J Scott Brennen
Biographic Data
| ID | 2053740 |
|---|---|
| NAME | J Scott Brennen |
| GIVEN NAMES | J Scott |
| FAMILY NAME | Brennen |
| SIGNATURE | BRENNEN J S |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5262-872X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 12 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 42 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 12 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2015 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2022 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Defining and Measuring Scientific Misinformation
We define scientific misinformation as publicly available information that is misleading or deceptive relative to the best available scientific evidence and that runs contrary to statements by actors or institutions who adhere to scientific principles. Scientific misinformation violates the supposition that claims should be based on scientific evidence and relevant expertise. As such, misinformation is observable and measurable, but research on s…
Beyond (Mis)Representation: Visuals in Covid-19 Misinformation
This article provides one of the first analyses of visuals in misinformation concerning COVID-19. A mixed-methods analysis of ninety-six examples of visuals in misinformation rated false or misleading by independent professional fact-checkers from the first three months of 2020 identifies and examines six frames and three distinct functions of visuals in pieces of misinformation: how visuals illustrate and selectively emphasize arguments and clai…
Balancing Product Reviews, Traffic Targets, and Industry Criticism: UK Technology Journalism in Practice
Despite growing expectations that technology journalists serve as critical watchdogs of the technology industry, technology journalism remains under-studied in journalism studies. Drawing on the hierarchy of influences model to analyze semi-structured interviews with UK technology journalists and editors, this article investigates how journalists strategically navigate relationships with the technology industry and how these relationships influen…
What to expect when you’re expecting robots: Futures, expectations, and pseudo-artificial general intelligence in UK news
Drawing on scholarship in journalism studies and the sociology of expectations, this article demonstrates how news media shape, mediate, and amplify expectations surrounding artificial intelligence in ways that influence their potential to intervene in the world. Through a critical discourse analysis of news content, this article describes and interrogates the persistent expectation concerning the widescale social integration of AI-related approa…
The Sense of Nuclear Physics: New Frontiers, Media, and Collaborations
Argument This article describes the efforts of one fifty-year-old nuclear physics research center to stay relevant as the boundaries of nuclear physics have expanded and distributed collaborations have become increasingly common. In adapting to these shifts, SENSE, a university-based institute in the United States, has seen notable changes in power relations, forms of legitimation, and social structures. This article recognizes and investigates t…
Magnetologists on the Beat: The Epistemology of Science Journalism Reconsidered
Drawing together recent scholarship in journalism studies, the philosophy of science, and science studies, this article offers a new descriptive and normative model of the epistemology of science journalism that acknowledges how the reduction of technical complexity affords the expansion of public meaning. To explicate the model, this article looks at how journalists construct and justify truth claims in coverage of direct detection of dark matte…
Digitalization
“Digitization” and “digitalization” are two conceptual terms that are closely associated and often used interchangeably in a broad range of literatures. This entry considers each term in detail and argues that there is analytical value in explicitly making a clear distinction between them. The entry defines digitization as the material process of converting analog streams of information into digital bits. It defines digitalization as the way many…
Normative Models of Digital Journalism
Network Society
Across a vast scholarly literature, “the network society” refers most broadly to a changing social structure whose primary mode of organization is social and media networks. This article begins by considering three communication traditions that describe “the network society” by emphasizing mediated and nonmediated social ties. Then, it further marks the broad contours of thought on “the network society” through a close reading of two foundational…
Information Society
The “information society” refers to a theory of contemporary Western society in which “information,” broadly construed, is the most important and powerful organizing force behind social, cultural, economic, and political life. This entry details five prevalent ways that scholars describe the information society, before considering three types of explanation for how it developed
Revealing rays: X-posing corruption of the body and the body politic
Drawing on theoretical insights from science and technology studies, this historical analysis addresses how late 19th century American science journalism helped translate the X-ray, as a new media technology, from the physics laboratory into the public sphere. Described as a form of light, the X-ray was given the moral and physical agency to see into concealed spaces and reveal and cure the ailments within, whether of the body or the body politic…
Taking our Pictures: Citizen photojournalism in traditional US news media
This qualitative research project explores the specific ways in which 12 traditional television, print and internet news organizations in the United States integrated user-generated visual content into news coverage over the course of an ordinary week, June 8–14, 2014. Framed from a cultural materialist perspective, we found that user-generated visual content constituted a minimal part of the print, broadcast and online news coverage. Based on ou…
What to expect when you’re expecting robots: Futures, expectations, and pseudo-artificial general intelligence in UK news
Drawing on scholarship in journalism studies and the sociology of expectations, this article demonstrates how news media shape, mediate, and amplify expectations surrounding artificial intelligence in ways that influence their potential to intervene in the world. Through a critical discourse analysis of news content, this article describes and interrogates the persistent expectation concerning the widescale social integration of AI-related approa…
Beyond (Mis)Representation: Visuals in Covid-19 Misinformation
This article provides one of the first analyses of visuals in misinformation concerning COVID-19. A mixed-methods analysis of ninety-six examples of visuals in misinformation rated false or misleading by independent professional fact-checkers from the first three months of 2020 identifies and examines six frames and three distinct functions of visuals in pieces of misinformation: how visuals illustrate and selectively emphasize arguments and clai…
Defining and Measuring Scientific Misinformation
We define scientific misinformation as publicly available information that is misleading or deceptive relative to the best available scientific evidence and that runs contrary to statements by actors or institutions who adhere to scientific principles. Scientific misinformation violates the supposition that claims should be based on scientific evidence and relevant expertise. As such, misinformation is observable and measurable, but research on s…
Magnetologists on the Beat: The Epistemology of Science Journalism Reconsidered
Drawing together recent scholarship in journalism studies, the philosophy of science, and science studies, this article offers a new descriptive and normative model of the epistemology of science journalism that acknowledges how the reduction of technical complexity affords the expansion of public meaning. To explicate the model, this article looks at how journalists construct and justify truth claims in coverage of direct detection of dark matte…
Taking our Pictures: Citizen photojournalism in traditional US news media
This qualitative research project explores the specific ways in which 12 traditional television, print and internet news organizations in the United States integrated user-generated visual content into news coverage over the course of an ordinary week, June 8–14, 2014. Framed from a cultural materialist perspective, we found that user-generated visual content constituted a minimal part of the print, broadcast and online news coverage. Based on ou…
Revealing rays: X-posing corruption of the body and the body politic
Drawing on theoretical insights from science and technology studies, this historical analysis addresses how late 19th century American science journalism helped translate the X-ray, as a new media technology, from the physics laboratory into the public sphere. Described as a form of light, the X-ray was given the moral and physical agency to see into concealed spaces and reveal and cure the ailments within, whether of the body or the body politic…
Taking our Pictures: Citizen photojournalism in traditional US news media
This qualitative research project explores the specific ways in which 12 traditional television, print and internet news organizations in the United States integrated user-generated visual content into news coverage over the course of an ordinary week, June 8–14, 2014. Framed from a cultural materialist perspective, we found that user-generated visual content constituted a minimal part of the print, broadcast and online news coverage. Based on ou…
Digitalization
“Digitization” and “digitalization” are two conceptual terms that are closely associated and often used interchangeably in a broad range of literatures. This entry considers each term in detail and argues that there is analytical value in explicitly making a clear distinction between them. The entry defines digitization as the material process of converting analog streams of information into digital bits. It defines digitalization as the way many…
Normative Models of Digital Journalism
Network Society
Across a vast scholarly literature, “the network society” refers most broadly to a changing social structure whose primary mode of organization is social and media networks. This article begins by considering three communication traditions that describe “the network society” by emphasizing mediated and nonmediated social ties. Then, it further marks the broad contours of thought on “the network society” through a close reading of two foundational…
Information Society
The “information society” refers to a theory of contemporary Western society in which “information,” broadly construed, is the most important and powerful organizing force behind social, cultural, economic, and political life. This entry details five prevalent ways that scholars describe the information society, before considering three types of explanation for how it developed
Revealing rays: X-posing corruption of the body and the body politic
Drawing on theoretical insights from science and technology studies, this historical analysis addresses how late 19th century American science journalism helped translate the X-ray, as a new media technology, from the physics laboratory into the public sphere. Described as a form of light, the X-ray was given the moral and physical agency to see into concealed spaces and reveal and cure the ailments within, whether of the body or the body politic…
The Sense of Nuclear Physics: New Frontiers, Media, and Collaborations
Argument This article describes the efforts of one fifty-year-old nuclear physics research center to stay relevant as the boundaries of nuclear physics have expanded and distributed collaborations have become increasingly common. In adapting to these shifts, SENSE, a university-based institute in the United States, has seen notable changes in power relations, forms of legitimation, and social structures. This article recognizes and investigates t…
Magnetologists on the Beat: The Epistemology of Science Journalism Reconsidered
Drawing together recent scholarship in journalism studies, the philosophy of science, and science studies, this article offers a new descriptive and normative model of the epistemology of science journalism that acknowledges how the reduction of technical complexity affords the expansion of public meaning. To explicate the model, this article looks at how journalists construct and justify truth claims in coverage of direct detection of dark matte…
Beyond (Mis)Representation: Visuals in Covid-19 Misinformation
This article provides one of the first analyses of visuals in misinformation concerning COVID-19. A mixed-methods analysis of ninety-six examples of visuals in misinformation rated false or misleading by independent professional fact-checkers from the first three months of 2020 identifies and examines six frames and three distinct functions of visuals in pieces of misinformation: how visuals illustrate and selectively emphasize arguments and clai…
Balancing Product Reviews, Traffic Targets, and Industry Criticism: UK Technology Journalism in Practice
Despite growing expectations that technology journalists serve as critical watchdogs of the technology industry, technology journalism remains under-studied in journalism studies. Drawing on the hierarchy of influences model to analyze semi-structured interviews with UK technology journalists and editors, this article investigates how journalists strategically navigate relationships with the technology industry and how these relationships influen…
What to expect when you’re expecting robots: Futures, expectations, and pseudo-artificial general intelligence in UK news
Drawing on scholarship in journalism studies and the sociology of expectations, this article demonstrates how news media shape, mediate, and amplify expectations surrounding artificial intelligence in ways that influence their potential to intervene in the world. Through a critical discourse analysis of news content, this article describes and interrogates the persistent expectation concerning the widescale social integration of AI-related approa…
Defining and Measuring Scientific Misinformation
We define scientific misinformation as publicly available information that is misleading or deceptive relative to the best available scientific evidence and that runs contrary to statements by actors or institutions who adhere to scientific principles. Scientific misinformation violates the supposition that claims should be based on scientific evidence and relevant expertise. As such, misinformation is observable and measurable, but research on s…
Political science (10 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Media studies (7 works) · Climate Change Communication and Perception (6 works) · Journalism (6 works) · Media Studies and Communication (6 works) · Epistemology (5 works) · Social Media and Politics (5 works) · Law (4 works)