The History of the Arlington Citizen-Journal (open access)

The History of the Arlington Citizen-Journal

This study was conducted to detail the history of The Arlington Citizen-Journal newspaper and its editors and the effect of an active newspaper on the orderly growth of a town. The Arlington Citizen-Journal evolved from a merger of two Arlington weekly newspapers, The Arlington Journal and The Arlington Citizen, which for more than fifty years reported Arlington happenings. The study includes historical information about the city, its people, and its institutions, and direct quotations of both editorial comment and news reports of Arlington events and people. It was found that throughout the years of Arlington's rapid growth, The Citizen-Journal was a vital force behind its citizens.
Date: August 1977
Creator: Forehand, Phyllis Hargrave
System: The UNT Digital Library
Representations of Women in The Dallas Morning News During the Feminist Movement (open access)

Representations of Women in The Dallas Morning News During the Feminist Movement

Content analysis of The Dallas Morning News focuses on sources, bylines, photographs, and main characters to determine the quantity and quality of portrayals of women. The study included front pages and main local news pages during one week each from 1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, and 1990. Change was charted by year for both sexes. In 1950, few representations of women were included and many were stereotypical. Some stereotyping persisted in 1990, and men outnumbered women more than 3 to 1 as story sources, nearly 3 to 1 in front-page bylines, more than 2 to 1 in photographs, and more than 2 to 1 as main characters. Women still lag behind men, despite feminists' efforts to improve coverage.
Date: August 1992
Creator: Lambiase, Jacqueline
System: The UNT Digital Library

Perceptions of Purity Messaging on Women and Secular Society

Purity culture was a movement created by evangelical Christian organizations in the United States and backed by marketing campaigns, media, churches, and sex education beginning in the 1990s. This movement was founded on the idea that young men and women should remain abstinent before marriage, thereby remaining in a state of "purity" for their future spouse. In purity culture messaging, women were positioned as sexual gatekeepers while men were framed as having little or no control over their sexual impulses, causing most of the purity expectation to fall on women. While the concept of remaining "pure" is not new, purity culture taught a new generation of women to feel ashamed and fearful of their sexuality and existed alongside an increasingly sexualized media landscape. This study analyzes purity culture and anti-purity culture themes that exist within television shows as well as how women perceive purity culture messaging and the effects this messaging had on their lives.
Date: May 2021
Creator: Hurd, Madison
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Psychoanalytic Study of Occupational Stress and Burnout among Public Relations Practitioners (open access)

A Psychoanalytic Study of Occupational Stress and Burnout among Public Relations Practitioners

Unfavorable opinions and images of the public relations industry have persisted for decades, and the industry still struggles to deal with them. Additionally, it is a demanding profession that is expected to grow faster than average but struggles to retain talent. Public relations research has also predominantly focused on how nonpractitioners perceive public relations. The present study psychoanalytically analyzed two movies with cinematic representations of public relations practitioners and 20 interviews with public relations practitioners to examine how practitioners' self-perceptions of public relations unconsciously influence their practice and expectations, as well as their stress and burnout. More specifically, stress and burnout dynamics were explored among younger and older practitioners and gender.
Date: August 2022
Creator: Martinez, Tiffany Adriana
System: The UNT Digital Library
And the Stereotype Award Goes to...: A Comparative Analysis of Directors using African American Stereotypes in Film (open access)

And the Stereotype Award Goes to...: A Comparative Analysis of Directors using African American Stereotypes in Film

This study examines African American stereotypes in film. I studied six directors, Kathryn Bigelow, Spike Lee, the Russo Brothers, Ryan Coogler, Tate Taylor, and Dee Rees; and six films Detroit, BlacKkKlansman, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, The Help, and Mudbound. Using the framework of critical race theory and auteur theory, I compared the common themes between the films and directors. The main purpose of my study is to see if White or Black directors predominantly used African American stereotypes. I found that both races of directors rely on stereotypes for different purposes. With Black directors, the stereotype was explained further through character development, while the White directors used the stereotype at face value with no further explanation.
Date: December 2019
Creator: Young, Kelcei
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Study of Thirty Newspaper-in-the-classroom Programs (open access)

A Study of Thirty Newspaper-in-the-classroom Programs

This study looks at thirty of the largest Newspaper in the Classroom (NIC) programs being operated in the United States. The researcher employed the questionnaire survey method to achieve quantitative and qualitative results.
Date: August 1973
Creator: Warrick, Shirley Malinda
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Effects of Change on Television News: A Comparison of the 10:00 p.m. News of the Dallas-Fort Worth Network Affiliates (open access)

The Effects of Change on Television News: A Comparison of the 10:00 p.m. News of the Dallas-Fort Worth Network Affiliates

The study determines and evaluates changes in the 10:00 p.m. newscasts of the Dallas-Fort Worth network affiliates following personnel and ownership changes, and a reduction in length of one station's newscast. Scripts and audio recordings of the newscasts were collected during four-week periods before and after the changes. The data were analyzed and supplemented with interviews conducted with the stations' news directors and producers. Conclusions drawn were that ownership changes had more impact on the presentation of the news than on its content, changes in anchormen and producers had more effect on presentation than on content, and a reduction in news time caused changes in the content of a television newscast.
Date: August 1976
Creator: Sparks, John Henry
System: The UNT Digital Library
Sepia (open access)

Sepia

This study of Sepia magazine was researched as a historical project in order to trace the progress of a twenty-five-year-old Negro publication begun as a sensational news sheet and expanded to a pictoral, entertaining magazine aimed at the middle-class black.
Date: May 1973
Creator: Ponder, Janace Pope
System: The UNT Digital Library
Transgender in India: A Semiotic and Reception Analysis of Bollywood Movies (open access)

Transgender in India: A Semiotic and Reception Analysis of Bollywood Movies

The transgender community in India, commonly known as hijras, consists of people who were born as males but address themselves as females. They have been considered as the third gender in India for millennia and have had specific religious and sociocultural values and roles, but are forced to live in shadows in this day and age. Isolation of this community is also reflected in the way transgender characters are represented in Indian entertainment media. The study analyses two transgender themed films semiotically and the audience reception of those representations by 20 members of the transgender community. Semiotics is a helpful tool to understand the ways signs communicate ideas to viewers. This study applies syntagmatic and paradigmatic analyses to understand how images are used to represent and relay information to the audience. Reception theory along with double colonization has been incorporated in this study to analyse the ways in which the transgender community interprets the representations in entertainment media.
Date: May 2020
Creator: Shewade, Ruchi Ravi
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Cross-cultural Textual Analysis of Western and South Korean Newspaper Coverage of North Korean Women Defectors and Victims of Human Trafficking (open access)

A Cross-cultural Textual Analysis of Western and South Korean Newspaper Coverage of North Korean Women Defectors and Victims of Human Trafficking

Trafficking women for sexual abuse has been a serious concern worldwide, particularly over the last two decades. The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated that illicit profits of human trafficking may be as high as $32 billion. However, the international media community has scarcely focused on North Korean women defectors and victims of human trafficking, despite the severity of the issue. More than two million North Koreans, predominantly women, have crossed borders to enter China from starvation. Among those women migrants, about 80% to 90% of them were abducted by traffickers at the border between North Korea and China, and the traffickers sold them to the Chinese sex industry or Chinese men who are unable to find a woman as a wife or a sex slave.This cross-cultural textual analysis examined South Korean and Western (U.S. and British) newspaper coverage of North Korean women as victims of human trafficking to discover similarities and differences in those countries’ news frames. The analysis has shown that politics was a crucial factor in the coverage of the issue. However, by generally failing to report on the fundamental causes of the trafficking, such as inequality between genders, both Western and South Korean newspapers perpetuated hegemonic masculinity …
Date: May 2014
Creator: Chong, Miyoung
System: The UNT Digital Library
How Hitler Controlled the Press (open access)

How Hitler Controlled the Press

Adolf Hitler advocated total control of the press for many years before he was elected Führer. Almost immediately after he assumed power in 1932, Hitler began writing new laws and regulations that totally exorcised all freedoms from the German press. This study follows the path that Hitler took to control the German press from 1920 until the end of World War II. It utilized translations of documents and statements by men whom Hitler appointed to control the press and books written by experts in the fields of communications as well as men who prosecuted Nazi war criminals after World War II. The study found that the control of the press was indeed a very necessary ingredient in Hitler's climb to power and remained crucial during his reign as Führer.
Date: May 1982
Creator: McConal, Billy Jon
System: The UNT Digital Library
Still on the Sidelines: the Female Experience in Sports Media (open access)

Still on the Sidelines: the Female Experience in Sports Media

This qualitative study aims to analyze the lived reality of women working in sports media today. Through systematic analysis of 12 in-depth interviews, the findings of this study suggest that the adoption of technological advancements in news media and all associated outlets have created a leveling effect for women due to the demand for highly skilled individuals who can handle the digital demand of modern news production. This study suggests that longtime gender disparities in sports media are experiencing a bit of a reprieve due to the massive digital audience and the need for professionals who can deliver information quickly and efficiently and with accuracy. However, the persistent symbolic annihilation of women as well as hegemonic hiring practices that emphasize aesthetic appeal have created a difficult path for women to move off the sidelines and into roles with more creative and analytical breadth, even with a rapidly increasing demand for jobs in the media industry.
Date: December 2014
Creator: Blankenship, Sara K.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Ethical Decision Making in the Indian Mediascape: Reporters and Their Stories (open access)

Ethical Decision Making in the Indian Mediascape: Reporters and Their Stories

Hundreds of reporters gather and interpret news for four English-language newspapers in India's second-largest urban area Kolkata, West Bengal's state capital, which is home to over 4 million people. Journalists from The Statesman, The Telegraph-Kolkata, The Hindustan Times and The Times of India discuss how they collect their stories in Bengali, Hindi, Urdu, and many other languages and write them in English targeting a small but emerging middle-class audience. Whether these articles focus on people-centric urban planning, armed vigilantes in community disputes, dowry death cases, or celebrity culture, all of the reporting involves cultural and ethical challenges. Using semi-structured interviewing and qualitative theme analysis, this study explores how gender, class, and religion affect the decision-making practices of 21 journalists working in Kolkata.
Date: May 2009
Creator: Spencer, Patricia Elizabeth
System: The UNT Digital Library
Oprah and Her Book Club: More than Mass Media Money-Maker (open access)

Oprah and Her Book Club: More than Mass Media Money-Maker

With her Book Club, talk show host Oprah Winfrey has used the relatively new technology of television to revive literature. Despite the odds against her--selecting hard-to-read, quirky books by generally unknown authors--Winfrey has successfully created women's spaces for the 1990s, not so different from the American women's social clubs from the late 1800s and early 1900s, and the French salons of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This study will show how Oprah's Book Club allows readers, especially women, to use the psychological processes of transference and transactional reading by using fictional literature from the Book Club to discuss sensitive areas of their lives.
Date: May 1999
Creator: Jones, Carrie S. Lilly
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Role and Function of Public Relations at National Semiconductor Corporation as Practiced by Two Departments (open access)

The Role and Function of Public Relations at National Semiconductor Corporation as Practiced by Two Departments

This study examines the public relations practices of the Public Relations Department and the Human Relations Department at National Semiconductor Corporation. Source material included interviews with twelve company employees, company publications, and other publications. Five chapters deal with particular problems with which the semiconductor industry in the 'United States is confronted; background and development of National Semiconductor Corporation; organization and practices of the Public Relations Department; and public relations practices of the Human Relations Department. The study finds much strength in each of the two departments but concludes that the public relations function would be strengthened by consolidation into one department. It recommends further scholarly research of public relations practices at other electronics companies.
Date: May 1982
Creator: Waller, Gwendolyn L. (Gwendolyn Lea)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Amarillo Globe-News: How Did Gene Howe and the Globe-News Help Guide Amarillo, Texas through the Dust Bowl and Great Depression? (open access)

Amarillo Globe-News: How Did Gene Howe and the Globe-News Help Guide Amarillo, Texas through the Dust Bowl and Great Depression?

For many years newspapers were locally owned by editors and publishers. However, today many are run by corporations from out of state. As a result, many communities have lost the personal relationship between the family owned publication and the community. Gene Howe, who served as editor, publisher and columnist of the Amarillo Globe-News from 1926 until his death in 1952, believed the community was where the focus should be and the newspaper should do all that it can to help their readers. Despite the fact that Howe was not born in Amarillo, Texas, his passion and love for the city and its inhabitants compensated for it. During the Dust Bowl and Great Depression Howe and the Globe-News helped Amarillo survive the dust and economic storms that blew through the Texas Panhandle, an area that has not been written as much as other parts of Texas. Through his “Tactless Texan” column, which served as a pulpit to the community, to the various contests and promotions the newspaper sprang up, including the creation of Mother in Law Day, Gene Howe gave the newspaper another dimension little has been studied about, the role of the editor and publisher in guiding a community through …
Date: May 2015
Creator: Hasman, Gregory R. C.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Philosophy and Practice of Personal Journalism with Moral Concern in the Twentieth Century (open access)

Philosophy and Practice of Personal Journalism with Moral Concern in the Twentieth Century

This study seeks to show that a tradition exists of personal journalists who, more than supporting a partisan position, have moral concern and desire reconciliation. Between the First World War and the Hutchins Commission report of 1947, Walter Lippmann and other media critics theorized that journalistic objectivity is impossible, but recognized journalists' responsibility to interpret events to their publics. In the 1930s these new theories coincided with historical events to encourage journalists' personal involvement with their subjects. The work of the best personal journalists, for example, George Orwell and James Agee, resulted from moral concern. This tradition is furthered today in the journalism of Bill Moyers.
Date: December 1989
Creator: Surratt, Marshall N. (Marshall Nash)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Making Meaning out of Difference: A Cultural Studies Analysis of the Struggle over the Meaning of Gayness in "Ellen" and Time Magazine (open access)

Making Meaning out of Difference: A Cultural Studies Analysis of the Struggle over the Meaning of Gayness in "Ellen" and Time Magazine

On April 30, 1997, for the first time in television history, an actress on a popular television sitcom announced to the world that both se and the character she played were lesbians. This study offers an interpretation of the significance of Ellen DeGeneres' coming through a cultural studies analysis of the April 14, 1997 Time magazine article in which DeGeneres comes out and the April 30, 1997 "Ellen" television episode in which DeGeneres brings her character, Ellen Morgan, out. The study revealed sites of ideological differences between the two texts that could point to a struggle over the meaning of gayness in modern American society. The results suggest that mainstream attitudes and beliefs could be in the process of shifting toward a more normalized view of homosexuality.
Date: August 1998
Creator: Stearns, Susan, 1965-
System: The UNT Digital Library
Killing Flies With a Shotgun: How the Internet Set a New Journalistic Standard and Style (open access)

Killing Flies With a Shotgun: How the Internet Set a New Journalistic Standard and Style

Today, both the way a story is told and how long the viewer's attention can be held are often as important as the story itself. This study shows how online media sets new standards for narrative and continues some print traditions. This study focuses on the dialogue between print and online media. A quantitative and qualitative analysis of this dialogue through story length, readability, shovelware and story packaging shows the numerous effects the Internet has had on news media content.
Date: August 2000
Creator: Maher, Kelly M.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Environmental journalism curriculum as an imperative of democracy: A philosophical exploration. (open access)

Environmental journalism curriculum as an imperative of democracy: A philosophical exploration.

Economic retrenchment, social shifts, and technological changes endanger journalism's democratic role. Journalism education faces parallel threats. I review the state of journalism and education, linking the crisis to society's loss of story, framed philosophically by the Dewey-critical theory split over journalism and power. I explore the potential for renewing journalism and education with Carey's ritual model and Postman's restoration of storytelling. I then summarize existing major academic programs and suggest a new interdisciplinary curriculum for environmental journalism, a specialty well suited to experimental, democracy-centered education. The curriculum uses as pedagogy active and conversational learning and reflection. A graduate introductory course is detailed, followed by additional suggested classes that could form the basis of a graduate certificate program or, with further expansion, a graduate degree concentration.
Date: August 2007
Creator: Loftis, Randy Lee
System: The UNT Digital Library
Martin Luther: Mass Communicator and Propagandist (open access)

Martin Luther: Mass Communicator and Propagandist

This study presents a picture of Martin Luther as a pioneer in mass communications. The text is divided into four sections and the conclusion; Martin Luther: man and his world, Luther and the German printing press, propaganda devices in Luther's Primary Reformation Treatises of 1520, and, propaganda and mass communications in Luther's liturgical reforms, religious broadsides, and preaching. The final remarks pertain to Luther's effect upon the reordering of society in the Western world.
Date: August 1974
Creator: Batts, James Harold
System: The UNT Digital Library
Ray P. Holland, Editor and Conservationist (open access)

Ray P. Holland, Editor and Conservationist

The problem involved in this study was to determine the success or failure of the use of the editorial in achieving a goal, specifically, editorials by Ray P. Holland in favor of the Migratory Bird Conservation Act of 1929 and the Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act of 1934. Editorials from the Bulletin of the American Game Protective Association and Field and Stream were classified into categories to show an editorial position over a selected time period. Material from the permanent collection of the Holland library at Wesleyan University and family information was used to record a biography of Holland's achievements. The study shows that Holland's contributions in journalism will stand as a benchmark to ensuing generations of journalists who seek to realize their goals through the proper use of the editorial.
Date: May 1977
Creator: Holland, Linda R.
System: The UNT Digital Library
A History of DALLAS Magazine and Its Changing Roles in the Dallas Chamber (open access)

A History of DALLAS Magazine and Its Changing Roles in the Dallas Chamber

This study explains the development of DALLAS magazine from its beginnings and changes in sixty-three years in content and format, departments, staff, and editorial policy. The study shows how DALLAS developed, reflecting the history of the City of Dallas' economic and business growth, and the Chamber of Commerce viewpoints since 1922. Concluding, the study reveals that the magazine projected the Dallas Chamber's viewpoints, that the magazine reported only positive images of the City of Dallas and its economy, that the magazine chronicled the changes in journalistic writing and graphic arts technology, that the magazine's audience remained the business leaders of the community, and that staff members progressively became better qualified for their positions.
Date: August 1986
Creator: Mahony, Linda MacDonald
System: The UNT Digital Library

Narrative Solutions to Climate Change

Climate change is one of the preeminent problems facing humanity today. It has the potential to cause incalculable damages, loss of life and property, and can create an almost unlivable habitat for humans on this planet. Governments need to act in order to stop future climate harms, but the electorate must be literate in the subject in order to do so. One of the jobs of the media is to inform the public, and so it is imperative that the media find a way to accurately inform the U.S. electorate about the changing climate in order to stimulate pro-environmental behavior and voting. It was hypothesized in this thesis that journalists should utilize narrative instead of simply relaying statistics and fact-based information to better engage the electorate and that it would prove a better way to educate them about science topics such as the climate. However, the politicization of such topics could not be ignored and so needed to be accounted for. A 2x2 factorial analysis was done using narrative versus fact-based stories with either conservative or liberal news outlet headers. These were then tested against three covariates: political ideology, narrative transportation, and locus of control. This research found that political …
Date: December 2022
Creator: Pezzulli, Katherine Keller
System: The UNT Digital Library