1st Edition
Newspaper Building Design and Journalism Cultures in Australia and the UK: 1855–2010
This book examines the micro-cultural ideologies of the journalism profession in Britain and Australia by focusing on the design, execution and development of newspaper building architecture.
Concentrating on the main newspaper buildings in some of the major metropolitan areas in Australia (Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide) and the UK (Manchester, London, Edinburgh and Liverpool) from 1855 to 2010, Newspaper Building Design and Journalism Cultures in Australia and the UK: 1855–2010 interweaves a rich analysis of spatial characteristics of newspaper offices with compelling anecdotes from journalists’ working lives, to examine the history, evolution and precarious future of the physical newsroom and the surrounding interior and exterior space. The book argues that newspaper buildings are designed to accommodate and extend journalism’s professional values and belief systems over time and that their architecture reflects ideological change and continuity in these value and belief systems, such as the evolution from trade to profession. Ancillary factors, such as the influence of the newspapers’ owners on the building design and the financing of new structures are also considered. As professional practice rapidly shifts out of the newspaper offices, this insightful study questions what this may mean for the future of the industry.
Newspaper Building Design and Journalism Cultures in Australia and the UK: 1855–2010 will benefit academics and researchers in the areas of media, journalism, cultural studies and urban history.
Chapter 1 – Situating the Newspaper Newsroom
Chapter 2 – The Emerging Newsroom: The British Newspaper Building in the Nineteenth Century
Chapter 3: Melbourne Newsrooms in the 20th century
Chapter 4: Murdoch and Myth
Chapter 5 - Twentieth Century Newspaper Buildings in the UK: National Newspapers
Chapter 6 – The Provincial Newsroom: British provincial newspaper building design in the twentieth century
Chapter 7 – The Newsroom Under Threat? British and Australian Newspaper Buildings in the Twenty-first Century
Chapter 8 – Conclusion: Main Themes and Further Research
Biography
Carole O’Reilly is a Senior Lecturer in Media and Cultural Studies, School of Arts, Media and Creative Technology, University of Salford, UK.
Josie Vine is a Senior Lecturer in the Journalism Program at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia.
'In this insightful work, O’Reilly and Vine expertly trace the role of newspaper buildings as key communicators of, monuments to, and vehicles for journalism’s professional culture and socio-political impact. An important and timely contribution to the ongoing "spatial turn" in journalism studies.'
E. James West is a Lecturer in US History at the University of York, UK.
'Vine and O'Reilly's book tells the vital 'origin story' of metropolitan newsroom spaces and their work cultures in the UK and Australia. Through a savvy examination of their architecture, semiotics, cultural meaning and history, it provides new understandings into the cultural function of newsrooms even as those spaces transform in the twenty-first century.'
Will Mari, assistant professor, Louisiana State University, USA
