News Icons and the Mainstreaming of Social Change

Abstract

Two theoretical paradigms have traditionally guided understandings of the news. The liberal-pluralist paradigm posits the mass media as a vital conduit of accountability and bottom-up change, whereas the critical paradigm views the news as a crucial site and mechanism of ideological domination. This analysis furthers an evolving ecological approach, which bridges the two dominant paradigms, contending that the same market imperatives and journalistic routines which so often produce news that reinforces the status quo can at times produce news which challenges it. Analysis of news about the environment and waste recycling from 1980–1990 reveals a dramatic shift in coverage patterns following the ill-fated voyage of the Mobro, the garbage barge that sailed the high seas for three months in an unsuccessful search for a port that would accept its cargo. The barge became what we call a news icon: an image that lived on beyond its originating event by being introduced into a variety of subsequent news contexts. The icon provided an occasion for both journalists and their sources to refigure cultural scripts about garbage and recycling. In this process news routines and source communication strategies interacted to produce news as cultural forum, creating opportunities for cultural transformation.

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