Washington & Lee University

Knight Chair in Journalism Ethics

Edward Wasserman

Biography

Ed Wasserman, formerly of The Miami Daily Business Review and The Miami Herald was named in 2003.

(Louis Hodges, a renowned ethics professor, was the previous chairholder.)

Grant Background

The Knight Chair will enable the university to develop a program with emphasis in three areas: (1) an expanded undergraduate curriculum in journalism ethics, of particular interest to journalism majors but open to all students, (2) increased offerings for continuing professional education in journalism ethics, on campus, at regional and national conferences, and in newsrooms throughout the country, and (3) education of the general public by creating a quick-response team of editors and teachers to address issues of journalism ethics while they are fresh in the public’s mind and by developing materials for newspapers, magazines and television. (1996)

Recent Activities

• Knight Chair Edward Wasserman continued expansion of activities internationally, with a talk in November at the London School of Economics and a five-month academic leave in Buenos Aires, January-June.
• The Knight Chair gained approval for a new undergraduate course in Media Ethics, which will cover fields such as public relations, advertising, fictional programming and documentary film (as well as journalism, for mass communications majors who do not expect to be journalists).
• For nonacademic readers, Prof. Wasserman wrote 26 newspaper columns, which were distributed nationally, four columns for the quarterly publication of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers, and an in-depth article titled, “Investigative Reporting: Strategies for its Survival,” for Nieman Reports, Nieman Foundation, Harvard.
• For academic readers, Prof. Wasserman had two book chapters published: “The Future of Journalism Ethics,” in Cooper, Christians and Babbili, An Ethics Trajectory: Visions of Media Past, Present, And Yet To Come (Urbana: Univ. of Illinois Institute of Communications Research), and “Conflict of Interest Enters a New Age,” in Wilkins and Christians, The Handbook of Mass Media Ethics (New York: Routledge).
• Prof. Wasserman began work on an ethics book for general readership, tentatively titled, Honest Journalism: A Guide for the Perplexed—Professional, Semi-Pro or Citizen Journalist. He also prepared a web site for an autumn 2009 launch, with archives of columns, speeches and miscellaneous articles migrated to a newly designed location.

Quality News and Information

Says Ed Wasserman: My core mission is to interpret, apply and, as necessary, adapt the best of traditional journalistic values so that they remain a vibrant part of news and commentary in the digital age. Those concerns guide my writings and teachings. My current focus is on conflict of interest, which, with the widening role of semi-professional and citizen journalists who rely on income from elsewhere, is becoming the signature ethical challenge of the new media industry.

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Ed Wasserman Washington and Lee University Knight Chair in Journalism Ethics