UAF Journ Study Guide

 

Updated Feb. 13. Reminder: Quiz on newspapers (Baran and class notes) will be Thursday, Feb.13

Study Guide from Lesson Plan on February 11, 2025

Current event: John F. Kennedy assassination many decades later

Background: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sSta0qn-CA

https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/11/politics/jfk-assassination-files/index.html

Meet Rebecca Woolington:  Excellent, Pulitzer Prize reporter and her team. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jM_tYwt59dg

Student journalism: 2020.  Franklin College president Thomas Miner: story by student journalists

Student journalists at Lehigh University: animal abuse in labs. “It is extremely disturbing that Lehigh University staff both failed to properly euthanize an animal and failed to provide food/water to an animal for 36 hours,” an investigator wrote in a letter to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Alaska Daily: based on ignored stories about murdered indigenous women in Alaska

Database Reporting: show don’t tell.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvafU6OkPkg

More stories are needed:  Factual studies on Indigenous peoples’ injustices https://www.bia.gov/service/mmu/missing-and-murdered-indigenous-people-crisis

Be sure your source is reliable: Frederick A. Cook.  Lied about reaching top of McKinley (Denali) and being first explorer to reach North Pole.

Chris Farklelas: medic and reporter.  Point of including him. Reporters are human too.  Search for details that touch other human beings, your readers. https://www.plough.com/en/topics/justice/reconciliation/coward-take-my-cowards-hand

When a reporter is accused of faking interviews. 

Commentary: facts and opinion vs. hard news

Hard news: https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/japan-weighs-alaska-lng-pipeline-pledge-win-trumps-favour-2025-01-31/

An offense to avoid:  Inserting opinion in a news story.  (It should go into a commentary or editorial). The goal is  high-quality objective reporting from  journalists.  They should address and remove any bias and present stories from neutral viewpoints. What to avoid: incorrect, inaccurate, incomplete, misleading, misrepresented, or otherwise skewed reporting.

  • understand the concept of bias
  • identify a point of view based on word choice
  • understand the role of perception in media
  • understand the reasons why bias might occur in news
  • recognize the different ways in which bias can occur in news reporting

Example: During wartime, national news outlets tend to engage in overt bias by reporting extensively on their war crimes while failing to report on U.S. military war crimes. Killing of unarmed prisoners occurred by German and U.S. military during 1944 Battle of the Bulge.

Example: Media coverage of Gabby Petito was overhyped

https://people.com/gabby-petito-dad-faces-missing-combats-white-woman-syndrome-8752515

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

REVIEW for future quiz: Newspaper terms:  hard news, soft news, headline, top of fold, folio, feature (example was opioids interviews by your instructor), sports page, entertainment section (FDNM Latitude), publisher, editor/managing editor (same meaning), circulation, advertising, audience, demographics, deadline, editorial and commentary = opinion based on facts)

Note: A byline is how we readers know the name of the reporter who wrote an article).

_________

Why was the Alaska Daily tv series so important in terms of making the public aware of the deaths of indigenous girls and women in Alaska?  Could this also be a big story in Canada’s Yukon?

Alaskan to know: What reporter in Anchorage won an important award for his reporting on an insensitive library director, and earlier, missing Alaska women and girls (indigenous)?

Alaskan to know: What Alaska writer and playwright was associated with the series?

How is data collection important in helping readers understand the facts in a story? https://diverseelders.org/2019/01/29/inadequate-data-on-missing-murdered-indigenous-women-and-girls/

Name a Pulitzer Prize winner whose byline and work we learned about Feb. 11. Rebecca Woolington:  Pulitzer Prize reporter and her team. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jM_tYwt59dg

Be able to trace the growth of newspapers and their current financial challenges

Know the Penny press. P. 76

Know the significance of the New York Morning Herald. Correspondents abroad

Important journalists: Investigative journalist Nelly Bly and publisher Joseph Pultizer

How should newspapers cover community issues like student drug overdoses?

Important Newspapers:

Historically African American Chicago Defender: The Great Migration and Harlem Renaissance. The newspaper helped shape and respond to the migration, which lasted from about 1915 to 1970.

 

https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/remembering-chicago-defender-print-edition-1905-2019

 

 

Yellow Journalism: scandal sheets. Name derived from comic character, the Yellow kid (his words and dialogue were in his yellow shirt)

https://comicvine.gamespot.com/the-yellow-kid/4005-66506/images/

 

 

192os beginning of newspaper chains

 

Important news publisher: William Randolph Hearst.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvJQ6AZfT6Q

 

 

Famous journalism movie: Citizen Kane

(Orson Welles) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9OUZNicTGU

 

 

 

Role of Advertising with regard to newspaper profits

 

Collapse of classified ads

 

Demographics still make corporate advertising appealing

 

 

Decline overall in advertising dollars

 

 

https://www.statista.com/chart/596/advertising-revenue-of-us-newspapers/

 

 

Employment and other important news

 

https://redline.digital/us-newspapers-statistics/

 

Buffalo Courier Express:  Driven out of business by rival Buffalo News

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/264950997882

 

 

Firewall:  advertising and editorial not so distinct: see Baran

 

 

Nonprofit newspaper:Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

 

p. 89: attracting younger readers a must

 

 

 

Definitions of Soft news and hard news: p. 90

 

Quote: top pf 91: Jefferson

 

END of study guide

 

 

Study Guide on Feb. 4 for Feb. 6

  1. Write your interview questions and schedule an interview or interviews as soon as possible. Procrastination kills a project.

ResearchLearn about the company’s history, values, and culture. You can also research the interviewee’s background and previous work. 

Ask permission before taping on your phone or recorder. Verify date and time of interview with your interviewee. Take notes only if they refuse permission to tape. It happens.

Prepare talking pointsHave key messages and examples ready to stay on topic. Take notes with you, not prepared questions written out. 
Consider challenging questions that show us how your subject thinks. 
Dress appropriatelyDress in what'[s normal for a workplace. 
Be on timeArrive on time for your interview. Be patient if interviewee is a bit late. 
Be respectfulTreat the interviewee with respect. 
ListenListen to what the interviewee is saying. DON’T IGNORE THE INTERVIEWER and Jump to your next question.
Thank the interviewee at the end of the interview for his or her time. 

Baran: READING

P. 56:  Books can make a difference–movies, TV news, social media, conferences, town meetings.

Current Event: Trial of https://www.thetimes.com/us/news-today/article/sir-salman-rushdie-prepares-to-face-his-attacker-in-court-0xzztddc7

Current events: Tariffs with Canada, Mexico, China imposed by U.S. government. What is the latest?

Super Bowl: KC and Philadelphia.  But also the ads and performers at half-time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adkICTkIZeA

Books to know on p. 55

 We discussed on Thursday briefly Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (Lived 1907-1964)

 Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) was a landmark book that sparked the modern environmental movement. It raised awareness of the dangers of pesticides and the chemical industry’s influence on legislation. The book’s message inspired new policies, the development of environmental sciences, and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)

The first Earth Day was celebrated on April 22, 1970, and Rachel Carson’s book “Silent Spring” is widely credited with significantly influencing the public awareness that led to the establishment of this environmental holiday, . 

 

Page 56: Importance of Libraries

1st PRIVATE LENDING LIBRARY: The first lending libraries in the United States were the Library Company of Philadelphia and the Franklin Public Library. 

1st PUBLIC LIBRARY: The Franklin Public Library in Franklin, Massachusetts is America’s first lending library. In 1778, when the town was incorporated, the designated name Exeter was changed to Franklin in honor of Dr. Benjamin Franklin.

Local Trivia: George C. Thomas Memorial Library was Alaska’s first library.

  • Built in 1909 in Fairbanks, this log building was the first public library in the area.
  • The library was funded by George C. Thomas, who also donated money to buy books. (City paid $1 for a lot).

Censorship: Students in 30s in Germany

Bruce Severy:

Excerpt from Hank’s next book: Censorship

Trial by Storm

Why did the burning of Slaughterhouse-Five by a North Dakota school board erupt into a national debate on censorship and the rights of parents to choose reading material they feel is age appropriate.

 

Kurt Vonnegut: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6nputMJi7U

At first, Bruce wasn’t worried when the school superintendent informed him about the complaint. “I was more concerned because about half my class could barely read or write,” he said in a phone interview.

Clayton Kemper saw no problem. Shut down the book and assign a classic in its place, he said at the board meeting.

That might have ended matters. The board might have buried the books in a storage room. That would have drawn no attention. Instead, the school’s janitor tossed Kurt’s masterpiece into a furnace.

No one ever would say publicly who the Einstein had been that hatched the solution. “I don’t remember who said we should burn the books but somebody said it,” board president Charles McCarty told the press.

School superintendent Dale Fuhrman said he’d take care of the matter. “I gave them to the janitor as I would my waste paper,” Fuhrman said to s reporter.

And what about janitor Sheldon Summers? “I work here,” he said. “I only follow orders.”

That argument hadn’t worked so well at the 1946 Nuremberg trials of Nazi leaders. Nonetheless, years after the Drake censorship debacle, Bruce Severy would say to this writer that the one regret he had was that the simple, unsophisticated janitor found himself unsure and embarrassed to continue living in Drake after some in the community harangued him.

Summers followed orders on November 7, 1973. He threw into the giant blue furnace about 70 copies of the Vonnegut novel.

After a few Drake students refused to turn back Slaughterhouse Five as the school demanded, employees searched the children’s lockers and confiscated copies. Newspapers reported the search and seizure.

Following the seizure, a small number of vocal students staged a protest in the high school’s library.

 

Summarize:

E-book popularity p. 61-62

Conglomeration: 5 big publishing conglomerates and independent presses.

Independent Press (pp. 65-66) editor Rick Ardinger and his wife

https://www.pbs.org/video/limberlost-press-xozi2v/

 

 

Current events: at least 10 states give parents power above librarians as to what books should appear in libraries.

The Fault Is in our Stars (Cancer patients fall in love)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyzXpZ3iByM

 John Green: interview (pay attention to interview itself)

The Episcopal Missionary Society in Alaska believed they had a responsibility to provide reading materials to people in isolated areas. According to local tradition, in 1905 eight “sourdoughs from Fairbanks wrote to the Reverend Peter Trimble Rowe, first Episcopal Bishop in Alaska, asking for “mental food.”

Great Alaskans of Historical Importance:

https://thecordovatimes.com/2024/09/15/last-frontier-days-peter-rowe/

Big books support smaller author books

From book pages to a new sport at some campuses:

 

Quidditch: UCLA

 

Stop here.

 

Books:  Step to finished book on market.

 

  1. You have a vague notion or a need to express yourself in a book. That’s not good enough.  You must make the notion into a fact-based IDEA or IDEAS.  You write a proposal (about 20-30 pages with one sample chapter.
  2. OR, a publisher discovers your work and asks you to write the book. Same thing: You write a proposal (maybe 10 pages) with one sample chapter.
  3. You get a book contract stipulating words, deadlines, rights, copyright, photo and illustration responsibilities, index and legal liability issues.
  4. You work a year up to many years on the project while your other books or a job support you.

https://theamericanscholar.org/10-famous-authors-with-surprising-day-jobs/     You edit and fact-check.  You catch errors and stay the course.

 

  1. Editor and/or editorial board reads the manuscript. (3-6 months rewriting). You purchase illustrations and photos. You fight to get a reasonable image of your novel on the cover.

Your editor sends book proof (galleys) to get “blurbs” from well known persons in field. A book blurb is a one-to-three sentence micro-review of a book. It’s function is to express a positive, excited and ‘wowing’ description of the book that will provoke a reader to buy and read it. Sometimes a book blurb is one word – but the word is eye-catching and powerful. The book blurb is an important part of the marketing life of a book. It is written before a book is published and intended to support the publicity and marketing cycle of the book/author.

 

 

  1. One day the mail arrives with an actual book.
  2. Reviewers receive the book about the same time.
  3. Optional: A movie producer takes an option on your book. Then it may actually become a movie. A screenwriter takes your story and adapts to the screen. (Fact-based)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgW3vJqh864

 

 

  1. 54. Books are agents of social and cultural change.
  2. a) How did Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle do that?
  3. b) 1918-1937. A movement with authors, artists, cultural leaders, activists

https://www.britannica.com/video/did-you-know-Harlem-Renaissance/-253733

 

 

Page 55: Top

 

Book to know on p. 55:

 Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (Lived 1907-1964)

 

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) was a landmark book that sparked the modern environmental movement. It raised awareness of the dangers of pesticides and the chemical industry’s influence on legislation. The book’s message inspired new policies, the development of environmental sciences, and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)

 

  1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SeJNRaE11A0

 56 Early Libraries and their cultural importance

 

1st PRIVATE LENDING LIBRARY: The first lending libraries in the United States were the Library Company of Philadelphia and the Franklin Public Library. 

1st PUBLIC LIBRARY: The Franklin Public Library in Franklin, Massachusetts is America’s first lending library. In 1778, when the town was incorporated, the designated name Exeter was changed to Franklin in honor of Dr. Benjamin Franklin.

 

Local: George C. Thomas Memorial Library was Alaska’s first library.

  • Built in 1909 in Fairbanks, this log building was the first public library in the area.
  • The library was funded by George C. Thomas, who also donated money to buy books. (City paid $1 for a lot).

 

 

The Episcopal Missionary Society in Alaska believed they had a responsibility to provide reading materials to people in isolated areas. According to local tradition, in 1905 eight “sourdoughs from Fairbanks wrote to the Reverend Peter Trimble Rowe, first Episcopal Bishop in Alaska, asking for “mental food.”

Great Alaskans of Historical Importance:

https://thecordovatimes.com/2024/09/15/last-frontier-days-peter-rowe/

BULLETIN: Please read.  Jan. 29

January 29, 2025

Next Quiz 2 on Feb. 4, Chapter Two and current events.

Study Guide for First Part of Chapter Two:

  1. 35. Concentration of ownership: And consolidation, p. 35. Conglomerates, p. 35

 

Disney’s properties. https://privacy.thewaltdisneycompany.com/en/company-overview/

 

Ghost papers (and radio stations). P. 36

 

Oligopoly, p. 36.  And https://study.com/academy/lesson/video/oligopoly-competition-definition-examples.html

 

  1. 37: Be able to answer the question at top of page: Should local papers get governor subsidies like farmers get, for example?

Study Guide for Chapter Two, posted Jan. 28 a.m., 2025 (below).

 

Define and give examples of globalization: China (5 years ago): https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=fTsOfvOpvig&t=5m13s

Define: Niche marketing and audience fragmentation, p. 38

Convergence: important, all on 40-41

41 What is a content producer?

 

P. 44  Definition of cheap Speech

P. 45: Questions for review: Know 11, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8

Have a great day!