Noah Grand
MA, Sociology, UCLA, 2007. BA, Sociology and Political Science, UCLA, 2004.
Fax: 310-206-9838
E-mail:
ngrand@ucla.edu
Subfield
News media, sociology of culture, economic sociology, political sociology
Research Interests
My primary research focuses on how journalists take events and synthesize them into a finalized news product. My research tries to answer classic questions about the power of the press, in relation to the power of policy makers, to set the news agenda.
I am currently studying presidential press conferences to examine quotability. While the President is the most important news source in the nation, his press conferences to not get quoted in their entirety. What gets quoted or paraphrased in final news stories, and what does not? Are certain kinds of statements (eg using certain rhetorical devices or predictons of impending doom) more "quotable" that others?
In a pilot study (for my master's thesis), I show through regression analysis that the "substance" or action in the president's statement - such as declaring policy or attacking a rival - is not the only factor determining quotability. Rhetorical devices and the effects of the interaction between journalists and the President also play a large role in whether a statement gets into the newspaper.
This suggests a more nuanced theory of how presidents and journalists work to construct the news agenda through interaction. My research suggests that the power to control the news agenda is fluid. Power can shift from presidents to journalists and back again within a press conference, based on the interaction between journalists and the president. Additionally, presidents and journalists can collaborate to set a mutually beneficial news agenda.
I have also conducted an ethnography of a local television news department, focusing on how the journalists decide which stories to cover and why they seem preoccupied with the crime of the night. I also examined how reporters interact with interviewees off camera to socialize them about how to speak and provide quotes as on camera news sources.
Publications
"Making the Grade: The Gender Gap, ADHD and the Medicalization of Boyhood." (with Nicky Hart and Kevin Riley) In Medicalized Masculinities (Dana Rosenfeld and Christopher A. Faircloth, eds.) Philadelphia, Temple University Press. (2006).
Working Papers:
Technology, Deadlines, and the Rush to Cover Murders: The Case of a Local Television Station.
Turning People Into News Sources: The Off Camera "Pre-Interview"
From the President's Mouth to the Printed Page? (Master's Thesis)
Stenographers of Power? Macro Influences on the President’s Ability to Set the News Agenda
Grants and Awards
Honorable Mention, National Science Foundation, 2006.
UCLA Graduate Division Summer Research Mentorship, Summer 2006 and Summer 2007. (Faculty mentor Steve Clayman).
Conference Presentations
What Makes an Event News? Presidential Strategies for Influencing Coverage. Accepted for Presentation at American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, August 2009.
Political Journalism as Prism? Exogenous Influences on the President's Ability to Set the Agenda. Accepted for Presentation at the National Communication Association Annual Meeting, Nov. 2009.
To Quote or Not to Quote? Substance, Rhetoric and Interaction in News Coverage of Presidential Press Conferences. American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 2008.
From the President's Mouth to the Printing Press: "Attack the Foreigner!" National Communication Association Annual Meeting, November 2007.
Technology, Deadlines, and the Rush to Cover Murders: The Case of a Local Television Station. American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 2006.
Turning People Into News Sources: The Off Camera “Pre-Interview” (2006). Chicago Ethnography Conference, April 2006. A revised version of this paper was presented at the Annual Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction Conference, August 2006.
How News is Made: The Case of a Local Television Station (2004). Presented at UCLA Alpha Kappa Delta undergraduate honors conference, June 2004.
Edit This Page