Instructor: Dr. Marc Edge
SCS 02-42|790-5810
tmarc@ntu.edu.sg
Office Hours: M 11-12, T 11-12, TH 11-12, F 10-12
Lecture: T 3:30-5:30, PPC Lab
Tutorial:
W 10-12, CSTR2 ***Note venue change***
Textbook: Mitchell Stephens, A History of News (New York, Harcourt Brace), 1997.
Readings: Supplementary readings
will be available from
the Copy Centre, Library 1
Grading: Final course grades will
be determined equally by the student’s
performance on a Final Exam, and
by Continuous Assessment of the student’s
performance on assignments and
in class discussion.
Assignments: Each student is expected
to write a short (10-15 pages) research
paper on
a topic relevant to the course, the findings of which are to be summarized
in a class
presentation during the final week of the course. Paper topics are to be
developed in consultation with
the instructor and finalized in a one-page outline
by recess.
NOTE: Due to the Chinese New Year
holiday, classes will not be held for this
course during Week 6.
Course Outline and Reading List
Week 1 Introduction
James Carey, “The Problem of Journalism History,” (pp. 86-93) in Munson
and Warren, eds., James Carey: A Critical Reader
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press), 1997.
Week 2 News in Oral Societies
Stephens, Ch. 1-3
Jack Goody, “Oral Culture,” (pp. 12-19) in Richard Bauman, ed., Folklore, Cultural Performances, and Popular Entertainments: A Communications-Centered Handbook (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 1992.
Week 3 The Writing Revolution
Stephens, Ch. 4-5
Marshall McLuhan, “The Spoken Word,” (pp. 77-80); “The Written Word,”
(pp. 81-88); and “The Printed Word,” (pp. 170-178) in
Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (London: Routledge), 1964.
Week 5 The Printing Press
Stephens, Ch. 6-8
Elizabeth Eisenstein, “The Expanding Republic of Letters,” (pp. 92-107)
in The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press), 1983.
Z. He, “Diffusion of movable type in China and Europe: Why were there two fates?” Gazette (1994), 153-174.
Week 6 Early Newspapers
Stephens, Ch. 9-10
Daniel J. Czitrom, “‘Lightning Lines’ and the Birth of Modern Communication,
1838-1900,” (pp. 3-29) in Media and the American
Mind From Morse to McLuhan (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina
Press), 1982.
Neil Postman, “The Typographic Mind,” (pp. 44-63) in Amusing Ourselves to Death (New York: Penguin), 1985.
Week 7 Mass Circulation Dailies
Stephens, Ch. 11-12
Li Liangrong, “The Historical Fate of ‘objective reporting’ in China,”
(pp. 225-236) in C.C. Lee, ed. China’s media, media’s China
(Boulder, Colorado: Westview), 1994
Week 8 Recess
Week 9 The Rise of Reporting
Stephens, Ch. 13-14
Michael Schudson, “Telling Stories: Journalism as a Vocation After 1880,”
(pp. 61-87) in Discovering the News: A Social History of
American Newspapers (New York: Basic Books), 1978.
Michael Schudson, “Question Authority: A History of the News Interview,”
(pp. 72-93) in The Power of News (Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard University Press), 1995.
Week 10 Electronic Media
Stephens, Ch. 15-16.
Marshall McLuhan, “Radio,” (pp. 297-307) in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (London: Routledge), 1964.
Joshua Meyrowitz, “The Separation of Social Place from Physical Place,”
(pp. 113-125) in No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic
Media on Social Behavior (New York: Oxford University Press), 1985.
Week 11 Advertising and Public Relations
Gerald Baldasty, “Advertising and the Press,” (pp. 59-80) and “Shaping
and Packaging the News: Luring Readers and Advertisers,”
(pp. 113-138) in The Commercialization of News in the Nineteenth Century
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press), 1992.
Stuart Ewen, “Controlling Chaos,” (pp. 60-81) and “Educate the Public,”
(pp. 82-101) in PR! A Social History of Spin (New York:
Basic Books), 1996.
Week 12 A (Very) Short History of Singapore Media
C.M. Turnbull, “Origins,” (pp. 3-16); and “‘Pains and Perils,’ 1845-1867,”
(pp. 17-37) in Dateline Singapore: 150 Years of the Straits
Times (Singapore: Singapore Press Holdings), 1995.
Francis T. Seow, “The Subjugation of the Print Media: Two Important
Cases,” (pp. 38-55) in The Media Enthralled: Singapore Revisited
(London: Lynne Reiner), 1998.
Drew McDaniel, “Broadcasting in Singapore,” (pp. 163-190) in Broadcasting
in the Malay world : radio, television, and video in Brunei,
Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore (Norwood, NJ: Ablex), 1994.
Week 13 Paper
Presentations