News from the Interview Society

During the 20th century, the interview has evolved in such a way that it has become the dominating form for talk and text production in the mass media (i.e. in newspapers, radio, television). This book introduces the Interview Society as an innovative, provocative and challenging concept to understand the construction of news, the use of language, and the power of journalism in contemporary media society. It focuses on the journalistic interview and on the techniques for the representation of utterances, talk and conversation, and combines theories of the public sphere, news journalism, and the interview as a form of interaction. It relates discursive techniques on a micro level to institutional and cultural condi­tions on a macro level, with regard to journalism and the media public sphere, and takes a historically point of departure with the intention of pinning down important tendencies in the development of modern journalism during the 20th century. Without being nation-specific, it presents findings from a number of empirical studies from five different countries and various genres. The book is structured in relation to four main themes: (1) Historical perspectives, (2) Practices of inter­viewing and institutionalised interaction, (3) Quoting and editing, (4) New arenas and new forms of interaction.

Content

Preface

Introduction
Mats Nylund, Åsa Kroon, Mats Ekström

I. Historical Shifts and the Role of the Journalistic Interview in Modern Media

Interviewing, Quoting and the Development of Modern News Journalism. A Study of the Swedish Press 1915-1995
Mats Ekström

Questioning Presidents. Journalistic Deference and Adversarialness in the Press Conference of U.S. Presidents Eisenhower and Reagan
John Heritage, Steven E. Clayman

Power on the Threshold of the Interview Society. Journalism, Politics, Popularization
Martin Eide

II. The Interview as Institutional Practices and Interaction

‘Doing’ Interviewer Roles in TV Interviews
Mie Femø Nielsen

Hidden Camera Speaks Louder than Words
Christian Svensson Limsjö, Konstantin Economou

III. Quoting and Editing. Recontextualising the Interview

Journalism’s Vitality. On the Narrative Functions of Quotes
Mats Nylund

The Gendered Practice and Role of Pull Quoting in Political Newspaper Journalism
Åsa Kroon

Framing of Politicians’ Answers and the Mediazation of Politics. A Historical Comparative Study of the Discourse Practice of Framing in News Stories
Göran Eriksson

Control and Collaboration. Interviewing and Editing in Television News Production
Mats Nylund

IV. The Interview as an Interdiscursive Phenomenon and Interaction on New Arenas

Broadcast Talk: The Interview and its Hybrids
Ulla Moberg

Arenas of Interaction in the New Media Era
Steven E. Clayman

The Authors