Following the crusaders and scandal-mongers of the Fourth Estate through more than a century of pop culture
Matthew C. Ehrlich is a professor of journalism at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is the author of Radio Utopia: Postwar Audio Documentary in the Public Interest and Journalism in the Movies. Joe Saltzman directs the Image of the Journalist in Popular Culture, a project of the Norman Lear Center at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at the University of Southern California. He is a professor at USC Annenberg and author of Frank Capra and The Image of the Journalist in American Film.
"A perceptive study of an enduring and tantalizing question: What
do they think of us? Ehrlich and Saltzman craft a persuasive,
sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious montage of the omnipresence
of journalists in popular culture. But the book does more than
that. The authors work also tells us a great deal about the
powerful and defining role of popular culture itself."
--Richard Reeves, author of President Kennedy: Profile of Power
"Authors Matthew C. Ehrlich and Joe Saltzman have done a
painstakingly thorough job of marshaling, assembling, organizing,
and setting down in print the vast amount of material that makes up
our popular culture's representation of journalism and the men and
women who commit it. . . . The subject matter holds plenty of
interest for readers drawn to the popular media, and that's a lot
of us; that's why it's cold the popular media."--The Santa Fe New
Mexican
"Authors Matthew Ehrlich and Joe Saltzman make a convincing case
that fictional journalists are both ubiquitous and significant in
pop culture-- in plays, movies, television, novels, short stories,
comic strips, graphic novels, video games, and so on… With scores
of examples and an extensive appendix of media sources, Heroes and
Scoundrels is a terrific resource for courses in mass communication
and society, contemporary issues in journalism, journalism ethics,
media history, and related courses."--Journalism and Mass
Communication Quarterly
"Ultimately, anyone who studies media portrayals or public
perceptions of journalists would benefit greatly from reading this
book and incorporating it into their teaching and
research."--Journalism and Mass Communication Educator
"Stimulating and thought-provoking. . . . No other work comes close
to covering the subject as broadly."--Maurine H. Beasley, author of
Women of the Washington Press: Politics, Prejudice, and
Persistence
"The assumption behind Heroes and Scoundrels: The Image of the
Journalist in Popular Culture is that the audience's perception of
the messenger shapes the message. That's hardly a new idea but,
applied to journalism in a democracy, it's vastly significant. For
example, it turns out that, while the media have been transformed
by technology, archetypal images of journalists have persisted.
Maybe everything hasn't changed all that much after all. That,
along with other important insights gained from formidable
research, will help both journalists and their audiences better
understand the news of the future. Besides, it’s fun to read all
those stories."--Warren Olney, Host and Executive Producer, "To the
Point" and "Which Way, LA?", KCRW-FM
"A great read that showcases depictions of journalists over the
past century in popular culture. Its thoughtful analysis integrates
cultural theory with media concepts and provides important
historical context that will interest professionals and academics
alike."--Bonnie Brennen, author of Qualitative Research Methods for
Media Studies
"Using a multidisciplinary approach that draws on everything from
language studies to cultural studies, Matthew C. Ehrlich and Joe
Saltzman creatively and entertainingly address the history of the
journalist’s image, 1890 to the present. Fascinating chapters focus
on the images of photographers, war correspondents, gay and lesbian
journalists, journalists of color, women journalists, and
journalists of the sci fi future. The dueling myths of the
journalist as hero and scoundrel, the book persuasively argues,
raise questions about the enduring tension in society between the
press as a force for freedom and a tool of oppression."--Loren
Ghiglione, author of CBS's Don Hollenbeck: An Honest Reporter in
the Age of McCarthyism
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