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Beyond news : the future of journalism
by Mitchell Stephens
A provocative, historically based argument that digital-era journalists need to aspire to much more than simply reporting the news.
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BiblioTech : why libraries matter more than ever in the age of Google
by John G. Palfrey
Citing the cultural role of libraries as facilitators of essential information, the author of Born Digital argues for the importance of transitioning libraries into readily accessible digital formats that can preserve essential functions and provide for evolving needs.
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The creation of the media : political origins of modern communications
by Paul Starr
The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Social Transformation of American Medicine offers a historical analysis of the creation of modern communications in the United States and demonstrates how political decisions affected the developing American society and how these choices have social, economic, and military impact.
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The definitive book of body language
by Allan Pease
The ultimate guide to human body language explains how to decipher nonverbal communication, how to read other people's thoughts and emotions through their gestures, and how to insure that one's own gestures are sending the right message.
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Detecting Bull : How to Identify Bias and Junk Journalism in Print, Broadcast and on the Wild Web
by Ph.D McManus, John H.
Detecting Bull exposes the biases of both audiences and journalists, helping us notice how we interpret the world as well as how media do. It lays open the fundamental conflict of interest all news providers face between maximizing audience and servicing advertisers on the one hand and on the other, providing a picture of the world upon which citizens can act. The author, a former journalist and professor, rejects objectivity as impossible for humans and undesirable for journalists. In its place, the book provides a set of rules for judging journalism based on a more accurate, honest and rigorous standard -empiricism - the logical assembly of reliable evidence.
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A field guide to lies : critical thinking in the information age
by Daniel J Levitin
An esteemed psychology professor outlines recommendations for critical thinking practices that meet the challenges of the digital era's misinformation, demonstrating the role of science in information literacy while explaining the importance of skeptical reasoning in making decisions based on online information.
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The filter bubble : what the Internet is hiding from you
by Eli Pariser
A report on how internet personalization is controlling and limiting information to users reveals how sites like Google and Facebook only display search results that they believe people are most likely to select, raising a risk that users will become less informed, more biased and increasingly isolated.
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Getting it wrong : ten of the greatest misreported stories in American journalism
by W. Joseph Campbell
Did the Washington Post bring down Richard Nixon by reporting on the Watergate scandal? Did a cryptic remark by Walter Cronkite effectively end the Vietnam War? Did William Randolph Hearst vow to "furnish the war" in the 1898 conflict with Spain? In Getting It Wrong, W. Joseph Campbell addresses and dismantles these and other prominent media-driven myths--stories about or by the news media that are widely believed but which, on close examination, prove apocryphal. In a fascinating exploration of these and other cases--including the supposedly outstanding coverage of New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina--Campbell describes how myths like these can feed stereotypes, deflect blame from policymakers, and overstate the power and influence of the news media.
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The Googlization of everything : (and why we should worry)
by Siva Vaidhyanathan
Looks at the dark side of Google and its search engine, raising issues about intellectual property rights, the way Google makes people think and more, in a book where the author also looks at ways to avoid a Google-dominated Internet.
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How not to be wrong : the power of mathematical thinking
by Jordan Ellenberg
The columnist for Slate's popular "Do the Math" celebrates the logical, illuminating nature of math in today's world, sharing in accessible language mathematical approaches that demystify complex and everyday problems.
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How Propaganda Works
by Jason Stanley
Our democracy today is fraught with political campaigns, lobbyists, liberal media, and Fox News commentators, all using language to influence the way we think and reason about public issues. Even so, many of us believe that propaganda and manipulation aren't problems for us--not in the way they were for the totalitarian societies of the mid-twentieth century. In How Propaganda Works, Jason Stanley demonstrates that more attention needs to be paid. He examines how propaganda operates subtly, how it undermines democracy--particularly the ideals of democratic deliberation and equality--and how it has damaged democracies of the past.
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How to lie with statistics
by Darrell Huff
Darrell Huff runs the gamut of every popularly used type of statistic, probes such things as the sample study, the tabulation method, the interview technique, or the way the results are derived from the figures, and points up the countless number of dodges which are used to fool rather than inform.
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How to watch TV news
by Neil Postman
A guide to interpreting television news discusses how news programs are presented and the difference between what they say they present and what they actually deliver
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An illustrated book of bad arguments
by Ali Almossawi
A software engineer and a graphic designer combine forces to depict the lost art of logic as demonstrated by illustrations of cute and whimsical animals having nonsensical arguments including the "false dilemma" and the "appeal to ignorance."
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The influencing machine : Brooke Gladstone on the media
by Brooke Gladstone
The cohost of NPR's On the Media narrates, in cartoon form, two millennia of the influence of the media on the populace, from newspapers in Caesar's Rome to the penny press of the American Revolution to today.
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The information diet : a case for conscious consumption
by Clay A. Johnson
The modern human animal spends upwards of 11 hours out of every 24 in a state of constant consumption. Not eating, but gorging on information ceaselessly spewed from the screens and speakers we hold dear. Just as we have grown morbidly obese on sugar, fat, and flour--so, too, have we become gluttons for texts, instant messages, emails, RSS feeds, downloads, videos, status updates, and tweets. We're all battling a storm of distractions, buffeted with notifications and tempted by tasty tidbits of information. And just as too much junk food can lead to obesity, too much junk information can lead to cluelessness.
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Liespotting : proven techniques to detect deception
by Pamela Meyer
Outlines the techniques of three disciplines to instruct readers on how to detect lies in others while obtaining necessary accurate information, offering strategies for effective and truthful communications for a variety of professional scenarios
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Logic made easy : how to know when language deceives you
by Deborah J. Bennett
A collection of anecdotal histories defines the relationship between language and logic, sharing visual examples and puzzles that can be used by readers to raise test scores and recognize the illogical in everyday things.
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Mastermind : how to think like Sherlock Holmes
by Maria Konnikova
The "Literally Psyched" columnist for Scientific American draws on neuroscience and psychology studies while analyzing the deductive strategies used by the character of Sherlock Holmes to counsel readers on how to promote mental strength, clearer observation and effective problem-solving.
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Media control : the spectacular achievements of propaganda
by Noam Chomsky
Examines American propaganda efforts and discusses how both major political parties use the falsification of history, suppression of information, and promotion of meaningless discourse to stifle questions about U.S. policy
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The middle mind : why Americans don't think for themselves
by Curtis White
A lighthearted examination of the current decline in American imagination in such fields as the media, politics, and technology considers how modern practices toward following a "path of least resistance" enables inconsistent or less responsible behavior.
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Mindware : tools for smart thinking
by Richard E Nisbett
A renowned psychology expert offers a tool kit for thinking more clearly and making better decisions, explaining how to reframe problems using simplified concepts from science and statistics including the law of large numbers, statistical regression, cost-benefit analysis and causation and correlation.
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Naked statistics : stripping the dread from the data
by Charles J. Wheelan
The author of the internationally best-selling Naked Economics takes on the stuffy study of statistics to describe and demystify another essential discipline by explaining how Netflix knows which movies you'll like and how to catch schools that cheat on standardized tests.
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Nudge : improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness
by Richard H. Thaler
Offering a groundbreaking study of the application of the science of choice, a guide that uses colorful examples from all aspects of life demonstrates how it is possible to design environments that make it more likely for us to act in our own interests.
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Numbers and nerves : information, emotion, and meaning in a world of data
by Scott Slovic
We live in the age of Big Data, awash in a sea of ever-expanding information--a constant deluge of facts, statistics, models, and projections. The human mind is quickly desensitized by information presented in the form of numbers, and yet many important social and environmental phenomena, ranging from genocide to global climate change, require quantitative description. The essays and interviews in Numbers and Nerves explore the quandary of our cognitive responses to quantitative information, while also offering compelling strategies for overcoming insensitivity to the meaning of such information. With contributions by journalists, literary critics, psychologists, naturalists, activists, and others, this book represents a unique convergence of psychological research, discourse analysis, and visual and narrative communication.
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On second thought : outsmarting your mind's hard-wired habits
by Wray Herbert
Reveals the evolutionary science behind how and why the human brain makes snap decisions, explaining how biological programming helps and hinders modern lives and how to avoid common mistakes by understanding the factors that prompt biased choices.
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The outrage industry : political opinion media and the new incivility
by Jeffrey M. Berry
In early 2012, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh claimed that Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown University law student who advocated for insurance coverage of contraceptives, "wants to be paid to have sex." Over the next few days, Limbaugh attacked Fluke personally, often in crude terms, while a powerful backlash grew, led by organizations such as the National Organization for Women. But perhaps what was most notable about the incident was that it wasn't unusual. From Limbaugh's venomous attacks on Fluke to liberal radio host Mike Malloy's suggestion that Bill O'Reilly "drink a vat of poison... and choke to death," over-the-top discourse in today's political opinion media is pervasive. Anyone who observes the skyrocketing number of incendiary political opinion shows on television and radio might conclude that political vitriol on the airwaves is fueled by the increasingly partisan American political system. But in The Outrage Industry Jeffrey M. Berry and Sarah Sobieraj show how the proliferation of outrage-the provocative, hyperbolic style of commentary delivered by hosts like Ed Schultz, Bill O'Reilly, and Sean Hannity- says more about regulatory, technological, and cultural changes, than it does about our political inclinations.
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Predictably irrational : the hidden forces that shape our decisions
by Dan Ariely
An upbeat cultural evaluation of the sources of illogical decisions explores the reasons why irrational thought often overcomes level-headed practices, offering insight into the structural patterns that cause people to make the same mistakes repeatedly.
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Proofiness : the dark arts of mathematical deception
by Charles Seife
The best-selling author of New York Times Notable Book Zero shows how mathematical misinformation pervades--and shapes--people's daily lives and is used to bring down government officials, convict the innocent, ruin the U.S. economy and more.
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Republic of spin : an inside history of the American presidency
by David Greenberg
A history of the political publicity methods of the past century documents the rise of the White House "spin machine" to illuminate the art of image-making and message craft, citing the activities of presidents and back-stage strategists as well as ongoing debates about the impact of spin on politics.
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The shallows : what the Internet is doing to our brains
by Nicholas G. Carr
Expanding on an article that appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, the best-selling author of The Big Switch discusses the intellectual and cultural consequences of the Internet, and how it may be transforming our neural pathways for the worse.
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Spy the lie : former CIA officers teach you how to detect deception
by Philip Houston
Three former CIA officers share their techniques for lie detection, outlining methods for identifying deceptiveness as revealed by verbal and non-verbal behaviors from facial expressions and grooming gestures to invoking religion and using qualifying language
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Thinking, fast and slow
by Daniel Kahneman
A Nobel Prize-winning psychologist draws on years of research to introduce his "machinery of the mind" model on human decision making to reveal the faults and capabilities of intuitive versus logical thinking, providing insights into such topics as optimism, the unpredictability of happiness and the psychological pitfalls of risk-taking.
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Trust me, I'm lying : confessions of a media manipulator
by Ryan Holiday
An influential media strategist reveals how blogs are controlling the news in the digital age and exposes the ways in which today's marketers are manufacturing news stories, affecting stock prices and shaping elections through fake story planting and misleading marketing tactics.
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The United States of paranoia : a conspiracy theory
by Jesse Walker
A books editor at Reson magazine explores the origins, evolution, legacy and impact of paranoia in American politics and culture by discussing five conspiracy narratives that keep recurring throughout history.
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What Orwell didn't know : propaganda and the new face of American politics
by András Szántó
Propaganda. Manipulation. Spin. Control. It has ever been thus, or has it? On the eve of the 60th anniversary of George Orwell's classic essay on propaganda ( Politics and the English Language ), writers have been invited to explore what Orwell didn't, or couldn't, know. Their responses, framed in pithy, focused essays, range far and wide: from the effect of television and computing, to the vast expansion of knowledge about how our brains respond to symbolic messages, to the merger of journalism and entertainment, to lessons learned during and after a half-century of totalitarianism. Together, they paint a portrait of a political culture in which propaganda and mind control are alive and well (albeit in forms and places that would have surprised Orwell). The pieces in this anthology sound alarm bells about the manipulation and misinformation in today's politics, and offer guideposts for a journalism attuned to Orwellian tendencies in the 21st century.
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Your call is important to us : the truth about bullshit
by Laura Penny
A trenchant analysis of the vast array of "bullshit" that is undermining twenty-first century life skewers everything from corporate communications and wartime propaganda to scripted political events, misleading ads, and the Bush White House, explaining the harmful repercussions of living in a world of continual exposure to phony discourse.
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