Chapter One: Journalism Defined

Is it possible to imagine what our present day world would be like without journalism? If it would be possible to imagine it would not be anything like the world we live in today. We definitely would not share all of the freedoms we enjoy in the U.S. and other democratic countries. That is because journalism provides information to make a democracy run more smoothly and it inspires ordinary citizens to fight for freedom. In turn, those actions build strong communities that can be a lot more trustworthy. Here one could ask how trust is strengthened. Well, the reason for the added trust can be traced back to the purpose of journalism, which is to pass on information to others and report on events. In other words, journalism is a type of watchdog, where it governs itself through a type of checks and balances system. The other side to the news media's job is to report to the public all it needs and then for the public to sort out for itself the truth over time (The Elements of Journalism, p. 26). This means that as the public comes across several media sources, they can compare and contrast to check for themselves to see who is accurate. In the end, this allows them to find reliable sources for their information needs.

Although, the media has had to adapt to it's surrounding world over the past several hundred years, today is no different. In today's ever changing world, we see the media shifting its ways of reporting, because of challenges it is facing. Three challenges mentioned in the reading were: new technology, conglomeration and globalization (The Elements of Journalism, p. 29-31). These challenges allow journalism to find new channels of reporting information and they are even shifting journalism's role to ordinary citizens through the Internet and the many social media channels. With this change, the public also has to adjust and make sure what it finds is reliable by once again checking their sources. Surprisingly, not everything on the Internet, TV or radio is true. What this process of checking does to the public is permit it to be stronger researchers and according to John Dewey, help fulfill democracy's purpose of allowing people to develop to their fullest potential (The Elements of Journalism, p. 22).