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Com 480 Fall, 2003 Broadcast News: Perspective Iraq |
Updated: 10/15/2003
Dr. Janet McMullen jlmcmullen@una.edu
Course meets: MTW 12 Noon - 12:50
Office Hours and ADA Statement:
Required Texts:
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Boorstin, Daniel J. The
Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events In America
Vintage: New York, 1997 ISBN:
0-679-74180-1 |
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Stephens, Mitchell.
Broadcast News, 3rd edition (or newest) Wadsworth 1993 |
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Wiener, Robert. Live from Baghdad: Making Journalism History Behind the Lines. St Martin’s Griffin: New York, 2002 ISBN: 0-312-31465-5 |
We'll be reading these three fairly quickly and fairly early in the class, so get the first two as quickly as possible. We'll follow with Live from Baghdad as soon as we've finished the other two.
Recommended Reading: A list of recommended reading books will be provided at the end of this syllabus or linked from the syllabus.
Objectives: To examine the media coverage of the 2003 Iraq War in terms of method, content and impact.
Course Operation: The course will operate in a lecture/discussion format. Dr. McMullen will lecture during many of the class sessions, and news video from war coverage will be discussed and examined. Students participation is expected and students will be required to make a class presentation on some aspect of Iraq war coverage.
Assignments:
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Students will be asked to complete all assigned reading in the texts listed. |
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Tutorials: The instructor reserves the right to assign a tutorial during any part of the semester in which she believes such an assignment will positively contribute to student's understanding of the course. A tutorial essay will be given, students will write no less than 1.5 and no more than 2 pages typed. Dr. Mc will grade and return those completed assignments within one class meeting of their due date. Those students who receive a grade of 40 or better may elect to rewrite the tutorial in attempt to receive a higher grade which will be added to the original grade, or they may elect to have their original 40+ grade doubled. Those students who make less than 40 on the first attempt at the tutorial MUST rewrite the essay and the grade received will be added to the original grade. At this time, no tutorials are planned for the course, but Dr. Mc reserves the right to assign them if needed. Value: 100 points each. |
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Book Reviews: Students will be expected to read two books from the recommended reading list, and write a review of the books, and participate in a panel discussion on the book's topic during which they will provide a printed 1/2 page abstract of the book to all members of the class. These panels will be informal and should involve a question and answer period. Value:
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Exams: There will be two exams. Exam 1 will be given near the mid-term. Exam 2 will be given at the end of the semester or during the final exam period. Exam format will be a combination of identify, fill-in-the-blank, multiple choice, and essay questions. Possible essay questions may be provided to students prior to the exam. Value: 100 points each |
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Term Paper: Each student will be required to write a term paper on some aspect of the coverage of the Iraq war. These topics should be approved by Dr. Mc, and it is recommended that students discuss paper topics with her early in the semester, so they can be applying classroom discussion and activities to the paper topic where applicable. Value: 200 points. A link to a web page about how to write term papers for Dr. Mc can be found at http://fly.hiwaay.net/~jmcmulle/termpaper.htm A link to APA style can be found at that page or at http://www.psychwww.com/resource/apacrib.htm |
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Extra Credit: Dr. Mc believes that students who are willing to put forth extra effort should be rewarded for that effort. To that end, several extra credit options are available to students in this class:
Extra credit canNOT hurt a student's grade. It is added to the total assigned points the student has earned. Grading scales are determined based on assigned points only. Therefore, extra credit can only increase a student's grade points and final grade determination. |
Notice: ALL STUDENTS will be required to turn in all written work, including book reviews, term papers, tutorials, and extra credit book reviews or mini papers to turnitin.com . Instructions are linked from the term paper page, and will be provided to students later in the semester. Dr. McMullen will NOT grade any assignment which has not been uploaded to the turnitin.com site. This procedure is necessary as a prevention for plagiarism. Your instructor considers plagiarism to be very serious concern and will hold violators responsible pursuant to the fullest extent of university policy.
The UNIVERISTY OF NORTH ALABAMA has contracted with Turnitin.com to provide plagiarism checking service. You will be expected to upload designated written work to the site before a grade will be recorded. For information about how to do that, see Instructions for Turnitin.com .
Students agree that by taking this course all required papers may be subject to submission for textual similarity review to turnitin.com for the detection of plagiarism. All submitted papers will be included as source documents in the turnitin.com reference database solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism of such papers. Use of the Turnitin.com service is subject to the terms of use agreement posted on the Turnitin.com site.
Be aware that any work which is plagiarized will receive an "F" and should the plagiarism be intentional and/or blatant, the student may receive an "F" in the course. Students should be aware of university policy on this matter as well as the extremely serious consequences which can occur when one engages in plagiarism.
GRADING SCALE:
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A = 90 to 100% of possible assigned points. |
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B = 80 to 89% of possible assigned points. |
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C = 70 to 79% of possible assigned points. |
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D = 60 to 69% of possible assigned points. |
NOTE: Due to the nature of this course, we may need to be flexible concerning our schedules and course of study. Current events in the middle east could shift our focus from what happened in April to what is happening now. A general calendar will be provided at the the beginning of the semester, but it is NOT chiseled in granite. As your instructor, I will always try to respect your time and your ability to plan it responsibly. You just need to be aware that in a course of this nature, we sometimes need to recognize and learn from changing or current events.
Calendar: (link active 9-2-03)
Book Review 1 Assignment and List:
Dramatic Curve/News as Drama Short Assignment:
News: Why We Hate the Media and Why We Need Them:
Recommended Reading List ( If you find another book appropriate for this course, you may read it for your book review with the approval of the instructor.) Many of these books will be order into our local Barnes and Noble bookstore.
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Carruthers, Susan L. The
Media at War: Communication and Conflict in the Twentieth Century.
Palgrave Macmillan: 2000 ISBN:
0312228015 |
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Cockburn, Leslie. Looking
for Trouble: One Woman, Six Wars, and a Revolution.
Anchor Books, 1999. ISBN: 0385483554
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Chomsky, Noam. Media
Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda (Open media series) Seven
Stories Press, September 2002. ISBN:
1583225366 |
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Emery, Michael. On the Front Lines: Following America’s
Foreign Correspondents Across the Twentieth Century (The American
University Press Journalism History)
American University Press, 1995
ISBN 1879383365 |
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El-Nawawy, Mohammed, Adel Iskandar,
Al Jazeera: How the Free Arab news Network Scooped the World and
Changed the Middle East. Westview
Press, 2002 ISBN: 0813340179 |
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Fialka, John. Peter
Braestrup. Hotel Warriors:
Covering the Gulf War (Woodrow Wilson Center Special Studies) Woodrow
Wilson Center Press, 1992 ISBN:
0943875404 |
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Garrels, Anne. Naked
in Baghdad. Farrar
Straus and Giroux : Sept, 2003 ISBN:
0374529035 |
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Gitlin, Todd. Media
Unlimited: How the Torrent of Images and Sounds Overwhelm our lives.
Holt and Co., 2002. ISBN:
0805072837 (also for
Com 314) |
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Glassner, Barry. The
Culture of Fear: Why Americans Are Afraid of the Wrong Things.
Perseus, New York, 1999 ISBN:
0-465-01490-9 |
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Hess, Stephen and Marvin Kalb. The Media and the War on Terrorism
The Brookings Institution, Ist ed. July, 2003.
ISBN: 18015735812 |
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Jenkins, Philip. Images
of Terror: What We Can and Can’t Know about Terrorism. Aldine de
Gruyter, 2003. ISBN: 0-202-30679-8
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Johnson, Richard, Jeff
Seidel Portraits
of War Detroit Free Press, July 2003
ISBN 09372421 |
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Journalists of Reuters. 21 Days to Baghdad: A Chronicle of
the Iraq War Reuter’s Books, June 9, 2003; ISBN: 012143165x |
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Katovsky, Bill and Timothy Carlson. Embedded: The
Media at War in Iraq Glore
Pequot Pr.: September 2003 ISBN
1592282652 |
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Kick, Russ. Everything you Know is Wrong: The
Disinformation Guide to Secrets and Lies.
The Disinformation Company. June 2002 ISBN: 0971394202 |
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Knightly, Phillip, John Pilger. The First Casualty: The War Correspondent As Hero and
Myth-Maker from Crimea to Kosevo. Johns
Hopkins University Press (May, 2002)
ISBN: 080186951x |
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Lule, Jack. Daily News, Eternal Stories.
Guilford Publications. 2001 ISBN:
1-57230-606-8 |
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MacArthur, John R., Ben H. Bagdikian. Second Front:
Censorship and Propaganda in the Gulf War.
U. of California Press: 1993 ISBN:
0520083989 |
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Mowlana, Hamid, George Gerbner, and Herbert Schiller. Triumph
of the Image: The Media’s War in the Persian Gulf—A Global Perspective
(Critical Studies in
Communication and in the Cultural Industries)
Westview Press: 1992 ISBN
0813316103 |
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Murray, David. Joel
Schwartz and S. Robert Lichter. It Ain’t Necessarily So: How the
Media Remake our Picture of Reality.
Penguin, New York: 2002 |
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Palmer, Nancy. Terrorism, War and the Press Hollis
Publishing Co.: 2003 ISBN: 1884186211
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Phillips, Peter. Robert
W. McChestney. Censored
2003: The Top 25 Censored Stories (Censored 2002-3) Severn
Stories Press: 2002 October ISBN:
1583225153 |
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Protess, David L. Fay Lomax Cook, et al. The
Journalism of Outrage: Investigative Reporting and Agenda Building in
America Guildford
Publications: 1992 ISBN:
0-89862-591-2 Collier Library
PN 4759 L85 2001 |
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Rampton, Sheldon, John C. Stauber. Weapons of Mass
Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush’s War on Iraq.
J.P. Tarcher: July, 2003 ISBN 1585422762 |
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Saba, Marcel, and Yolanda Cuomo. Witness Iraq: A War Journal, February-April 2003.
Powerhouse Books, 2003 ISBN:
1576872009 |
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Rivera, Shiela. The
Media War (World in Conflict – the Middle East) will not be released until Jan 2004. |
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Schechter,
Danny, Jackson Browne, Robert Waterman McChesney. The More You Watch, the Less You Know: News Wars/Submerged
Hopes/ Media Adventures Seven
Stories Press; (December 18, 1998) ISBN: 1888363800 |
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Schechter,
Danny. Embedded –
Weapons of Mass Deception: How the Media Failed to Cover the War in Iraq
Promethius, Jan 2003, but not yet available as of 8/14/03
ISBN: 1591021731 |
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Schechter,
Danny, Roland Schatz, Walter Cronkite.
Media Wars: News at a Time of Terror.
Rowman and Littlefield : June 2003
ISBN: 0742531090 |
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Sifty, Micah L. and Christopher Cerf. The Iraq War Reader:
History, Documents, Opinions. Touchstone, 2003 ISBN: 0743253477 |
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Silberson, Sandra. War of Words:Language, Politics
and 9/11. Routledge: 2002 SIBN
0415290473 |
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Time Magazine Editors. 21 Days to Baghdad: Photos
and Dispatches from the Battlefield Time Inc.: June 2003
ISBN: 1932273123 |
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Winburn, Jan. Shop
Talk and War Stories: American Journalists Examine their Profession. Bedford/St.Martins:
Boston, 2003 ISBN:
0-312-40105-1 |
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Zelizer, Barbie. Journalism
After September 11. Routledge: 2002 ISBN 0415288002 |
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Zinsmeister, Karl. Boots On the Ground: A Month with
the 82nd Airborne in the Battle for Iraq. Truman and Talley Books
Sept 2003 ISBN:
0312326637 |
Photojournalism Books related to the
Iraq War: While these may be extremely valuable, they may not
have much written material in them and that may make them inappropriate for a
book review. The titles are provided because of their value to the topic under
study, FYI.
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Korman, Lewis J., Jr. , Matthew Maythons.
A Day in the Life of the United States Armed Forces.
Harpet Collins, 2003 ISBN:
0060541806 |
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Regan Books. The
War in Iraq: A Photo History. Regan
Books: May 2003 ISBN: 0060582863 |
Copyright, 2003
Dr. Janet McMullen
University of North Alabama
jlmcmullen@una.edu or home email at drmcrtf@aol.com
