The History Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) has selected Dr. Will Slauter as the winner of its Book Award honoring the best journalism and mass communication history book published in 2019. 

The author of Who Owns the News? A History of Copyright (Stanford University Press), Slauter is an associate professor at Université de Paris and a member of the Institut Universitaire de France. He earned his Ph.D. in History from Princeton University and taught at Columbia University and Florida State University before relocating to France in 2010.

The runner-up for this year’s Book Award is Dr. Aimee Edmondson, author of In Sullivan’s Shadow: The Use and Abuse of Libel Law During the Long Civil Rights Struggle (University of Massachusetts Press). An associate professor and director of graduate studies at Ohio University, Edmondson earned her Ph.D. in Journalism at the University of Missouri. She teaches courses in media law; computer-assisted reporting; and race, class, and gender in the media. 

A panel of three distinguished media historians chose Who Owns the News? from a field of 18 entries. The judges described the work as “ambitious,” “topical,” and “incredibly smart and thought-provoking,” applauding Slauter’s “historical imagination” and his “methodically laid-out research.” One reviewer called it “some of the best media history I’ve read.”   

Who Owns the News? explores the intertwined histories of journalism and copyright law in the United States and Great Britain, revealing how shifts in technology, government policy, and publishing strategy have shaped the media landscape. Beginning with the earliest printed news publications and ending with the Internet, Slauter examines the debates about copyright and efforts to control the flow of news.

According to one of the judges, “The quality of the primary source research and its synthesis with secondary literature produce a smart and insightful historical narrative that expands our understanding of news as property. I was truly impressed by the scholarship and writing. I also applaud Slauter’s transnational approach.”

Edmondson’s book, In Sullivan’s Shadow, offers a detailed analysis of libel litigation during the Civil Rights Movement. Drawing on extensive archival research and scholarship in journalism, legal history, and African American studies, Edmondson tells the story of activists, journalists, publishers, and Southern officials involved in a series of captivating cases that preceded and followed the Supreme Court’s historic New York Times v. Sullivan ruling. 

These little-known courtroom dramas at the intersection of race, libel, and journalism go beyond the activism of the 1960s and span much of the country’s history. One judge observed, “This work is significant because it connects Sullivan with the long struggle for equal rights in the country in a way that most journalism texts do not. The case’s significance matters just as much to civil rights as it does to journalistic freedoms. This work shows how and why.” 

Slauter will receive a plaque and cash prize. Both Slauter and Edmondson will be recognized during the division’s Awards Gala at the AEJMC National Convention, which will be held virtually this year, and featured in future episodes of the Journalism History podcast.