What is Journalism For?

Journalism has evolved over time to become increasingly broad and complex, but the crux of it remains giving individuals the ability to gain greater knowledge, insight, and understanding about issues and events around the world.  Without reading articles in the New York Times such as James Kanter’s “European Leaders Step Up Talks,” average American citizens would not know that despite Germany’s generous offer of aid, Greece may fail to remain in the euro zone due to the country falling behind in the effort to reduce its deficit.  At the same time, it is important to note that there are numerous types of articles even in one publication that vary in style, topic, and length.  During these pivotal months before the United States, articles such as Michael Cooper’s “How the Party Platforms Differ” examines in a general manner stark differences about how the respective platforms for the Democratic and Republican Parties view pertinent issues rather than specific events related to this topic.
 

However, the emergence of new technology such as the Internet has revolutionized the meaning of journalism.  As John Carey and Nancy Hicks Maynard emphasize in “The Future of News, The Future of Journalism” the Internet has provided extra space which allows for the ability to provide essentially constant news coverage from different publications.  Of greater import, Carey and Maynard also point out that the Internet provides citizens with an outlet to write their own entries in blogs.

With the cacophony of different voices and options of both consuming and responding to news, it is difficult to uniformly capture the purpose and definition of journalism.  As Carey and Maynard discuss, the emergence of specialized news has caused segmentation in audiences.  This trend is evident in myself: since I am passionate about politics, I avidly consume news predominately about governmental matters.  Journalism constantly puts forth sources that examine practically any issue one can conjure, but few people utilize all of these resources.  Consequently, journalism provides a plethora of news formats, but its purpose can be tailored on an individual basis.