Michael Schudson

Bio: Michael Schudson is an academic researcher from Columbia University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Journalism & Politics. The author has an hindex of 40, co-authored 119 publications receiving 11750 citations. Previous affiliations of Michael Schudson include University of California, San Diego & University of California, Berkeley.

The science of fake news

Abstract: The rise of fake news highlights the erosion of long-standing institutional bulwarks against misinformation in the internet age. Concern over the problem is global. However, much remains unknown regarding the vulnerabilities of individuals, institutions, and society to manipulations by malicious actors. A new system of safeguards is needed. Below, we discuss extant social and computer science research regarding belief in fake news and the mechanisms by which it spreads. Fake news has a long history, but we focus on unanswered scientific questions raised by the proliferation of its most recent, politically oriented incarnation. Beyond selected references in the text, suggested further reading can be found in the supplementary materials.

Discovering The News: A Social History Of American Newspapers

Abstract: The Ideal of Objectivity The Revolution in American Journalism in the Age of Egalitarianism: The Penny Press Telling Stories: Journalism as a Vocation After 1880 Stories and Information: Two Journalisms in the 1890s Objectivity Becomes Ideology: Journalism After World War I Objectivity, News Management, and the Critical Culture

The sociology of news

Abstract: The Sociology of News reviews and synthesizes not only what is happening to journalism but also what is happening to the scholarly understanding of journalism. In the Second Edition, each chapter of the book has been updated to account for the radical changes that have reshaped the news industry over the last decade. With a new chapter on the sharp contraction of the news business in the United States since 2007, The Sociology of News examines journalism as a social institution and analyzes the variety of forces and factors-economic, technological, political, cultural, organizational-that shape the news media today.

The objectivity norm in American journalism

Abstract: Why did the occupational norm of ‘objectivity’ arise in American journalism? This question has attracted the interest of many journalism historians but it has not previously been examined as an instance of a more general social phenomenon, the emergence of new cultural norms and ideals. Four conditions for the emergence of new norms are identified – two having to do with the self-conscious pursuit of internal group solidarity; and two having to do with the need to articulate the ideals of social practice in a group in order to exercise control over subordinates and to pass on group culture to the next generation. Reviewing the history of the professionalization of American journalism, this essay identifies the late 19th and early 20th century as the period when these conditions crystallized. Alternative technological and economic explanations of the emergence of objectivity are criticized and the difficulty of understanding why objectivity as a norm emerged first and most fully in the United States rather...

The good citizen : a history of American civic life

Abstract: In 1996, less than half of all eligible voters bothered to vote. Fewer citizens each year follow government and public affairs regularly. Is popular sovereignty a failure? Not necessarily, argues Michael Schudson in this history of citizenship in America. This work sees American politics as evolving from a "politics of assent" in colonial times and the 18th century, in which voting generally reaffirmed the social hierarchy of the community; to a "politics of affiliation" in the 19th century, in which party loyalty was paramount for the good citizen. Progressive reforms around the turn of the century reduced the power of parties and increased the role of education, making way for the "informed citizen", which remains the ideal in American civil life at the end of the 20th century. A fourth model, "the rights-bearing citizen", supplements the "informed citizen" model and makes the courthouse as well as the voting booth a channel for citizenship. From the Civil Rights movement on, rights-consciousness has thrust politics into everyday life. This message seeks to counter recent claims that American civic life has declined because participation in traditional civically oriented associations has declined.

Critical Discourse Analysis

Abstract: Since the late 1980s, Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) has become a well-established field in the social sciences. However, in contrast with some branches of linguistics, CDA is not a discrete academic discipline in the traditional sense, with a fixed set of research methods. The manifold roots of CDA lie in a myriad of disciplines including rhetoric, anthropology, philosophy and cognitive science, to name a few. This four-volume set brings together seminal articles on the subject from varied sources, creating an invaluable roadmap for scholars seeking to consolidate their knowledge of CDA, and of its continued development. Sculpted and edited by a leading voice in the field, this work covers the interdisciplinary roots, the most important approaches and methodologies of CDA, as well as applications in other disciplines in an updated and comprehensive way. Structured thematically, the four volumes cover a wide range of aspects and considerations: Volume One: Histories, Concepts and Interdisciplinarity Volume Two: Theoretical Approaches and Methodologies Volume Three: 'Doing CDA' - Case Studies Volume Four: Applications and Perspectives - New Trends in CDA

Comparing Media Systems: three models of media and politics

Abstract: This book proposes a framework for comparative analysis of the relation between the media and the political system Building on a survey of media institutions in eighteen West European and North American democracies, Hallin and Mancini identify the principal dimensions of variation in media systems and the political variables that have shaped their evolution They go on to identify three major models of media system development, the Polarized Pluralist, Democratic Corporatist, and Liberal models; to explain why the media have played a different role in politics in each of these systems; and to explore the force of change that are currently transforming them It provides a key theoretical statement about the relation between media and political systems, a key statement about the methodology of comparative analysis in political communication, and a clear overview of the variety of media institutions that have developed in the West, understood within their political and historical context

A Consumer Values Orientation for Materialism and Its Measurement: Scale Development and Validation

Abstract: This article reviews the construct and measurement of materialism and concludes that materialism is appropriately conceptualized as a consumer value. The development of a values-oriented materialism scale with three components—acquisition centrality, acquisition as the pursuit of happiness, and possession-defined success—is described. In validation tests high scorers (compared with low scorers) desired a higher level of income, placed greater emphasis on financial security and less on interpersonal relationships, preferred to spend more on themselves and less on others, engaged in fewer voluntary simplicity behaviors, and were less satisfied with their lives.

Culture and cognition

Abstract: Recent work in cognitive psychology and social cognition bears heavily on concerns of sociologists of culture. Cognitive research confirms views of culture as fragmented; clarifies the roles of institutions and agency; and illuminates supraindividual aspects of culture. Individuals experience culture as disparate bits of information and as schematic structures that organize that information. Culture carried by institutions, networks, and social movements diffuses, activates, and selects among available schemata. Implications for the study of identity, collective memory, social classification, and logics of action are developed.