“Spectacles of the Poor”: Conventions of Alternative News

Abstract

This is an ethnographic case study of an inner-city neighborhood newspaper caught between two worlds: that of mainstream journalism, with its traditional routines and expectations, and that of alternative journalism, which emphasizes advocacy for lower-income people and presenting the world from the neighborhood's, not the outside world's, perspective. The study focuses on how the newspaper deals with the conflict between those worlds and their interpretations of the conventions of objectivity, newsgathering, and story construction.