The Knight Chair in Media and Religion at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism is pleased to announce the publication of the Oxford Handbook of Religion and the American News Media, edited by Diane Winston, in August 2012.
Once relegated to the private sphere, or confined to its own section of the newspaper, religion is now a major part of daily news coverage. Every journalist needs a basic knowledge of religion to cover everything from presidential elections to the war in Iraq to the ethical issues raised by latest developments in medical research.
The Oxford Handbook of Religion and the American News Media will be the go-to volume for both secular and religious journalists and journalism educators, scholars in media studies, journalism studies, religious studies and American studies. Comprised of six sections, the first examines how the history of the mass media and the role religion played in its grown. The second looks at how the major media formats — print, broadcast, and online — deal with religion. The next two examine how journalists cover major religious traditions and particular issues that have religion angles. The fifth examines the religious press, from the Christian Broadcasting Network to The Forward. The final section looks at how the American press covers the rest of the world.
Applying the insights of history, sociology, and cultural studies, several able and eminent scholars have joined to produce The Oxford Handbook of Religion and the American News Media, a wide-ranging exploration of how religion interacts with the news.