Public Journalism’s Use of Visual Communication in an Election
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Most of these studies about public journalism have focused on the reporting and editing;
few have examined it from the equally important perspective of photography and design.
Public journalism practitioners and theoreticians argue that the content of
newspaper stories generated through public journalism is significantly different from the
content generated by traditional reporting (Blazier & Lemert, 2000). Newspaper
designers re taught that the form of their designs must reflect the content of the stories
(Turnbull & Baird, 1975); photographers taught that their images must reflect the story
(Kobre, 1991). If the content of stories generated through public journalism is different
and design is driven by content, then the photography and design of public journalism
should also be different than that of traditional journalism. Journalists are aware of and
effectively use the “independent persuasive power” that is carried by visual images
(Stein, 2001, p. 249). Thus it is also important to study this aspect of media messages to
fully understand what information and impressions are being communicated to audiences.
This study includes an overlooked but important aspect of journalistic content –
the visuals – and also answers the question of whether the changes undertaken in the
name of public journalism have reached the visual elements of the print media.
This research is important because it is concerned with improving the way
newspapers inform readers. By drawing on both visual and verbal resources, newspapers
have a more powerful and effective way of delivering their message. Effective integration
of visual information with verbal information is necessary to communicate the same
message and reinforce that message. One of public journalism’s stated goals is to focus
more on issues in election coverage than on who’s winning and campaign strategy. If the
visual elements of the newspapers are not reinforcing this message, then it will be more
Convention