What caused the New Left rebellion of the 1960s? In Smoking Typewriters, historian John McMillian argues that the "underground press" contributed to the New Left's growth and cultural organization in crucial, overlooked ways.

Drawing examples from the UK and the US, this volume offers an introduction to alternative media. It includes radical media as well as newer cultural forms such as zines, fanzines, and personal Web sites.

Taking its collective name from the wartime "underground press" of Europe's anti-Nazi resistance, the publications examined here were all members of the Underground Press Syndicate (later renamed the Alternative Press Syndicate), founded in 1967 so that member papers could freely share and reprint material. This utopian model resulted in an explosion of alternative publications worldwide as every small start-up had access to the work of soon-to-be famous writers, journalists, artists, and graphic designers. Among the notable figures whose work has appeared in these pages are Hunter S. Thompson, T. Coraghessan Boyle, Ken Kesey, R. Crumb, Art Spiegelman—to name only a few. The underground press documented everything from politics and art to film and fashion. Among the publications featured here are The Los Angeles Free Press (persecuted by the Nixon-era FBI for its antiwar views), The East Village Other (the first to adopt a psychedelic layout), Interview (founded by Andy Warhol and the first to feature homoerotic imagery), The Chicago Seed, Oracle, and The Berkeley Barb (famous for one cover showing a young man with a chain around his mind). The ideas unleashed in these now vintage publications continue to reverberate through society and influence public discourse and graphic design in the form of today's 'zines and online blogs.

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Historically, alternative media have been viewed as fundamental, albeit at times culturally peripheral, forces in social change. In this book, however, Kenix argues that these media do not uniformly subvert the hierarchies of access that are so central to mainstream media - in fact, their journalistic norms and routines have always been based on the professional standards of the mainstream. Kenix goes on to posit the perception of 'mainstream' and 'alternative' as a misconception. She argues that, although alternative media can - and do - construct distinct alternative communications, they have always existed on the same continuum as the mainstream and the two will continue to converge. Through comparative analysis, this book argues that many alternative and mainstream media are merging to create a continuous spectrum rooted in commercial ideology. Indeed, much of what is now considered alternative media actually draws very little from principles of the independent press, whereas many contemporary mainstream media now use communication techniques more commonly associated with media that do not operate for financial gain. This book puts forward a controversial but convincing argument around the relationship between alternative and mainstream media, drawing on examples from the UK, US, Australia and New Zealand to strengthen and develop the central premise.

"A provocative, inspiring and challenging intervention in both journalism and media studies.... Alternative Journalism is that rare book that services students as much as scholars. It widens the trajectory of media studies and creates different modes of reading, writing and thinking... It offers an alternative history beyond the tales of great men, great newspapers, great editors and great technologies. It adds value and content to overused and ambiguous words such as "community" and "citizenship" and captures the spark of new information environments." - THE, (Times Higher Education) Alternative Journalism investigates and analyses the diverse forms and genres of journalism that have arisen as challenges to mainstream news coverage. From the radical content of emancipatory media to the dizzying range of citizen journalist blogs and fanzine subcultures, this book charts the historical and cultural practices of this diverse and globalized phenomenon. This exploration goes to the heart of journalism itself, prompting a critical inquiry into the epistemology of news, the professional norms of objectivity, the elite basis of journalism and the hierarchical commerce of news production. In investigating the challenges to media power presented by alternative journalism, Atton addresses not just the issues of politics and empowerment but also the journalism of popular culture and the everyday. The result is essential reading for students of journalism - both mainstream and alternative.