Lost Storytellers

Community journalism in the era of clickbait An incisive and firsthandlook at the landscape of community news today, Lost Storytellers argues that the decline of local journalismthreatens the future of democracy. Award-winning photojournalist JohnPendygraft asks: How did Americans lose trust in the media, and how can theirlocal newsrooms earn it back?Pendygraftuses his own experiences at Floridas largest newspaper, the Tampa Bay Times, to illustrate whytrusted local reporting matters more than ever in the era of fake news,clickbait, conspiracy theories, and social media. Through interviews with hiscolleagues, the history of his own paper, journeys into the evolutionarypsychology of storytelling, and examples of the ways multinational mediaconglomerates hook readers on news cycles of chaos and crisis, Pendygraftargues that community journalists can reclaim their roles as localstorytellersand that the public good demands that they try. Lost Storytellers offers insights forall who feel confused about the media, politics, and the well-being of theircommunities in the information age.