Yellow Journalism Puncturing the Myths, Defining the Legacies

Subjects:

• Communications » Journalism
• Communications » Political Communications
• History » American History -- 1900 to 1945

Reviews:

• ...this book is an excellent companion to recent books about the press at the turn of the century....Highly recommended for journalism history collections serving both undergraduates and advanced scholars.
  —Choice
• [c]hallenges several popular misconceptions about this era of American journalism, particulary the charge that yellow press coverage propelled the United States into the Spanish-American war. Moreover, the author argues that yellow journalism had a more lasting impact on the American press than is commonly realized, as seen in a variety of innovative news practices and layout elements that have been passed along largely intact to this day.
  —Harvard Journal of Press/Politics 2003
• Scholars who have followed Joseph Campbell's convention papers will find much that is familiar in Yellow Journalism. That earlier work, completed over five years, is integrated into this difinitive treatment. His research is comprehensive, his assessment keen. Campbell pricks flawed generalizations that have misrepresented the Yellow Press since historians first identified it as a distinctive period in U.S. media history. Because of Campbell's work, almost everyone who has written about the period, including me, will need to revise what's been said before. This work is that significant.
  —American Journalism Spring 2002
• ...every journalism historian should at least read chapter three of the book, which is a compelling and definitive treatment of the Hearst-Remington telegram.
  —Journalism History Spring 2002
• Combining content analysis with archival research, this study...challenges several popular misconceptions about this era of American journalism, particularly the charge that yellow press coverage propelled the United States into the Spanish-American War.
  —Harvard Journal of Press/Politics
• Campbell demonstrates how careless research and sloppy thinking of journalism historians and others have perpetuated myths about a pivotal period of the American press.
  —Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly

• Endorsement From Dr. Margaret Blanchard
  William Rand Kenan Jr. Professor
  University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Yellow Journalism, Puncturing the Myths, Defining the Legacies is an extensively researched, well-written, and myth-shattering study of the phenomenon of yellow journalism. W. Joseph Campbell uses a careful reading of the newspapers and periodicals of the era to create the best picture to date of the yellow journalism era. He corrects errors in interpretation and establishes a clearer, more accurate picture of the time period and the phenomenon. This is a `must read' for all interested in this topic.

Table of Contents:

• Preface
• Introduction
• Puncturing the Myths
• First Use: The Emergence and Diffusion of "Yellow Journalism"
• The Yellow Press and the Myths of Its Readership
• Not Likely Sent: The Remington-Hearst "Telegrams"
• Not to Blame: The Yellow Press and the Spanish-American War
• Defining the Legacies
• How Yellow Journalism Lives On: An Analysis of Newspaper Across 100 Years
• Echoes in Contemporary Journalism: Other Ways in Which the Yellow Press Lives On
• Tble of Contents Preface
• Tibliography