Politics In America - Ch. 6 - Vocabulary
Terms
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- mass media
- all means of communication with the general public, including television, newspapers, magazines, radio, books, recordings, motion pictures, and the internet
- newsmaking
- deciding what events, topics, presentations, and issues will be given coverage in the news.
- agenda setting
- deciding what will be decided, defining the problems and issues to be addressed by decision makers
- socialization
- the learning of a culture and its values.
- Soft news
- news featured in talk shows, late-night comedy and TV news magazines - reaches more people than regular news broadcasts
- muckraking
- Journalistic exposés of corruption, wrongdoing, or mismanagement in government, business, and other institutions of society
- feeding frenzy
- intense media coverage of a scandal or event that locks out most other news
- name recognition
- Public awareness of a candidate - whether they even know his or her name
- horse-race coverage
- media coverage of electoral campaigns that concentrates on who is ahead and who is behind, and neglects the issues at stake.
- sound bite
- Concise and catchy phrase that attracts media coverage
- prior restraint
- government actions to restrict publication of a magazine, newspaper, or books on grounds of libel, obscenity, or other legal violations prior to actual publication of the work
- equal-time rule
- FCC requirement that boradcasts who sell time to any political candidate must make equal time available to opposing candidates at the same price.
- libel
- writings that are false and malicious and are intended to damage an individual
- slander
- oral statements that are false and malicious and are intended to damage an individual
- Sullivan rule
- Court guideline that false are malicious statements regarding public officials are protexted by the 1st Amendment unless it can be proven they were known to be false at the time they were made or were made with reckless disregard for their truth of falsehood.
- information overload
- situation in which individuals are subjected to so many communications that they cannot make sense of them
- selective perception
- mentally screening out information or opinions with which one disagrees
- television malaise
- generalized feelings of distrust, cynicism, and powerlessness stemming from television's emphasis on the negative aspects of American life.