Fast Forward

The last time we devoted an entire issue of Southern Exposure to the media was back in 1975. The cover of that issue — entitled “Focus on the Media” — says something about our perceptions of media technology 17 years ago. The major elements are a large motion picture camera used for television and a strip of motion picture film curling across the face of the magazine. Allusions to newspapers and radio can be seen underneath.

What is interesting is what cannot be seen; many of the fundamental elements of today’s mass media simply were not a part of the picture in 1975. The first VCR was introduced that year with a price tag of nearly $2,000. Camcorders did not exist. Neither did compact discs. Digital recording was discussed in trade magazines in futuristic terms. Satellite technology was only beginning to show its potential. Desktop publishing was a costly and high-tech undertaking. Cable television was making inroads, but nobody envisioned 150 channels. Fax, Email, laser printers, high-definition television, interactive video — such words were not even in our vocabularies. Blockbuster Videos was not a Saturday-night option.

Since that first media-focused issue, most of us have come to think of ourselves as living in an Information Age. Indeed, economists and other social scientists point out that so much of our day-to-day work revolves around the production and exchange of information, we essentially labor in an information economy. More people than ever before are engaged in some sector of the information industry. In fact, more Americans are employed in the generation and processing of information than in the manufacture of goods.

Not all of this information shows up in the mass media as news or entertainment, of course. Much of it involves financial figures, scientific data, government statistics, or military information. Nevertheless, we accept information processing as a fact of life. We know that everything is computerized, and it strikes us as ordinary.

Still, even in 1975, the trend toward an increasing reliance on information was apparent. Most of the mass media were controlled by a few large corporations. The industry was growing, but the number of owners was shrinking as conglomerates gobbled up independent newspapers and broadcast outlets. Cross ownership of different media in the same market and elsewhere was cause for alarm. The Federal Communications Commission sought to limit the number of outlets any one company could control to seven FM, seven AM, and seven TV stations. But the regulatory efforts were little more than Band-Aids applied to a bleeding wound.

If the wound was bleeding then, it is hemorrhaging now. Media industry forces persisted, and the 1980s brought a climate of deregulation that favored large corporations. Companies can now own as many as 12 AM, 12 FM, and 12 TV stations, and can sell them more rapidly. The result was predictable. As our new survey of media ownership in this issue shows, corporate giants have consolidated their hold on Southern newspapers and television stations.

Thanks to the media boom, we have more to choose from than ever before — more TV channels, more videos, more movies, more magazines, more records, more radio stations, even more daily newspapers, at least in the South. More of us are employed to produce what we see and hear. But with ownership of the channels of communication more concentrated than ever, much of what we see and hear comes from the same sources. We may have a diversity of faces to look at, but most of them speak with the same voice.

In the midst of the growing media monopoly, however, a few alternative voices continue to speak out. Some media are huge, powerful entities that invade every aspect of our lives. Others are smaller, almost personal entities that reach us by indirect routes, that touch our lives in unexpected ways. Together, they weave a complex and varied web of interaction between producers, distributors, and audiences that defies simple description.

Few homes remain unconnected to radio or television. Nearly three fourths of all households have VCRs, and almost two thirds are hooked up to cable systems. Barely half of all Americans read a newspaper each day, but our consumption of mass-produced paper publications — from supermarket tabloids to junk mail — has reached an all-time high. Our participation in this high-tech communications array, as consumers of the media and the goods they sell through advertising, is worth billions of dollars to those who own it. Time-Warner, the largest media conglomerate in the nation, collected $8 billion all by itself in 1988.

In this issue of Southern Exposure we look at large and small media, old and new. Our survey of daily newspapers and commercial television stations looks at who owns the mass media in the region; Brigette Rouson looks at who doesn’t. Mike Nielsen and Eric Bates examine movie production as a growth industry in the region; Mark Reid and Tom Whiteside show us Southern images on the silver screen. And in “Just Do It,” correspondents from all across the region introduce us to ordinary Southerners who are doing their own media work — some legally, some illegally.

Included here as well are the winners of our fifth annual Southern Journalism Awards — the best of the daily press in the region. When SE first presented the awards in 1987, the editors described how local newspapers shape our perceptions of ourselves and the world around us: “By defining legitimate newsmakers and sources of worthy copy, the press circumscribes the public debate and regulates a community’s capacity to analyze its problems and reflect on its potential for change.”

That is no less true today. Whether owned by a huge Canadian corporation or a local Southern publisher, the hometown paper is still the single most influential arbiter of a community’s images and information. The Southern Journalism Awards are designed to honor those reporters whose stories broaden the range of issues, voices, and sources typically found in the mainstream media.

As always, our heartfelt thanks to the panel of judges who selected the winners from among 118 entries: Bill Adler, Maxine Alexander, Harry Amana, Don Baker, Linda Belans, Richard Boyd, Cynthia Brown, Millie Buchanan, Anne Clancy, Evangeline Ellison, Meredith Emmett, Robin Epstein, Ilda Hall, Jerry Hardt, Roger Hart, Lois Herring, Neill Herring, Steve Hoffius, Chip Hughes, Marc Lee, Ruby Lerner, Marc Miller, Jim O’Reilly, Dee Reid, Carol Reuss, Hazel Rich, Linda Rocawich, Derek Rodriguez, Al Sawyer, Susan Schmidt, Carolyn Schwartz, Caroline Senter, Bob Sherrill, Vernie Singleton, Dimi Stephen, Lena Stewart, Elizabeth Tornquist, Lester Waldman, Nayo Watkins, Michael Yellin, Barry Yeoman, and Gordon Young.

The publication of this issue of SE marks the end of Volume XX, our second decade. Over the past 20 years, the magazine and its publisher, the Institute for Southern Studies, have worked to encourage solid investigative reporting in the region, and to prod the mainstream media to use their powers of analysis and reflection to the fullest. To build on this tradition and to commemorate our 20th anniversary, the Institute is establishing an endowed Investigative Journalism Fund. The fund will sponsor independent investigative projects, provide internships for a new generation of journalists and activists, and develop the capacity of local communities to investigate and resolve their own issues.

Such work is more important than ever. We don’t pretend to examine all the media in this issue — we barely touch on the booming cable industry, for example, or on the record business that presents Southern music to the world. Nor do we pretend to analyze all aspects of the media we do examine. Instead, we offer a beginning, an initial look at media in the region. We promise it won’t be another 17 years before we get around to it again.