Three Mexico City Tabloid Newspapers: Some Surprises
In: The journal of popular culture: the official publication of the Popular Culture Association, Band 18, Heft 1, S. 65-77
ISSN: 1540-5931
Mexico today enjoys one of the most dynamic and varied print media in Latin America. Dating from 1542 when the first news flier came off the press in Mexico City, print journalism has had a lively history culminating in a most favorable situation in the 1980s in which this country's population counts on a daily deluge of newspapers, magazines and other publications. Al Hester concentrates on three tabloids which make up over one‐tenth of the total daily circulation of papers in the capital. He examines their textual and pictorial content, sources of news, the importance of news coverage in comparison with advertising space, the general characteristics of the papers in the way they approach their tasks, how the communicators perceive their missions and their readers, and finally what contributions these tabloids make to Mexico City readers. Hester discovers that the tabloids do not fit the traditional picture of sensationalist publicatons but to varying degrees provide hard news, variety, even investigative reporting, and socially conscious types of content.