Hunter S. Tompson and Gonzo Journalism Essay

Around the time of the novels publication in the late 1960s, a new literary genre had begun to surface: New Journalism. New Journalism sought to combine the elements of news writing and journalism with the elements of fiction writing. Described as being a form of literature that “engages and excites”, it sought to challenge its readers not only “emotionally” but also “intellectually”. Typically, New Journalism consists of four major characteristics such as

Clay Shirky who wrote Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable (1993) argues that society doesn’t need newspapers society needs journalism to save society. Shirky supports this argument by giving a historical background to the problems newspapers face and how the problems have developed over time and the solutions society has came up with. The blogger concludes that in order for journalism to go farther new models must be created in place of past molds. Shirky directs this blog toward the current and future generations in attempt to motivate new models and methods of journalism.

It is not always easy to look someone in the face and address their faults. Yet, Clare Booth Luce’s introduction of her speech is straight to the point and effective through her appeals to ethos and pathos as well as various tones to do just that. The purpose of her speech is to criticize the tendency of the American Press to sacrifice their journalistic integrity in favor of the public demand for sensationalist stores. In a number of ways, Luce is successful in setting up her speech’s message and working towards cushioning her audience for her upcoming

American journalist Clare Boothe Luce writes a speech to the Women’s National Press Club about how the press sacrifices sensationalist stories. Luce’s introduction talks about how the American press is wrong and how she tries to address the problem. She starts off by tells the other journalist how she is happy, but the audience makes her unhappy and challenged. This shows her hard work in writing and how the press lacks in writing true stories.

Objective journalism in the United States should be reconsidered to accommodate the demands of varied audiences and increased media outlets. With the media growing in magnitude and influence, many people are looking for fresh, like-minded news sources. Declines in newspaper readership and television news viewing among many Americans suggests that objectively reported news is a failing philosophy. Younger, more impressionable people may be ready for the advantages of the partisan news reporting style.

Journalists are infamous for their motivation to produce hard hitting editorials, twisting the truth for their own selfish benefit. Steve Chapman strays away from this stereotype by ensuring integrity in every article. Continuously, Chapman strives to present the public with his analytical opinions. Douglas Adams describes the drive of Steve Chapman; “To give real service, you must add something which cannot be bought of measured with money, and that is sincerity and integrity”. Steven Chapman, who writes weekly op-eds for the Chicago Tribune, delivers insight into national headlines using suggestive rhetoric appeals to address the reader’s fears of uncertainty followed by accredited reasoning, a condescending tone targeted at the written subject, calling the reader for reformation within society, and dashes to separate general statements from definitive fact, shifting from a mission-based point of view to thought-provoking opinionated writing in order to spark motivation within his readers using his opinions so that they can take action to better their communities in hopes of improving future national development.

“Journalism is an art and at times it's a science.” Goldman-Hall said. This source of information takes a lot of practice and observation, a route that online writers aren't willing to take on.

Hunter S. Thompson was the man responsible for what is known today as gonzo journalism. This type of journalism is written in the first-person narrative and places the reporter in the middle of the action, allowing for personal experiences, emotions, and biases in a way that defies traditional journalism. Thompson’s subversive style of journalism was so radical that according to Jennifer Marinelli’s (2010) post on the Michigan Online News Association, “Thompson didn’t just create a new form of journalism. He created a new way of thinking that is still important in today’s society” (para. 2). In other words, he didn’t just transform journalism; he transformed people’s minds. Perhaps this should not come as a surprise that such a man could

Who was it that sat behind the computer screen and typed what would soon be published in your favorite newspaper? When you read anything in the newspaper you do not know much about the author of the article aside from his or her name. With such little knowledge, how can you discern whether you are being presented with an article that is in compliance to reality or rather a story that has been transformed because of an author’s biased attitudes? Take for example The Fourth Branch, a student run newspaper at Tennyson High School. Writers of the newspaper do not have any special certification or degree, rather they are journalist enthusiasts who write about a wide range of news articles.

In my view, the most significant time period in the development of literary journalism is the 1960’s through early 1980’s; also known as the period of New Journalism. The innovative journalistic style is a combination of fact and fiction writing. The literary journalists of this time period wrote about real-life situations using vivid descriptions and literary devices such as, characterization, scene setting, and dialogue. They wrote longer and more complex pieces similar to novels, consisting of more than one larger truth. The journalists pursued sources in the same manner as a conventional journalist; however, they would spend months, or even years gathering the facts. The narrative form plus the truth made the writing strong, allowing the

In a publication Objectivity & Balance: Today’s Best Practices in American Journalism by Joel Kaplan, the associate Dean for

At the beginning of television news an arrangement existed between television journalists and the public. It was look at as that in modern times promotion journalism was normal. The United States was the modern, broadminded leader of the free world. When Walter Cronkite reported on the daily count of deaths of American soldiers in Vietnam, in lead to the antiwar disapprovals of the 1960s. One man changed how the United States look at the war with his power and influence to change people opinions. (Mann)

Even after forty years, Hunter S. Thompson’s creation of gonzo journalism became a new style of writing that remains imitated. Gonzo journalism has many different characteristics; one of the most predominant is

The belief that journalism is in decline has triggered major alarms, because society needs an informational environment that is easily available to all citizens such as newspapers. There is a large body of journalist that suggests that if television has taken over from the press as our main source of news this may limit our capacity to learn about public affairs; newspapers are believed to be far more effective than television at conveying detailed information necessary to understand complex and detailed issues. There is also widespread concern that if journalism fails as a profession it will not be able to reach large sections of the community, particularly younger or less educated readers. This may reinforce a growing gap among citizens between the information that they receive.

To wholly have a grasp on how this new founded approach to journalism has changed alongside technology—as well as understanding the dangers such openness brings forth—one has to understand what exactly those changes are. Primarily, those that are writing for the sake of offering information have, whether willingly or not, fed into the usage of social media as it has become a centralized method of distribution that is relatively inescapable with the current times. As such those framing the news for the masses find an authentic avenue to stay in contact via social media that has benefits ranging from, “its extraordinary newsgathering potential; its potential as a new tool to engage the audience; and as a way of distributing our news” (Eltringham, 2012), all of which are deeply different from the presentation of reporting that occurred during earlier eras. Days of strongly structured instances of journalism that could not travel with such speed have been replaced as, “social media has trashed many of the foundations on