___________________________________________to top

History of This Week

Institution: Bournemouth University
Researchers: Patricia Holland
Funder: Harold Hyam Wingate Foundation (as an independent researcher) and AHRB (through Bournemouth University)
Status of Project: Ongoing

Research:
The original project, begun by Dr Vicki Wegg-Prosser, was to preserve This Week programmes.   This was expanded when Thames television lost its franchise in 1992, This Week came to an end, and Vicki Wegg-Prosser and I were granted access to the written archive. The book I am completing is a consequence of this work. The AHRB funded project, through Bournemouth University, is to make all the information we hold accessible through a database to be hosted by the BUFVC.

___________________________________________to top

TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT? The role of embedded reporting during the 2003 Iraq war:

Institution: Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies.
Researchers: Professor Justin Lewis, Professor Terry Threadgold, Dr. Rod Brookes, Nick Mosdell, Kirsten Brander, Sadie Clifford, Ehab Bessaiso and Zahera Harb.
Funder: BBC
Status of Project: completed

Research:
This research, commissioned by the BBC, conducted a thorough analysis of embedded reporting during the 2003 Iraq War. It was informed by an analysis of the production, content and reception of the broadcast coverage of the war with Iraq. It involved:

• Interviews with 37 key actors in the broadcast coverage, 27 of whom were reporters, editors and heads of news departments, and 10 of whom were key personnel with the Ministry of Defence and the Pentagon.
• An extensive analysis of the broadcast coverage during the war, with a particular focus on the role of embedded reporters.
• A series of focus group interviews with members of the public about the coverage, presented in the context of surveys of attitudes by Cardiff University and the Independent Television Commission (ITC).

report summary

___________________________________________to top

BBC TV's Panorama 1987-2004: the changing face of public service television under Birt and Dyke

Institution: Bournemouth University
Researchers: David McQueen
Funder:
Status of Project: Ongoing

Research:
Areas of inquiry include the evolving representation of Panorama's main stories and issues in the period under discussion, changes in journalistic and production techniques and the increased marginalisation of mainstream current affairs. The effects of political challenges to, pressure on, and interference with, the BBC are of central concern, particularly in relation to war and terrorism. The research sets to test assumptions that the BBC's 'compromised independence', anxiety over ratings and a fear of 'politically sensitive' reporting has negatively affected journalistic practice and current affairs coverage

___________________________________________to top

US Overt propaganda since 1945

Institution: University of Leicester
Researchers: Prof. Nick Cull
Funder: AHRB
Status of Project: Ongoing

Research:
This is an archive-based history of the United States Information Agency from its creation in the post war period up to its destruction in 1999. It makes extensive use of interviews with key characters in the story. Chapters have already appeared in the following forms:

• 'Auteurs of Ideology: USIA documentary film propaganda in the Kennedy Era as seen in Bruce Herschensohn's The Five Cities of June (1963) and James Blue's The March (1964) in Film History, Vol. 10, No. 3, 1998, pp. 295-310
• 'Projecting Jackie: Kennedy administration film propaganda overseas in Leo Seltzer's Invitation to India, Invitation to Pakistan and Jacqueline Kennedy's Asian Journey (1962)' Bertrand Taithe and Tim Thornton (eds), Propaganda: Political Rhetoric and Identity, 1300-2000 (Sutton Publishing, Stroud, Glos., 1999), pp. 307-326
• The Man Who Invented Truth: Edward R. Murrow as director of USIA‚ Cold War History. Vol. 4, No.1, October 2003, pp. 23-48 also published as a chapter in Rana Mitter and Patrick Major (eds), Across the Blocs: Cold War Cultural and Social History. (Frank Cass: London, 2004), pp. 23-48.
• The Man in Murrow's Shoes: Carl Rowan as director of USIA' for David Welch and Mark Connelly (eds), War and the Media: Reportage and Propaganda, 1900-2003, I.B.Tauris, 2005, pp. 183-203.
• Public Diplomacy and the Private Sector: The United States Information Agency, its predecessors, and the private sector.‚ Helen Laville and Hugh Wilford (eds) The Cultural Politics of the Cold War: State-Private Networks in the United States, London, Frank Cass, 2005 (forthcoming)

___________________________________________to top

North Belgian media coverage during the 2003 Iraqi war

Organisation: KUB (Catholic University of Brussels) and VUB (Free University of Brussels)
Researchers: Nico Carpentier
Funder: KUB (Catholic University of Brussels)
Status of Project: Ongoing

Research:
This project aims to provide an in-depth analysis of the ideological frame on the war as it can be found in the Flemish media.

___________________________________________to top