The Roots of Fake News: Objecting to Objective Journalism - Softcover

Winston, Brian

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0367145464 ISBN 13: 9780367145460

Publisher: Routledge, 2020

Synopsis

The Roots of Fake News argues that ‘fake news’ is not a problem caused by the power of the internet, or by the failure of good journalism to assert itself. Rather, it is within the news’s ideological foundations – professionalism, neutrality, and most especially objectivity – that the true roots of the current ‘crisis’ are to be found.

Placing the concept of media objectivity in a fuller historical context, this book examines how current perceptions of a crisis in journalism actually fit within a long history of the ways news media have avoided, obscured, or simply ignored the difficulties involved in promising objectivity, let alone ‘truth’. The book examines journalism’s relationships with other spheres of human endeavour (science, law, philosophy) concerned with the pursuit of objective truth, to argue that the rising tide of ‘fake news’ is not an attack on the traditional ideologies which have supported journalism. Rather, it is an inevitable result of their inherent flaws and vulnerabilities.

This is a valuable resource for students and scholars of journalism and history alike who are interested in understanding the historical roots, and philosophical context of a fiercely contemporary issue.

About this title

About the Author

Brian Winston is the Lincoln Professor at the University of Lincoln (UK). He is the author of A Right to Offend, The Rushdie Fatwa and After and also writes on documentary film and media technology. He was the founding director of the Glasgow University Media Group.

Matthew Winston is the author of Gonzo Text: Disentangling Meaning in Hunter S. Thompson’s Journalism . He teaches in the School of Media, Communication and Sociology at the University of Leicester.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0367145464
• ISBN 13: 9780367145460
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224