, and how gatekeepers in some instances disregard feminine perspectives.
The discussion of foreign news and conflict reporting takes up two chapters. Foreign newsgathering and distribution was for a century dominated by news agencies and conglomerate news organizations that are predominantly from western countries. These chapters form a central basis for this book and proffer the utility for undertaking this project. One of the central points discussed is the domination of news from the western perspective and the resulting hegemony and misrepresentation of other cultures. The chapter ends with a brilliant discussion of citizen journalism, its pros and cons and how it may transform traditional newsgathering.
Chapter seven reviews peace journalism versus real journalism from the conflict reporting perspective. The authors discuss how peace journalism can be applied, its positive effects, and the arguments against it. They examine the effects and possible future of peace-oriented journalism in a troubled world where various forms of conflicts are rising. This chapter is abstractly captivating; so much so that I wish the authors had delved comparatively into the broad practices and plight across nations and regions. Perhaps some readers would also have liked to see a description of how journalists can disseminate peace in light of their ethical demands and principles during ongoing conflicts.
The book expounds on the decline of newspapers, particularly in the United States and some European countries. Yet newspaper circulation is growing in many developing countries, where readers are on the increase. The last two chapters aptly detail the impact of new technologies on journalism, commercialization of newspapers, and increasing media consolidation, and its impact on the quality of news. These concluding chapters deliver the ethical dilemmas of new technology, its pervasiveness and invasiveness, the changing demographics and real-time reporting, convergence, and high demand for quick accessible news.
Overall, the book is a superb introduction to the ever-expanding field of journalism around the world. It is an excellent introductory instructional book for aspiring journalists and college students who wish to work globally in the technologically advanced world of journalism.