“The Supremacy of Ignorance Over Instruction and of Numbers Over Knowledge”

Media scandals, rumour and gossip: A study with an ear close to the ground

“…He shows how scandals in the longue durée have been intimately connected with news and journalism, to the extent that they were treated as synonyms in the French language in the eighteenth century. Darnton’s mapping of the communication circuits in Paris at that time, which were mainly oral, offers clues as to the power of the spoken word when a scandal plays out in public, through various forms of journalism – then and now (see also Hartley, 1996, 2008).…”

“…The analysis of the stories of the subjects of mediated scandals in this article also says something fundamental about journalism and its historical heritage, which is often neglected by researchers within the field. ‘Modern political journalism was founded as much in scandal, gossip, and sensationalism as it was in reason and truth’, as Hartley ( 2008: 681) puts it. He points to the fact that journalism not only reports on popular culture, as object, but also constitutes popular culture, as subject.…”

“…This underlines the staying power of the gossipy, oral dimensions of journalism even in the context of the so-called serious journalism of today. The staples of popular culture are the very propellant of modern journalism and therefore of modern political ideas, such as celebrity, scandal and bedroom antics, Hartley (2008: 687) argues. He concludes that these critical perspectives on journalism have had ‘remarkably little impact’ on the study of journalism, in research as well as in the teaching at journalism schools, where you tend to shed light on what counts as journalism in relation to the ‘rational’ democratic process, the development of policy and the business cycle (Hartley, 2008: 688–9).…”

Alternative and Mainstream Media

“…Early newspapers were known for their muckraking investigative journalism and their calls to action. The European Enlightenment, French Revolution and British industrialization from the 1790s to the 1840s gave birth to this radical form of journalism (Hartley 2008). Early papers used evocative language in their commentary and invited readers to take action.…”

“…'The early mass-circulation newspapers were produced by radicals among whom were also entrepreneurs, who had the "ability to harness commercialism for the purposes of political dissent and cultural populism"' (Haywood 2004: 164 cited in Hartley 2008. The fi rst newspapers focused on a form of popular radicalism aimed for a collective, unifying audience -labelled the 'we press' by Hartley (2008). In America, ideals of the 'we press' were evident in the mainstream and prominent Pennsylvania Gazette .…”