Many point to the network era as a “golden age” of broadcast journalism when Americans could trust neutral reporters who told them the news the way it was. Except a lot of Americans did not. Television entered US homes in the mid-twentieth century, swiftly becoming the nation’s primary source of news just as the fight for Black freedom initiated a war of ideas about the meaning of American equality. Segregationists and civil rights activists alike fought to shape how the networks determined what constituted responsible coverage, who reported the news, and which narratives reporters told about race in America. This talk by Dr. Sage Goodwin (The Charles Warren Center, Harvard University) tells the story of how the pioneers of television news responded, uncovering how racial politics forged the modern television newsroom.
Dr. Sage Goodwin’s presentation is part of the spring, 2025 Department of Communication and Journalism Colloquium. The event is co-sponsored by the McGillicuddy Humanities Center as part of the 2024-2025 Annual Symposium: “From Talkies to TikTok: 100 Years of Audiovisual Storytelling.”
