Journalism Hits a Wall

Abstract

This study analyzes how business and editorial staff members at US newspapers rhetorically construct or deconstruct the metaphoric norm of a wall or line of separation between news and advertising functions. The study is based on 18 in-depth interviews with news and advertising professionals at middle-market US newspapers and the subsequent analysis of their rhetoric about the relationship between the news and advertising sides of their organizations. The study seeks to understand the rhetorical construction of an institutional norm and our observations are focused on the organization level. This study aids understanding of two related phenomena: how institutional norms are rhetorically constructed and how norms are rhetorically renegotiated or deconstructed.

KEYWORDS:

• advertising
• institutional norms
• metaphors
• news
• news organizations
• rhetoric
• wall of separation

Notes

1 A two-letter reference scheme was developed to identify participants’ responses while protecting their identity. Thus, the first letter identifies the geographic location while the second letter identifies whether the individual is an advertising executive or an editorial executive. For example, “LA” would refer to an individual located in geographic area “L” and would identify an advertising executive, “A”; LE would refer to the editor, “E,” in the same place.