Tuned Out: Why Americans Under 40 Don't Follow the News

Rating:
Summary: The Future of News
Review: As the title of this provocative new book suggests, journalism professor David Mindich has interviewed "young people"-a group he defines widely to include not only college-age students but also members of Generation X who are in their thirties-to find what they know about the world and how they get that information, as well as how they define "news." The answers are not encouraging. But this is not just another hand-wringing exercise, and the book asks broader questions. It explores the reasons why Americans in general have come to feel less of a sense of obligation to follow current events as they are reported in journalism today. The result, as he notes, is civic disengagement as well as disengagement with news media, a loss that diminishes people's sense of national identity as well as their pool of information about national issues.

Mindich contextualizes news against the backdrop of entertainment media with which it increasingly is confused, but avoids collapsing the two into a monolithic concept called "the media." Instead, he recognizes that newspapers, television news, and Internet news site have distinctive characteristics and varying impacts on and relationships with news audiences, in addition to a range of types and quality of news content. Given his own expertise in journalism history, he also provides truly useful context from the past in a sophisticated cultural discussion that draws on sources ranging from Walt Whitman to American Idol.

The central question Mindich asks is important not just with regard to the state of news today; as he points out, the present "tuned-out generations . . . will lead our children and grandchildren." In a larger sense, then, this book is about the future of news and its political, social, and civic functions in American life in an entertainment age and a multimedia world.

Rating:
Summary: Factually good, but dry and depressing
Review: David Mindich's new book, "Tuned Out" is a well-researched, if short attempt to tell us something we already know...that younger people, as a rule, pay scant attention to the news. The serious news, that is. Armed with collected data Mindich plows on, like a good college professor, describing in detail how the younger generation has tuned out. Indeed, the narrative often suggests that the reader is in the author's classroom as he dissects the problems associated with the topic. This is not your easy summer (or winter) read.

Anyone who has ever seen the segment on the "Tonight Show" called "Jaywalking" (where Jay Leno asks younger people on the street things about which they should know) will recognize the utter alarm many of us feel at the lack of knowledge these people being interviewed possess. Could these citizens really be THAT far removed from current events and history? They are. Mindich's book is like "Jaywalking" without the fun.

The author does make some excellent points. He devotes part of a chapter to local news and how appallingly bad most of it is. He's certainly right on that score. He also raises a question in his conclusion regarding civics. He writes, "we demand a civics test of everyone who wants to become a U.S. citizen; it seems fitting to have high school students take a news/civics test, too." This is an equally good point. We test citizens-to-be and then let them loose, in a manner of speaking, never to ask anything more of them once they become citizens.

I'm leery, however, of Mindich's assertion that we are in a "crisis". The lack of young people's interest in the news is growing and is disturbing but it is also an evolution which may or may not be as bad as he warns. Still, I recommend the book
for its acknowledgement of the problems that we, who are tuned in, face with those who are not, as a society.

Rating:
Summary: Bad Research?
Review: I bet the author didn't even study youth surfing the web.
If he had, he might have realized that today's youth are *highly* literate (not illiterate). They are also increasingly critical.

That is precisely *why* they are abandoning Network News. They know that it can't be trusted for the really important stuff, unless they're willing to drink the swill that is "spin".

The new generation does not need to be "inspired". What needs to happen is for the older generation to realize that the web surfing habits of the youth are both social and educational, in that they increase global knowledge by facilitating social interation unbound by geography.

20 years ago you learned about Vietnam by reading the paper.
Now kids just logon to MSN/ICQ/AOL, find someone living in Vietnam, and initiate a chat.

Does reading the paper *truly* provide a better indicator of what daily life is like in Vietnam?

Rating:
Summary: Must Read TV
Review: With all that is going on in the world right now, it's stunning to think how many people are out of touch with day to day news. The newspaper is now nothing more than the front page, maybe an eye-catching headline and the more importantly the horoscope and ads for groceries or cars, maybe the sports schedule or boxscore. TV news is reduced to glitz, glamour, Hollywood dirt, Washington scandal and the dog caught down a drain. At no time in world history has there been so much readily available media to the masses, sometimes unwillingly pumped into your subconscious by airports, banks and post offices on blaring televisions that have no off switch.. and this book eloquently examines why more watch less. To find out why so many have so often decided to watch or read so little news, Mindich hit the road; his journey is related as a classroom of the mind, challenging assumptions and explaining indifference. No one in the business of journalism - and lest no one be fooled, it is a business, a very profitable business for those who control it - and no one who is raising a child in this 21st century should miss a chance to learn why Americans under 40 are 'tuning out.' I heartily recommend educators who want their students to be informed about the world around them, to find a copy for their classroom.

Rating:
Summary: Required Reading
Review: With statistics, personal anecdotes and a fine writing style, Mindich does an excellent job of describing a simmering crisis - the failure of young people to follow serious news coverage. Even better, Mindich describes creative solutions to this problem. If you're a teacher, parent, student, journalist or politician, then consider Tuned Out to be required reading!