The document discusses the evolution of news values and what constitutes news over time. It outlines Galtung and Ruge's seminal 1965 study which identified 12 news values that influence news selection. It also summarizes Harcup and O'Neill's 2001 updated study reducing news values to 10 factors and making them more relevant to contemporary news coverage. The document argues that while news values provide a framework, they do not fully explain how ideological and cultural factors shape how the news is framed and reported.

1. News values, frames & shifting debates
#MAC201
robert.jewitt@sunderland.ac.uk
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2. Outline
1. Introduction
2. Rise of reporting
3. Galtung and Ruge (1965)
4. Harcup and O’Neil (2001)
5. Conclusion
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3. Introduction
 What is news...?
3

4. Introduction
 What is news...?
 “When a dog bites a man
that is not news, but when a
man bites a dog, that is
news”
 (Charles Anderson Dana, editor and proprietor, New
York Sun, 1882)
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5. Introduction
 What is news...?
 “[News is] anything that
makes the reader say
‘Gee whiz’”
 (quoted in Mott, 1950: 126)
5

6. Introduction
 What is news...?
 “[News is] anything that
makes the reader say
‘Gee whiz’”
 (quoted in Mott, 1950: 126)
6

7. Introduction
 What is news...?
 “News is what somebody
wants to suppress; all the
rest is advertising”
 (attributed to Lord Northcliffe in MacShane, 1979:
46)
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8. Introduction
• Millions of events happen every day – but why are the
same stories replicated throughout the media?
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9. News as routine
 Golding and Elliot (1996: 405) note that news
production…
 ‘is for the most part the passive exercise of routine and highly
regulated procedures in the task of selecting from already
limited supplies of information’
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10. Limited News Supply Because:
 Historical decisions regarding what is thought to be
interesting to readers
 Material thought to be inoffensive to specific advertisers
 Material profitable to media companies
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11. Rise of reporting
 Venice (16th century): gazettes
 see Allan, 1999/2004/2010
 Content: military/political/trade events
 Bookshops and coffee houses
 (17th
century, increased literacy
 New formats emerge:
• [Which] ‘brought sex and scandal, fantasy, sensationalism,
bawdiness, violence and prophecy to their readers:
monstrous births, dragons, mermaids and most horrible
murders; but they also brought items of news’.
(Craven, 1992: 3)
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12. Popular press?
 Emergence of ‘non-partisan’ (supposedly
neutral) reporting of issues in the ‘public
interest’
 Legacy of ‘pauper press’ (UK) & ‘penny press’
(US) in 19th
century
 (see Allan, 2010)
 Pauper press actively campaigned for social
change
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13. 13
Pauper press Traditional press
Working class Educated elite
1-2 pence 6-7 pence
Human interest Analytical
Revolutionary Respectable
Controversial Critical

14. 14
TABLOID Vs BROADSHEET
Pauper press Traditional press
Working class Educated elite
1-2 pence 6-7 pence
Human interest Analytical
Revolutionary Respectable
Controversial Critical

15. TABLOID Vs BROADSHEET
15
Pauper press Traditional press
Working class Educated elite
1-2 pence 6-7 pence
Human interest Analytical
Revolutionary Respectable
Controversial Critical

16. Important historical factors
1. market forces
2. human interest and sensationalism
3. political decisions and the public good
4. the speed at which ‘facts’ could be reported
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17. What are news values?
 Series of unwritten ground rules
 “News values are meant to be the distillation of what an identified
audience is interested in reading or watching” (Richardson, 2007: 91)
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18. 18

19. Galtung and Ruge (1965)
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• Journal of Peace
Research
• International news in
Norwegian papers
• Identified 12 factors

20. Galtung and Ruge (1965)
Eight principles of news
selection
(F1) Frequency
• The temporal unfolding
of an event has to
correspond with the
needs of the news media.
• Daily news focuses on
events rather than
longer trends.
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21. (F2) Threshold
 The bigger the event, the more
violent the murder, the greater
the casualties/fatalities in an
accident: the more newsworthy
it will be.
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22. (F3) Lack of ambiguity
The clearer the meaning
of an event, the easier it
can be understood
(F4) Meaningfulness
Has to be of
significance, or be
meaningful, within the
given cultural
environment.
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23. (F5) Predictability
 “…this creates a mental
matrix for easy
reception” (Galtung and
Ruge, 1981: 55); or much
of the news is the
delivery of routine
information.
(F6) Unpredictability
 Unexpected or rare
events are inherently
newsworthy
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24. F7) Continuing news
• If something is already
newsworthy, it will continue
to be so: even if its impact
decreases.
(F8) Compositional value
• A balance of domestic,
international, celebrity and
sports news is required.
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25. Cultural factors in news selectionCultural factors in news selection
(F9) “Elite nations” are more newsworthy
 Economic power (i.e. Western Europe, USA).
Accusations of cultural “Eurocentrism” and a
corresponding “Orientalism” (see E. W. Said)
(F10) “Elite people” are more newsworthy
 The political and financial elite; the “celebrities”
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26. (F11) News should be presentable in terms of
the personal
•Focus on the “ordinary” person in exceptional
circumstances
(F12) Negativity
•Negative news is seen as unambiguous.
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27. 27

28. 28

29. In summary…
• The more criteria an event satisfies from the list of news
values, the more likely it will be selected to be news.
• Once an event is selected, the factors which made it
newsworthy will be accentuated (or distorted)
• The process of selection and accentuation will occur at all
stages, from the event through to the readers.
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30. Problems with Galtung and Ruge?
 Very useful for identifying the formal elements within the construction of
news…
 But what about the ideology behind the selection? How is news ‘framed’?
 Are news values always aligned around daily news stories or only major
events?
 Drawn from international news:
 Applicable to domestic news?
 Applicable to different formats?
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31. Problems with Galtung and Ruge?
‘News values appear as a set of neutral, routine
practices: but we need, also, to see formal news
values as an ideological structure – to examine these
rules as the formalisation and operationalisation of an
ideology of news’
(Hall, 1973: 182)
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32. ‘News Frames’
 Refers to the ways in which articles shape readers understandings
of news events depending on how the intro/headline to a story and
the conclusion are framed
 See Price, Tewksbury, Powers (1997)
 Valkenburg, Semetko, & de Vreese (1999)
 Article by de Vreese on SunSpace
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33. Harcup and O’Neil (2001)
Galtung & Ruge Revisited
 Re-tested news values – studied 3 British daily newspapers
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• Concluded that “Galtung and Ruge ignored day-to-day
coverage of lesser, domestic and bread-and-butter news”
(2001: 276)

34. Harcup and O'Neill (1-3)
(1) The POWER elite
 Stories concerning ‘powerful individuals,
organisations or institutions’ (2001: 278).
(2) Celebrity
 Stories concerning the already famous
(3) Entertainment
 Sex, show business, human interest, animals,
humorous stories or photos.
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35. Harcup and O'Neill (4-7)
(4) Surprise
• Contrast (formerly Unpredictability)
(5) Bad news
• Negative overtones
(6) Good news
• Positive overtones
(7) Magnitude
• Significant numbers of people or
large impact (formerly Threshold)
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36. Harcup and O'Neill (8-10)
 (8) Relevance
 …to readership (incorporates Meaningfulness and reference to Elite
Nations)
 (9) Follow-up
 Stories about subjects already in the news
 (10) Newspaper agenda
 Stories that fit the organisation’s agenda incorporates Continuing
news and Compositional value)
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37. Harcup and O’Neil (2001)
1 The POWER elite Stories concerning
‘powerful individuals, organisations or
institutions’ (p 278). This makes a
distinction between world or business
leaders and reality TV contestants etc.
2 Celebrity Stories concerning the already
famous
3 Entertainment Includes stories about sex,
show business, human interest, humorous
stories or photos.
4 Surprise Stories with an element of surprise
and/or contrast (formerly Unexpectedness)
5 Bad news Negative overtones – conflict,
tragedy, etc
6 Good news Positive overtones – rescue, miracle
cures, etc
7 Magnitude Stories with significant numbers of
people or large impact (formerly Threshold)
8 Relevance Issues perceived to be relevant to the
readership (incorporates Meaningfulness and
reference to Elite Nations). Would now include
places like Magaluf, Ibiza and Ayia Napa, which
might be relevant to certain readerships.
9 Follow-up Stories about subjects already in the
news
10 Newspaper agenda Stories that fit the
organisation’s agenda (incorporates Continuing
news and Compositional value)
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38. Harcup and O’Neill summary
 Updated G & R study
 Reduced news values from 12 to 10
 More contemporary and relevant
 E.g. Celebrity and Entertainment
 Perhaps a more reliable and trustworthy methodology
 E.g. Choice of newspapers
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39. Conclusion
 Range of historical factors impacting on professional
journalistic practice.
 Factors reveal the often unspoken, unconscious
(ideological) mechanics of news room selection
 News Values are limited analytical and critical tools
which should allow us to get behind the question of
‘what is news’ without always explaining HOW they are
reported
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40. Bibliography
 Anderson Dana, C., 1882, New York Sun, in Allan, S. 1999 NewsCulture, Buckingham: Open University Press.
 Allan, S., 2004, News Culture, Buckingham: Open University Press .
 Craven, L., 1992, ‘The early newspaper press in England’, in D.Giffiths (ed.) The Encylopedia of the British Press, London:Macmillan.
 Galtung, J., and Ruge, M., 1981, ‘Structuring and selecting news’ inCohen, S., & Young, J. (eds.), The Manufacture of News: Socialproblems, deviance and the mass media: Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
 Hall, S., 1973, ‘The determination of news photographs’ in Cohen,S., & Young, J. (eds), The Manufacture of News. London: Constable,pp. 181 & 182.
 Harcup, T. and O’Neill, D. (2001) “What is news? Galtung and Rugerevisited”, Journalism Studies 2: 261-280.
 Richardson, J (2007) Analysing Newspapers. London: PalgraveMcMillan
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