News Framing of School Shootings

Journalism and American Social Problems

By (author) Michael McCluskey

Publication date:

06 December 2016

Length of book:

236 pages

Publisher

Lexington Books

ISBN-13: 9781498532969

News discourse helps us understand society and how we respond to traumatic events. News Framing of School Shootings: Journalism and American Social Problems provides insights into how we come to understand broad societal issues like gun control, the influence of violent media on children, the role of parents, and the struggles of teenagers dealing with bullying. This book evaluates the news framing of eleven school shootings in the United States between 1996 and 2012, including the traumatic Columbine and Sandy Hook events. Michael McCluskey explores reasons behind news coverage patterns, including differences in medium, news audience political ideology, the influence of political actors and other sources, and the contextual elements of each shooting.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1: News, Society and Violence

Chapter 2: News Framing, Frame Building and Problem Definitions

Chapter 3: Influences on School Shooting News Frames

Chapter 4: Guns and Value Framing

Chapter 5: Popular Media, Moral Panics and Culture Wars

Chapter 6: Religion, Coping and Blaming

Chapter 7: Other Individual-Level Problem Definitions

Chapter 8: Other Societal-Level Problem Definitions

Chapter 9: Heroism Archetypes

Chapter 10: Evaluation of News Discourse, Effects and Lessons

References

About the Author

This book is an essential contribution to the study of news framing and frame building. Dr. McCluskey impeccably weaves in many complex concepts such as religion, guns, culture wars, journalistic norms, and news discourse in the United States to tell a compelling story with empirical data. A must-read for academics, journalists, and the public.