Reference no: EM133809934
Assignment:
Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman
Manufacturing Consent, "A Propaganda Model"
Write Your Post! Purpose: To practice textual analysis and close reading Instructions
1. Go to the YouTube channel or website any of the mainstream American corporate news networks (MSNBC, FOX, CNN, NBC, ABC, etc.). Virtually all will be available for free on YouTube.
2. Look at the titles and topics of the news segments that were presented on your channel over the last 24 hours. What do they focus on in general? How similar/diverse are the topics that these different news shows spotlight? Do you see any commonalities or any sharp divergences? (Note: you don't need to watch any of these clips, just read the titles and guess what they are likely about.)
3. Choose one clip from any of the shows released in the last 24 hours. How is the topic being approached? Is the point of view objective, or are they representing a certain group's interests? Why do you think so?
4. Who is being presented as an expert by the newspeople? What ties do they have to the issues in question? Whose interests do they represent?
5. Next, go to Democracy Now's website or YouTube channel and take a look at the general topics they focused on in their most recent show. How similar or different are the topics they choose to spotlight to those of the mainstream news network you chose? (Democracy Now is a progressive, independent news channel that is not corporate-owned and relies entirely on the donations of their viewers, so we're using it as our control group to compare/contrast against the corporate news sources.)
6. Watch the headlines from that day's show. What topics are being presented? How are they being approached? Is there more of an objective or subjective point of view? Are they representing the interests of certain groups? Which groups and why do you think so?
7. Who are they pointing to as experts in their news broadcasts? What ties or connections do those experts have to the issues in question? Whose interests do you think they represent?
8. Now think about how Democracy Now approaches and discusses these issues in comparison to the corporate news source you chose. What is the difference? Whose perspectives and stories are represented in each? What kind of language is being used to describe and discuss these issues?