About to Die

How News Images Move the Public
Erscheinungsjahr 2010
ISBN: 978-0-19-975214-0
Verlag: Oxford University Press

Buch, Englisch, 432 Seiten, Print PDF, Format (B × H): 231 mm x 152 mm, Gewicht: 618 g

Due to its ability to freeze a moment in time, the photo is a uniquely powerful device for ordering and understanding the world. But when an image depicts complex, ambiguous, or controversial events--terrorist attacks, wars, political assassinations--its ability to influence perception can prove deeply unsettling. Are we really seeing the world "as it is" or is the image a fabrication or projection? How do a photo's content and form shape a viewer's impressions? What do such images contribute to historical memory? About to Die focuses on one emotionally charged category of news photograph--depictions of individuals who are facing imminent death--as a prism for addressing such vital questions. Tracking events as wide-ranging as the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, the Holocaust, the Vietnam War, and 9/11, Barbie Zelizer demonstrates that modes of journalistic depiction and the power of the image are immense cultural forces that are still far from understood. Through a survey of a century of photojournalism, including close analysis of over sixty photos, About to Die provides a framework and vocabulary for understanding the news imagery that so profoundly shapes our view of the world.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Zelizer, Barbie

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Spezielle Soziologie Mediensoziologie
• Sozialwissenschaften Medien- und Kommunikationswissenschaften Medienwissenschaften Medien & Gesellschaft, Medienwirkungsforschung
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziale Gruppen/Soziale Themen Tod, Sterbehilfe: Soziale und Ethische Themen
• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft | Kulturwissenschaften Kulturwissenschaften

Inhaltsverzeichnis

- Acknowledgments

- Chapter One: Journalism, Memory and The Voice of the Visual

- Chapter Two: Why Images of Impending Death Makes Sense in the News

- Chapter Three: Presumed Death

- Chapter Four: Possible Death

- Chapter Five: Certain Death

- Chapter Six: Journalism's Mix of Presumption, Possibility and Certainty

- Chapter Seven: When the "As If" Erases Accountability

- Chapter Eight: How News Images Move the Public

Über Autor(innen)

Barbie Zelizer is the Raymond Williams Chair of Communication and the Director of the Scholars Program in Culture and Communication at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.