I found myself watching Teacher’s Pet, a 1958 romantic comedy about a hard-bitten hack going to journalism school and was struck that even then journalists were arguing over hard news versus analysis. This clip could be worth slipping into your teaching if you are a journalism prof:
“This isn’t a rehash – I’m talking about The Big Why behind the story. This is the function of a newspaper in today’s world. Why, TV and radio announce spot news minutes after it happens. Newspapers can’t compete in reporting what happened any more. But they can and should tell the public why it happened!”
