Revising the First Rough Draft: On Journalism, History, and Journalism History

Abstract

Media history is more important than ever. Yes, this is true because media are more pervasive, more fundamental to our lives than ever. It is also true because media historians form one of the final bulwarks of fact-based research in a world awash with false claims and fake news. Yet, the importance of media history is not only ontological and methodological. It is also quite practical. This essay speaks directly to those who conduct historical research in the areas of journalism, media, and communication and who make their disciplinary homes in schools of journalism, media studies, and mass communication. This essay argues that such scholars are uniquely positioned to help address issues of conflict between journalists and historians, and offers some strategies for them to do so.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Catherine Porter, Constant Méheut, Matt Apuzzo and Selam Gebrekidan, “The Root of Haiti’s Misery: Reparations to Enslavers,” New York Times, May 20, 2022.

2 See, for example, Jack Shafer, “Why Historians are at War with the New York Times,” Politico, May 23, 2022; and Paul Cohen, “On the Relationship between Journalism and History: Thoughts on the New York Times Haiti Ransom Project,” Age of Revolutions (blog), July 11, 2022.

3 “A debate is rekindled among historians,” New York Times, May 23, 2022.

4 See Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison, Objectivity (New York: Zone Books, 2007), 37; and C. W. Anderson, Apostles of Certainty: Data Journalism and the Politics of Doubt (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 16–49.

5 See Jack Shafer, “Who Said It First?: Journalism is the ‘first rough draft of history,’” Slate, August 30, 2010.

6 See Robert B. Townsend and Emily Swafford, “Conflicting Signals in the Academic Job Market for History,” Perspectives on History (blog), January 9, 2017; and Daniel J Cohen, Michael Frisch, Patrick Gallagher, Steven Mintz, Kristen Sword, Amy Murrell Taylor, William G. Thomas III, and William J. Turkel, “Interchange: The Promise of Digital History,” The Journal of American History 95, no. 2 (September 2008): 452–491.

7 See Donna Lampkin Stephens, Aimee Edmondson, Mike Conway, and Ross Collins, “History in the Curriculum: An evaluation of media history programs in United States colleges and universities,” 2019, https://ajha.wildapricot.org/resources/Documents/AJHAHistoryInCurriculum2019.pdf

8 See https://www.pblworks.org/research

9 Thomas S. Mullaney, Roberto Trujillo, Benjamin Stone, Sarah Sussman, and Tim Edward Noakes, “Massively Multiplayer Humanities: Can Project-Based Learning, Flipped-Classrooms, and ‘Simulated Archives’ Transform the Humanities at Stanford?,” Archives-Based Lecture Courses: A Vision Statement https://www.academia.edu/37934308/Archives_Based_Lecture_Courses_A_Vision_Statement.

10 See, for example, Charlton D. McIlwain, Black Software: The Internet & Racial Justice, from the Afronet to Black Lives Matter (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019); and Margaret O'Mara, The Code: Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America (New York: Penguin, 2020).

11 John Sherer, “Open Access History Monograph Initiative,” Longleaf Services (blog), June 13, 2018.

12 For a recent example of leveraging, see Meg Heckman and Guilia Taurino, Shifting the Archival Gaze: A Case for Leveraging Computational Methods to Uncover Media History Narratives,” American Journalism, 40, no. 2 (2023): 222–231.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jason Lee Guthrie

Jason Lee Guthrie is a media historian whose work interrogates the intersection of creativity and economics. The core of his research examines how artists understand and use copyright law, and explores how notions of artistic persona, creative process, and the ownership of intellectual property influence discourse about the creative industries.