News and Journalism

COURSE OBJECTIVE
After completion of this course, the student is able to ...
• describe and explain the developments in journalism (as an institution) in the modern democratic society;
• reproduce and apply different theoretical perspectives on selection and presentation of the news as an explanatory model of current news
examples;
• explain how news influences attitudes of news consumers;
• describe the media environment in a comparative perspective;
• reflect critically on the (difficult) relationship between journalists, (organizational) sources and the public.

COURSE CONTENT
This course is about understanding the significance and impact of journalism in society. Journalism is key for a well-functioning democratic society: It provides the public with information of general interest. The quality of the news, therefore, largely determines the quality of the public debate. The quality of the news depends of many factors, since it is not only about public information provision. News is also a commercial product that is produced in an almost industrial way and must be sold to news consumers. Who are those news consumers and how have news consumption patterns changed over the course of history? How do journalists select the relevant news events? How do they employ journalistic values ​​such as objectivity, impartiality, professionalism, news values? How biased (fake?) is the news? To guarantee daily news, journalists highly depend on access to elite sources, but who has the real power? In short, in this course you learn to understand and analyze what news looks like, why it looks like this and how news consumers utilize news. Furthermore, we place the study of journalism in a historical and comparative context as well as address the challenges faced by a digital society.

TEACHING METHODS
Lectures, Knowledge Clip Lectures, and Seminars

TYPE OF ASSESSMENT
A written exam and an assignment portfolio