Entertaining Ethics

Chad Painter is assistant professor of Communication at the University of Dayton, where he teaches journalism and mass communication courses. He studies media ethics with emphases on the depiction of journalists in popular culture, the alternative press, and diversity studies. He is the co-author Media Ethics: Issues and Cases. Currently, he serves as the teaching chair the AEJMC Media Ethics Division. Prior to academia, he worked as an editor and reporter for the Columbus, Ohio, alternative newsweekly The Other Paper, and in corporate communications for JPMorgan Chase.Lee Wilkins is Professor Emerita at Wayne State University in Detroit and the University of Missouri School of Journalism. At Wayne State, she chaired the Department of Communication. She taught at the University of Missouri for 23 years, winning the campus’ highest teaching award and then being named a Curator’s Distinguished Teaching Professor. During her time at Missouri, she was a weekly panelist and later host of Views of the News, a program that examined the news media, which aired on public radio station KBIA. She has also worked as a newspaper reporter and editor.

Painter and Wilkins seamlessly blend engaging analyses of popular cultural artifacts with accessible summaries of philosophical principles to depict the competing interests—including truth-telling, loyalty, privacy, public service, and the profit motive—that confront media professionals in making ethical decisions…. The authors memorably trace the phrase public service from an early use in 1576 to the normative roles of journalism displayed in the TV shows Adventures of Superman (1952–58) and House of Cards (2013–18) and the films All the President's Men (1976) and Contagion (2011) to document the profession's evolving values in the 20th and 21st centuries. This timely book samples popular culture and theoretical scholarship without short shrifting either. It includes discussion questions throughout and a conclusion full of fruitful questions for further research. Highly recommended. Undergraduates through faculty.