Year: 2005
Type: article
Abstract: This article addresses the formulaic dependence of the news media on images of people facing impending death. Considering one example of this depiction—U.S. journalism’s photographic coverage of the killing of the Taliban by the Northern Alliance during the war on Afghanistan, the article traces its strategic appearance and recycling across the U.S. news media and shows how the beatings and deaths of the Taliban were depicted in ways that fell short of journalism’s proclaimed objective of fully documenting the events of the war. The article argues that in so doing, U.S. journalism failed to raise certain questions about the nature of the alliance between the United States and its allies on Afghanistan’s northern front.
Author: Barbie Zelizer
Institution: University of Pennsylvania
Language: English
Subfield: Communication
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1989937498