Chapter 2 - PR History

In regards to PR History, the reading made me think more about PR theory/practice in that despite PR being practiced since the inception of newspapers, it took so long for PR to appear as a listing in the phone book. The reading also made me aware that in the 1950s, 'most of the people calling themselves public relations practitioners were ex-journalists' (Johnston and Zawawi, 2004:32).

More interestingly, I learnt that it wasn't until 1935 women became an important part of news audiences. As such, it was suggested to 'always have one woman's story at the top of all main news pages of your paper' (Moseley 1935:304). Despite a comprehensive history provided in the chapter, I have chosen to focus on this point for two reasons.

Firstly, is it not reasonable to question why it took so long for female audiences to be recognised as being 'important'? Using the chronology provided on page 39, there appears to be a 65 year gap between when the development of objectivity within newspapers and the importance of women as a news audience (Johnston and Zawawi, 2004).

Secondly, and what I came to think about most after this reading, is that since the 1930s and 1940s magazine articles on beauty, body image and fashion have maintained their prominence in the media, especially in magazines. This is not only apparent in women's magazines, but women are now used to sell men's magazines - eg. FHM, Inside Sport and a range of car magazines.

I just thought it was interesting to draw similarities between what was being published in the 1930s to women's articles published today.

Therefore, I think the key points to remember from this week's reading are that the practice of PR has been around for sometime, and despite changes in society and media over the past century, much of the PR principles practiced today remain the same (Johnston and Zawawi, 2004).

I have posted a comment on http://www.cmns1290michaelavirgara.blogspot.com


References:

Johnston, J. & Zawawi, C. (2004) Public Relations Theory and Practice, Allen&Unwin, Sydney.

Moseley, S.A. (1935) The Truth About a Journalist, Routledge, London.