2025/03/25 by Carolina Velloso
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Media Studies and Communication #Public Relations and Crisis Communication #Rhetoric and Communication Studies
paper · pdf · doi:10.1177/01968599251325847
openalex publication_date 2025/03/25 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
This study uses a theoretical framework grounded in alternatives to normative objectivity to investigate whether and how journalists call for a reimagining of objectivity as an operational framework for journalism. Through a textual analysis of 289 metajournalistic articles and X posts produced between 2012 and 2022, the study also compares how those discourses have (or have not) shifted within that decade. Findings indicate that calls to reimagine objectivity as a journalistic norm steadily increased in volume and gravity over the time period, with two critical incidents prompting a groundswell of discourse: The 2016 presidential election and the murder of George Floyd in 2020. It also found that the metajournalistic discourse on X was distinct but complementary to the discourse in the articles. This study shows that journalists are arguing for an alternative paradigm that retains a commitment to truth, facts, and accuracy during the newsgathering process, but conceptually acknowledges that no kind of knowledge production is inherently value-free, and thus values journalists’ standpoints as an asset, rather than a hindrance, to news coverage.