New for Journalism and Mass Communications

For many years, Leyburn Library has subscribed to The Capital Source, an excellent directory of Washington, D.C.-oriented government, mass media outlets, non-governmental associations, corporations, and other important contacts. This annual directory, published by the estimable National Journal folks, has been an extremely reliable resource, but it was updated only once a year -- and sat in printed form on one spot in the library's Reference collection.
We now have online access to The Capital Source, which is a huge improvement in access over the printed editions. And, since the publisher now can keep the database updated as needed, the information within the directory will be more accurate.
Links will be maintained in several locations in the library Web site, including here.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 7:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Weldon Cooper Center, University of Virginia.
Shelved in the Reference collection: REF KFV 2879.A1 T392 2006
Earlier editions are available online.
"Detailed information on tax rates levied for taxes for 95 counties, 39 cities, and 147 towns."
A link will be maintained on this library Web page.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 6:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Duke University Law School.
Available online.
This article, published in the William and Mary Law Review, "argues that commercial pressures are determining the news media’s contemporary treatment of crime and violence, and that the resulting coverage has played a major role in reshaping public opinion, and ultimately, criminal justice policy. The news media are not mirrors, simply reflecting events in society. Rather, media content is shaped by economic and marketing considerations that frequently override traditional journalistic criteria for newsworthiness. This article explores local and national television’s treatment of crime, where the extent and style of news stories about crime are being adjusted to meet perceived viewer demand and advertising strategies, which frequently emphasize particular demographic groups with a taste for violence."
This article will be available through our Periodical Finder.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 1:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

American Psychological Assocation.
Available online.   Printed copy to be added to the library collection.
This report "found evidence that the proliferation of sexualized images of girls and young women in advertising, merchandising, and media is harmful to girls’ self-image and healthy development.... To complete the report, the APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls studied published research on the content and effects of virtually every form of media, including television, music videos, music lyrics, magazines, movies, video games and the Internet. They also examined recent advertising campaigns and merchandising of products aimed toward girls."

Posted by Dick Grefe at 11:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Poynter Institute.
Available online.
An evolving collection of professional guidelines for online journalism, in the form of a "wiki" -- in effect, a participatory Web site.
A link will be maintained on this library Web page.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 11:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

RAND Corporation.
Available online.
Analysis of "media and public reactions to civilian casualty incidents, whether these incidents affect media reporting or public support for military operations, and, if so, how."
A printed copy will be added to the library collection.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 1:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Career Education Institute.
Available online.   (W&L subscription)
Listing of over 2,300 organizations which offer internships and/or summer jobs for students.
Note: This is one of the few W&L library subscription databases which uses passwords for security, so please do not share this password information with anyone outside the W&L community.
A link will be maintained on this library Web page, where you also can find other online job and internship services.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 1:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Knight Citizen News Network.
Available online.
"This report focuses specifically on micro-local community news sites that contain content generated by users... With limited readership and very little revenue, 73% of the respondents pronounced their sites to be a “success.’’ Why? Because they have watchdogged local government, provided news that couldn’t otherwise be had, nudged local media to improve, helped their community solve problems, even, to a degree, increased voter turnout and the number of candidates running for office."
A link will be maintained on this library Web page.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 12:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Reporters Without Borders.
Available online.
Newest edition of this annual survey "reports on press freedom in 98 countries and includes the main violations of journalists’ rights in 2006 and regional aspects of media and Internet freedom."
A link will be maintained on this library Web page.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 9:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Leyburn Library has initiated a subscription to the Blackwell Synergy collection of online journals, which is particularly strong in the social sciences.
Our collection includes over 700 online journals, including over 600 which are new to W&L.

For example, there about 50 journals categorized as Politics and Political Science, dozens more as Business, Economics, etc., and a handful in Communication and Media Studies.

Links to these journals will appear in Annie, the library's Periodical Finder, and elsewhere in our Web site.

One of the nice things about this collection is the fact that you can opt to have the tables of contents of new issues -- complete with links to the texts of articles -- delivered to you via e-mail or RSS feed. For more information, see "Continue reading...," below.

To set up e-mail delivery, you should register in the Blackwell site, creating your own account (password, e-mail, etc.).
Then go to any individual journal's page, such as the Journal of Communication and select the "Sign Up for E-Mail Alerts" option (upper-left of page). The next page will offer you a list of all journals, with access to each subject collection, where you can click next to any title to set up e-mail delivery.

To set up RSS delivery, you need not register. Instead, go to any individual title's page and copy the URL into your own RSS reader (Bloglines, for example).

If you have questions about the above, please let me know.

Posted by Dick Grefe at 1:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)