Why+we+know+what+we+know+by+Juliette+Monteleone

Question: Why does the media use innuendo and gossip as news?

Research Methods: online research, library research, scholarly articles, analysis of news broadcasts/ observation, content analysis,

Proposal:

Why does the news report on gossip and innuendo? It is because people care deeply about the lives of celebrities and public figures or because they want to feel as if they know them? Is it to make the news more interesting and upbeat to increase viewers and ratings? Is it to cause speculation about events or people? Is it to mold public opinions? Is it because the media wants to use fluff to distract us from the real issues?

The news decides what we know about the world around us. If they do not report on it, than there's a good chance we do not know about it. Therefore it's both interesting and important to examine why the news reports on certain stories and not others. This project will examine why the news reports on innuendo and gossip as opposed to actual ground-breaking stories or events. It will discuss specific instances where innuendo or gossip were used to distract the public from real issues. For example more news outlets recently have been reporting on Charlie Sheen than Libya. This project will explore why gossip and innuendo are used in place of real news.

First we will gather information from various sources such as the internet, scholarly articles, and library rearch. Once we have gathered all needed research we will analyze the actual content of different news broadcasts. We will examine past popular gossip and innuendo stories and compare them to what was happening in the world at the time. This will show whether or not there was something more important the news could have reported on and why they chose to report on the gossip. Through these steps this project will not only discover why the news reports on gossip and innuendo, but also how and why they choose what to air.

This is an important topic. You will need to drill down on some specific non-trivial examples of how reporting gossip had the effect of propaganda (ie. it had a profound influence on people's attitudes and behaviors in the public sphere). I'm not crazy about the idea of interviewing professors since it would be more effective to read what scholars write on this topic--- and you'll get better quality information this way, too.