Yellow Journalism

 Yellow Journalism is defined as American used terms to describe articles or stories that provide little to no legitimate well researched news where instead they prefer to what is known as "eye catching" headlines to increase profit sales. The term first came into the public eye in the early 1900's when New York City newspaper companies battled for circulation.  

Author W. Joseph Campbell of the book "Yellow Journalism: Puncturing the myths, defining the legacies" describes yellow journalism as having daily multi-column front-page headlines covering a variety of topics, such as sports and scandal, using bold layouts and self promotion. It is known to cause harm and do more harm than good. This is because Yellow Journalism as one of the causes as to why the US-Spanish War happened in the first place. Pulitzer and Hearst are credited as the main cause because the sensational stories of the terrible conditions in Cuba. Frank Luther Mott gave some advice while reading how to detect yellow journalism by listing five key characteristics used to find it. 

They are: scare headlines in huge print, often of minor news, lavish use of pictures, or imaginary drawings, use of faked interviews, misleading headlines, pseudoscience, and a parade of false learning from so-called experts, emphasis on full-color Sunday supplements, usually with comic strips, dramatic sympathy with the "underdog" against the system.


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