"A solid account of Luce's life and legacy... A concise, readable volume." -- Journalism Quarterly

Sensationalistic stories have attracted readers for as long as reading has been a popular form of entertainment. Readers have been frightened, revolted, yet fascinated by stories of death, thievery, kidnapping, murder, rape, scandal, love triangles, and colorful miscreants. Starting in the 1830s this morbid interest in lurid stories fueled the unprecedented growth of sensationalist newspapers that titillated and shocked their many readers. This study of sensationalism describes how newspapers added lurid details to their coverage of news events in an effort to attract as many readers as they could. Employing hyperbole and exaggerated details, they meant to grab the attention of the reader and keep him or her reading. For the next hundred years this form of journalism continued, later spilling over into radio and television news. Along the way, the "yellow journalism" wars of the 1880s and 1890s produced bold headlines, eye-catching illustrations, exaggeration of news events, and even false quotes and misleading information. Sensational reporting continued with muckraking reporting in the early 1900s as journalistic crusaders worked to expose municipal corruption, corporate greed, and misconduct in American business.

What is Americanism? The contributors to this volume recognize Americanism in all its complexity--as an ideology, an articulation of the nation's rightful place in the world, a set of traditions, a political language, and a cultural style imbued with political meaning. In response to the pervasive vision of Americanism as a battle cry or a smug assumption, this collection of essays stirs up new questions and debates that challenge us to rethink the model currently being exported, too often by force, to the rest of the world. Crafted by a cast of both rising and renowned intellectuals from three continents, the twelve essays in this volume are divided into two sections. The first group of essays addresses the understanding of Americanism within the United States over the past two centuries, from the early republic to the war in Iraq. The second section provides perspectives from around the world in an effort to make sense of how the national creed and its critics have shaped diplomacy, war, and global culture in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Approaching a controversial ideology as both scholars and citizens, many of the essayists call for a revival of the ideals of Americanism in a new progressive politics that can bring together an increasingly polarized and fragmented citizenry. Contributors: Mia Bay, Rutgers University Jun Furuya, Hokkaido University, Japan Gary Gerstle, University of Maryland Jonathan M. Hansen, Harvard University Michael Kazin, Georgetown University Rob Kroes, University of Amsterdam Melani McAlister, The George Washington University Joseph A. McCartin, Georgetown University Alan McPherson, Howard University Louis Menand, Harvard University Mae M. Ngai, University of Chicago Robert Shalhope, University of Oklahoma Stephen J. Whitfield, Brandeis University Alan Wolfe, Boston College

This book shows how Henry Robinson Luce used his famous magazines to advance his interventionist agenda in Cold War China, Korea, Japan, and above all, Vietnam. This is the first balanced work on Luce and his influence, using hitherto undiscovered or inaccessible sources. Luce saw the American Century as the heir to the fading British Empire; he failed to see the hubris and cultural blindness that would lead to disaster in Vietnam - a disaster for which his magazines paved the way.