St. Louis Journalism Review -
[Cached Version]
Published on: 10/1/1997
Last Visited: 3/21/2004
"There's a hard core of journalism professors who are fully committed to public journalism," said Gerald Stone, who is director of journalism graduate studies at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale."They give papers, hold workshops and give classes on public journalism.I think they'll be doing this for some time to come.
"I don't think this movement has gotten the scrutiny and criticism that it should," continued Stone."Quite frankly, I think this is because some academic heavyweights have gotten behind it, and some foundations are out there with them, and so a lot of professors are reticent to say too much against it.It deserves more scrutiny."
Stone said he was originally "quite impressed" with public journalism, but has become more of a skeptic as he has watched different projects unfold.He said he dislikes projects that involve a newspaper covering forums and town hall meetings that the newspaper has helped sponsor.
"That coverage just isn't news, it's promotion," said Stone.
"When there isn't foundation money to support these projects, then there's a promotion department that's ready to support them because it seems like good public relations," said Stone.