Blog Assignment #2

What is journalism for and what is its role in our society?

Journalism serves a variety of purposes. However, one of its most basic purposes is to inform people about things that have happened but that they might not have already known about. For example, today a man killed himself and his mother at Johns Hopkins Hospital. While this story does not directly have an affect on me, it is still something that is tragic and presents problems in our society. If stories had not been written on this incident, many (other than those who live in the Baltimore area) would have never heard of the event. But because it was written about, our society can now make changes that will hopefully prevent such a tragedy from happening again.

According to our textbook, The Elements of Journalism, "the primary purpose of journalism is to provide citizens with the information they need to be free and self-governing" (12). As we have often discussed in class, one of the first things that happens when a democratic system of government is abolished is the removal of the freedom of the press. Once this happens, the government is able to get away with more since there is no one to hold it accountable to the public. Which leads me to another purpose of journalism: to keep the government in check. Without journalism, it is extremely difficult to spread ideas or to hold the government accountable for its actions.

Journalism's role in society coincides with the above mentioned purposes, but its most basic role is to keep the public informed. Even today as journalism has reported more on celebrities, sports, and movies than important world or national events, it is still serving its purpose to inform the public. Yes, the latest celebrity relationship is not essential for survival, but it is still information. In class we discussed the almost innate human need for information. Thus, journalism fulfills this human need by providing us with information about a variety of topics from the upcoming midterm elections to the latest movie releases.