The Concept Of News <br />Al-Mustaqabal University College <br />Department Of English Language and literature <br />Assit. Lect. Mustafa Fadhil Obaid <br />Introduction <br /> Traditionally, News might be what viewers and listeners expect to see and hear when they switch on or switch channel at the appropriate moment in the broadcast schedule to catch a news bulletin program (usually on the hour or half-hour). However, the definition is more than that. Ekström remarks that news “reliable, neutral and current factual information that is important and valuable for citizens in democracy”,<br />presented “on a regular basis” (Ekström, 2002, p. 274). The reference to<br />democracy, however, seems perhaps unnecessary. As Schudson notes,<br />“I am reluctant to smuggle ‘democracy’ into the very definition of journalism” (2003, p. 14), offering instead a broader formulation: “information and commentary on contemporary affairs taken to be publicly important” though even here he concedes that “in any day’s newspaper or radio or television ‘news’ broadcast, there is a great deal of material that is interesting but not important” (Schudson, pp. 14–15). in light of what is mentioned, news can be defined as information about current or recent events, happenings or changes taking place outside the immediate purview of the audience and which is considered to be of likely interest or concern to them. Not every event or piece of information counts as news. News has to be notable according to particular principles of selection, paradigms of relevance, and frames for including and excluding material. Principles of exclusion and inclusion may be summed up under the heading of ‘news values’. Following the pioneering work of Galtung and Ruge (1965a,b). Events become news to the extent that they satisfy the following criteria; the following list is not exhausted. <br />1. Recency <br /> yesterday's news is not news. News should be fresh and urgent, as Tuchman (1978) observes, “news is a depletable consumer product that must be made fresh daily”. Park asserted the same perspective “What was live news becomes cold fact” (1999, p. 12). <br />2. Intensity/Discontinuity<br />Events in a series of stable, steady-state occurrences are less newsworthy than an event which represents a sudden deviation from the norm. for instance If cancer deaths as a proportion of early mortality remain annually at 35 per cent this is less newsworthy than if they suddenly increase in a year to 45 per cent.<br />3. Scale/Scope<br />Events need to be of a scale large enough to warrant attention. “The stronger the signal, the greater the amplitude, the more probable that it will be recorded as worth listening to” (Galtung and Ruge, 1965a, p. 64). For instance Tsunami that kills 150,000 people is more newsworthy than an earthquake that kills 150 people. 4. Conflict the struggle between opposing parties is fresh material for mass media and influences the public opinion. For instance strikes, breakdowns in<br />negotiations, divorce, war, election campaigns are all high in news value.<br />5. Negativity <br />Bad news makes good news. The clear example of bad news is war, famine, natural disaster, non-natural disaster. The dominant news items of the 21st century, 9/11, war in Iraq, the Indian Ocean Tsunami, climate change – are all examples of extremely bad news. <br /><br /><br />Conclusion <br />In brief words , news has a strong influence in societies as religion and science. Not every piece of information or event counts as news , it becomes prominent when it has unique characteristic and passes through paradigms of selection and a process of editing. The main platform of mass media is no longer print nor world-wide-web, but broadcasting. <br />References <br />Ekström, M. (2002) Epistemologies of TV Journalism: a theoretical framework. Journalism, 3(3), 259–282.<br />Galtung, J. and Ruge (1965a) The structure of foreign news: the presentation of the Congo, Cuba and Cyprus crises in four Norwegian newspapers. Journal of Peace Research, 1, 64–91.<br />Galtung, J. and Ruge (1965b) Structuring and selecting news. In Cohen, S. and Young(eds.) (1965/1981) The Manufacture of News. London: Constable.<br />Park, R.E. (1940) News as a form of knowledge: a chapter in the sociology of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology 45, 669–686. Extracts reprinted in Tumber, H. (1999) News: a Reader. Oxford: OUP..<br />Schudson, M. (2003) The Sociology of News. New York: W.W. Norton. <br /> <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Reference <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />