By Cayce Myers, Virginia Tech, Vice Chair/Program Chair, mcmyers@vt.edu
Will and I are excited to announce the results of the panel competition for AEJMC 2021, in the midst of a supremely challenging year. We received a number of very worthy and interesting panel pitches, but had to pick six to bring forward to our sibling divisions for negotiation as cosponsors, with AEJMC’s partnering system. Our teaching awards will be our seventh panel. While there’s still a few moving parts, we’re proud to continue partnerships and add new and important ones, for the division.
The History Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication will present its award for Outstanding Master’s Thesis in Journalism and Mass Communication History in 2021, recognizing the outstanding mass communication history thesis completed during the 2020 calendar year.
The award will be presented during the member awards gala at the 2020 AEJMC Conference, scheduled for Aug. 4-7 in New Orleans, La.
6:45 p.m. PT/7:45 p.m. MT/8:45 p.m. CT/9:45 p.m. ET
Chair Teri Finneman called the meeting to order.
Finneman gave an overview of the year’s accomplishments, which can be found in the annual report. She gave special recognition to Brian Creech for his fast turnaround from an in-person to virtual conference in March for the Joint Journalism and Communication History Conference and noted the success of a summer Zoom graduate student social.
Throughout 2019-20, she noted that 48 people were involved in some kind of division position and 110 people were featured in Clio. The division membership sits at 291, with 29 of them students.
Students should create a podcast of 10 to 20 minutes that either (1) explores the history of journalism through discussion of a particular topic, such as the life of a prominent journalist or a major event covered by the press years ago, or (2) integrates historical context into your reporting on a newsworthy event on your campus or in your community (e.g., you may review your university’s old yearbooks and back issues of your campus newspaper in order to add context to reporting on the cancellation of the university basketball season).
By Will Mari, vice chair and incoming chair, and Teri Finneman, chair, AEJMC History Division
Throughout the fall, we’re inviting you to involve your students in #MediaHistoryMatters, a Twitter campaign to get students talking about journalism history together.
Echoing past efforts with Media History Engagement Week and National News Engagement Day, the idea is to get our students engaged in a larger national conversation about the importance of perspective and context when it comes to media systems.
By Nathaniel Frederick II, PF&R Chair, frederickn@winthrop.edu
The coronavirus pandemic has forced a drastic change in the way of life in the United States. The new normal involves working from home, if possible. More importantly, we must not forget the homeless and other populations that are vulnerable during this time of uncertainty. While anyone can contract the virus, current data suggest a disproportionate burden of illness and death among racial and ethnic minority groups.
AEJMC is a month away away! Did you know that you can plan your schedule of History Division events now with our conference guide?
Erika Pribanic-Smith has once again designed a stellar conference guide. We have some great programming. We will also auction off two Mike Sweeney paintings: once during the gala and once during the business meeting. Bring your bidding wallets! Proceeds benefit the podcast.
By Perry Parks, Membership Co-Chair, Michigan State University, parksp@msu.edu
Sid Bedingfield
Where you work: I’m an Associate Professor in the Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities.
Where you got your Ph.D.: I earned my Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Journalism and Mass Communications in 2014.
Current favorite class: We have a wonderful “case studies” course at the Hubbard School that allows instructors to focus on journalism and mass media during a particular historical period or event. I use it to teach a course on mass media and the African American struggle for equality, from the antebellum period to the present. The Fall 2020 version could not be timelier.
Current research project: Fellow History Division member Kathy Roberts Forde and I are co-editing and contributing chapters to a book called Journalism and Jim Crow: The Making of White Supremacy in the New South. We have a strong lineup of historians from a range of subfields working with us on the project, which is under contract at the University of Illinois Press. With a little luck, it should be out in 2021.
Fun fact about yourself: As a failed jock, I tried out for my college baseball team just for fun. I was a pitcher, and during one practice, I struck out a star player who was later drafted by a major league team (he swung at a ball over this head). For the next few years, I tracked his progress through the minor leagues, eagerly awaiting the big day when he made it to “the show” and I could say, “I struck out an actual major league batter.” Unfortunately, he only got to Double AA. Saying I struck out a guy who made it to the high minors just doesn’t have the same ring to it.
By Rachel Grant, Membership Co-Chair, University of Florida, rgrant@jou.ufl.edu
Dr. Mike Conway is an associate professor of journalism at Indiana University’s Media School. He recently wrote Contested Ground: “The Tunnel” and the Struggle Over Television News in Cold War America.
Q: Describe the focus of your book.
A: A 1962 documentary on a Berlin Wall tunnel escape brought condemnation from both sides of the Iron Curtain. The strong reaction was not limited just to the topic, but for the medium itself. The Tunnel was produced for American network television.
The Tunnel controversy and the rise of television news reveal a critical juncture in American journalism and media history as the Cold War entered one of its most dangerous periods. The surprisingly fast ascendance of television news as the country’s top choice for information signaled the public’s acceptance but threatened the self-defined leadership role of print journalism as well as the implicit cooperation among government officials and reporters on Cold War issues.
NBC’s Reuven Frank is at the center of Contested Ground as producer of The Tunnel and creator of the most popular journalism source of the period, NBC’s nightly newscast, “The Huntley-Brinkley Report.” The production and reception of the documentary, and all of television news, bring into focus a major upheaval in American news communication and the boundary work involved as government leaders, journalism competitors, and other groups fought over the shifting media landscape.
Contested Ground has been named the 2020 winner of the Library of American Broadcasting Foundation Broadcast Historian Award. The book is also one of three finalists for the 2020 AEJMC Tankard Book Award.
