Philip Cass

The ghost of Felix Culpa: Adventures in the journalism education trade

What is the most effective way to teach the realities of journalism to students? This article argues that the most effective model is the community newspaper, which provides students with the opportunity to learn how to write for their own community, but also to learn the fundamentals of running a news outlet, from selling advertising to liaising with printers. It also argues that the same lessons can be applied in the digital age to online news sites and to students who need to know how to keep themselves afloat as independent journalists. Drawing on 20 years’ of experience teaching journalism in different countries, including Australia, Fiji and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the article looks at what worked, what did not and what lessons can be learned for the future.

Review: The realities of authoritarian media in China

Review of: Stockman, D. (2012). Media Commercialization and Authoritarian Rule in China. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-01844-0 China can no longer be called Communist. It is an authoritarian state in which a party that likes to call itself Communist maintains a firm grip on the country. However much the party and the corrupt party princelings enjoy the benefits of capitalism (and let us be frank that it is a distinctively 19th century robber baron style of capitalism), the government usemethods of media control that have not changed since Mao took power in 1959. Censorship has always been part of the regime, but Mao and his direct successors were always clever enough to give the masses a chance to let off steam now and then through such projects as the Hundred Flowers campaign and the Democracy Wall movement.

REVIEW: Noted: Disengagement and idiocy

Book review of: American Democracy, by Andrew Perrin. Cambridge: Polity Press. 2014, 228pp. ISBN 978-0-7456622-32-9. Perrins study of American democracy begins by stating what has become a commonplace of fear in many democracies, that people have become cynical and distrusting of the democractic system and that apathy and political disengagement are widespread. Only multi-millionaries backed by capitalist corporations with the deepest pockets can afford to run for office in the United States and nobody in power seems to be in any hurry to do anything about it.

Taking scalps and vicious 'attack' politics [Book Review]

Review(s) of: Dirty politics: How attack politics is poisoning New Zealands political environment, by Nicky Hagar, Nelson: Craig Potton Publishing, 2014, 166pp. ISBN978-1-927213-36-0.

Manipulation that we now take for granted [Book Review]

Review(s) of: Media and terrorism: Global perspectives, edited by Des Freedman and Daya Thussu, London: Sage, 2012, 336 pp. ISBN 9781446201572 (pbk).