The Jeremiad Over Journalism

iological sciences,‖ the social frameworks are man-made, ―a live agency‖ which ―begins with a
mental decision. 224 ‖
Goffman uses news coverage as an example of social frameworks and as such became one of the
pioneers in linking the concept of framing with the way the media presents its news. Furthermore,
Goffman stressed the human agency involved in the news process. Though journalists work within
restraints of their respective institutions, and conscientiously attempt to approach an ideal of
objectivity, they still shape the news in terms of selection and salience, and thereby undermine the
struggle for absolute ―objectivity.‖ Schudson, among others, have pointed to this obvious
constructionist component of news reporting as is apparent from this description of journalists‘
special relationship to reality,
―Journalists not only report reality but create it. To say that journalists construct reality in
producing the news is not to say they do so without constraints. (…) Journalists normally work
with materials that real people and real events provide. But by selecting, highlighting, framing,
shading, and shaping in reportage, they create an impression that real people – readers and
viewers – then take to be real and to which they respond in their lives.‖ 225
However, if frames are constructed and have real consequences in terms of people‘s responses to
them, how are frames actually detected? Scheufele points to the fact that, "journalists actively
construct frames to structure and make sense of incoming information,‖ and furthermore argues that
variables like ideology, attitudes and professional norms, play an important part in how frames are
built by journalists in news coverage. 226 Futhermore, Scheufele asserts that "organizational
routines" and "external sources of influence‖ (e.g., political actors, authorities, interest groups, and
other elites) also influence the way that frames are shaped which fits well with Cook‘s argument of
journalists affected by the institutional level.
224
Erving Goffman, Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience (New York: Harper Colophon
Books, 1974). Page 21-23.
225
Schudson, The Sociology of News. Page 2.
226
Scheufele, "Framing as a Theory of Media Effects." Page 115.
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