Hearts and Minds: Visual Images and Political Problems

In: News for Teachers of Political Science, Band 35, S. 4-5

Abstract

It's an evening network news show. The camera zooms in on Ted Kennedy speaking to an enthusiastic crowd in San Diego, while the voiceover sonorously ends a brief report with, "Can the Senator get the voters to forget about Chappaquidick?" It is a 30-second news item. Question: have we just seen a piece of nonfiction film or a mini-documentary? The Kennedy staffers will be outraged; others will insist that the coverage merely told it like it is. Yet those same staffers will be pleased several months later when the networks cover the Senator's speech to the Democratic convention by showing wildly cheering partisans, while the cameras pass over the many delegates who are either sitting on their hands or just chatting with each other. Others will claim that the coverage of the speech was visually distorted. They may all be right, but they may not be