The History Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) has selected two books as winners of its award honoring the best journalism and mass communication history book published in 2024.

The two books are Dr. Gwyneth Mellinger’s Racializing Objectivity: How the White Southern Press Used Journalism Standards to Defend Jim Crow (University of Massachusetts Press, 2024) and Dr. Ying Qian’s Revolutionary Becomings: Documentary Media in Twentieth-Century China (Columbia University Press, 2024).

It is the first time the division has awarded two winners.

The committee of judges—Drs. Kathryn McGarr, Will Mari, David T. Z. Mindich (chair), and Cristina Mislan—selected the two books after considering many quality entries.

Dr. Gwyneth Mellinger is a Ruth D. Bridgeforth Professor of Telecommunications at James Madison University. The judges were impressed with Racializing Objectivity’s deep research and important contributions to our understanding of both the Black press and the way that white journalists used “objectivity” to attack African Americans. One judge wrote, “In Racializing Objectivity, Dr. Gwyneth Mellinger takes on some of the most lingering tropes about the ‘race beat’ of the Civil Rights era, highlighting how white supremacy was baked into an idealization of objectivity that proved more harmful than helpful.”

Dr. Ying Qian is an associate professor of East Asian languages and cultures at Columbia University. The committee was impressed with her deeply researched exploration of the history of Chinese documentary films.  One judge wrote,  “In Revolutionary Becomings, Dr. Ying Qian speaks not just to scholarship on mass communication but expertly combines film history and the history of political propaganda to tell a new story of documentary in China during the twentieth century.”

Drs. Ying Qian and Gwyneth Mellinger will each receive a plaque and a cash prize. Both honorees will be recognized during the division’s awards gala, Aug. 6 at 7:30 p.m., at the 2025 AEJMC National Convention in San Francisco.