Constructing the Legitimacy of Journalists’ Marketing Role

U.S. journalists work in a digital environment in which they actively promote their news stories–and themselves–via social media. Prior research has identified an emergent marketing function, albeit one that journalists seemed hesitant to embrace in normative terms. This study seeks to understand how the legitimacy of this marketing function has been discursively constructed in the U.S. over 25 years. In line with discursive institutionalism–which sees institutional discourse as sites for normative contestation, (re)creation, and (re)interpretation–we seek to understand the ways in which a marketing function is being legitimized as a morally viable social role. This study analyzes 1978 examples of journalistic discourse from 20 online sites where primarily (but not exclusively) U.S.-based journalism is discussed and debated. We find the marketing function gaining traction as a normative role but falling short of formalization. Journalists continue to see a tension between emerging marketing work and longstanding journalistic norms.