Yukun's questions

Question about sociology and journalism
In page 78, the author mentioned that “much contemporary work on journalism no longer comes from sociology.” “The centrality of sociology in journalism studies is no longer certain.”
In my mind, journalism study is affected by different disciplines such as, sociology, political science and economics. Now does journalism study become a more inter -disciplinery or become a real independent subject?

In page 61, study of lang and lang showed how TV produced a mistaken impression of widerspread support for MacAuthur and his politics.
I am wondering how to improve the news practice. Duty of a journalist is to select different “important” elements to “construct” a story for audience. Based on news values, journalist always stresses exciting perspectives of an event. Without doing so, the stories will be bored. Readership will decline. What is the solution for it? I have no idea.

Question about the sociology of news production
In page 5, the political economy of news, the author indicated that “there is a ruling directorate of the capitalist class that dictates to editors and reporters what to run in the newspapers.”
Does the political economy be limited in capitalist societies? Can we apply this theory to the media in other state-systems rather than democratic countries?

Question about Brazilian Journalism
In pages 84, this paper indicates that more American journalists perceived themselves as interpreters but disseminators than Brazilian journalists.
Instead of viewing this from media sociology or political economy, I will attribute this to media themselves. Unlike western countries such as UK, France and America, most media in developing countries don’t have a good system for senior journalists. After several years, a young journalist must get a position of management or this journalist must change the career track. That is the reason why more Brazilian journalist perceived themselves as disseminators.

Question about Benson
He viewed media as an independent factor. However, most important of assumption of critical approach on media study is to view media as a dependent factor. Therefore, I am confused about that. If we view media as an independent factor, how can we explain the media through political economy? I don’t know how Benson solve this question.