Murder, the Media, and the Politics of Public Feelings

Jennifer Petersen is Assistant Professor of Media Studies at the University of Virginia. Her work has appeared in numerous journals including Media, Culture & Society and Critical Studies in Media Communication.

"Petersen grounds her study in a wide array of literature about topics including the ethics of mediating suffering, masculinity, gender, class, melodrama, liberalism, the public sphere, imagined communities, reason, and emotion. . . . Graduate students interested in cultural studies, gender and queer studies, and/or advocacy may find Petersen's book useful."—JHISTORY H-Net"Petersen makes use of an intriguing thesis and presents an insightful source for journalism and broadcasting students. July 2011"—Library Journal"Petersen offers an impressive reading of media discourses illustrating the value of public feelings and how they can become animating forces in the production of civic action."—Great Plains Quarterly"...engrossing and expertly-argued reading. Petersen gracefully blends theoretical investigations with narrative recountings of the two cases."—Beth Loffreda, author of Losing Matt Shepard: Live and Politics in the Aftermath of Anti-Gay Murder"[Petersen] breaks new ground by showing how national and local media coverage interact and how popular emotion and public legislation work together."—John D. Peters, author of Courting the Abyss: Free Speech and the Liberal Tradition

• Introduction: Media, Emotion, and the Public Sphere1. Mourning Matthew Shepard: Grief, Shame, and the Public Sphere2. "Hate is Not a Laramie Value": Translating Feelings into Law3. The Murder of James Byrd Jr.: The Political Pedagogy of Melodrama4. The Visibility of Suffering, Injustice, and the LawConclusion: Feeling in the Public SphereAppendix: Text and Interview SelectionBibliographyIndex