Journalism Glossary
Note: Linked keywords lead to dictionary.com's pronunciation. Audio files open in new windows.
Advance – A story about a future event; also called a preview. Example: Did you receive the advance on the mayor's speech?
Advertorial – An advertisement in the form of an editorial, usually identified as an advertisement.
Anecdote - a short entertaining or informative event told within a news story.
Angle – The approach or focus of a story. Sometimes called the news peg.
AP – The abbreviation for the Associated Press. (ap.org/)
Assignment – A job/task given to a journalist by an editor.
Background – Information that explains the situation and details of a story. Sometimes shortened to BG.
Back bench – Senior journalists on a newspaper.
Banner – A large headline that extends the width of a newspaper or web page. Sometimes called a streamer.
Beat – The geographic or subject area that a reporter regularly covers. Example: I cover the sports beat.
Bias – Characteristic of a story that is slanted, unfair, or has subjective reporting.
Blind Interview – An interview with an unnamed source.
Blog – An online commentary or journal often written by individuals about areas of specialist interest. The origin is from web+log= weblog.
Blogger – A person who writes a blog.
Blogosphere/Blogdom/Blogiverse/Blogmos/Blogostan – Words for the world of blogs.
Blurb – Brief biographical information of the writer, usually after the headline.
Break - When a news development becomes known and available. Example: We have a breaking news story - a fire is burning at a tire warehouse in Dallas.
Breakout – A text box that gives the short summary of the story, including key points of the story, or other information, such as a list of items that do not fit in the main article text.
Brief – A short story.
Byline – A journalist’s name at the beginning of a story.
Caption – Text printed below a picture used to describe it. Also called a cutline.
Churnalism – Bad journalism "churned" out by rewriting releases.
Center of visual interest (CVI) – The most prominent item on a page (usually a headline, picture, or graphic.)
Circulation – The number of copies sold by newspapers or magazines. Example: The New York Times has a circulation of nearly two million.
Citizen Journalism – The reporting of news events by members of the public who are not trained as professional journalists.
Civic media -- Media technologies that create a sense of engagement among community members through news and information. It is different from "citizen journalism" because it uses a wider range of media, including maps, wikis, and databases.
Closed question – A yes/no question that does not encourage an interviewee to follow up.
Column – A regular feature often on a specific topic, written by the same person, known as a columnist. Example: Mike Barnicle is a popular columnist for the Boston Herald.
Conflict of interest – When a reporter's personal interests (friendship, family, business connections, etc.) influence a story. Example: The reporter could not write the story about local judicial misbehavior, as his aunt is a prominent judge involved in the case.
Convergence – A multimedia newsroom producing news for different publishing platforms, such as in print, online video, online audio, etc.
Copy – The main text of a story.
Copy desk – The desk where articles are edited, headlines and captions are written, and writing style is checked/enforced.
Cover story – The main story, often used on the front cover of a magazine.
Credibility – The believability of a writer or publication. Example: Jayson Blair's credibility as a reporter was damaged when he plagiarized stories.
Cutline – The text printed below a picture that describes it. Also called a caption.
Dateline – A line of text at the beginning of a story, giving the location of the story.
Deadline – The time at which a journalist must finish an assignment.
Defamation – Information written by someone which damages another person’s reputation.
Direct quote – The exact reproduction of a quotation, written with quotation marks and accurately attributed.
Draft – The first version of an article, before editing and submission to an editor.
Editor – Someone who prepares stories, photos, etc., for print or broadcast.
Editorialize – To insert a writer’s opinion into a news story that should be written objectively.
Endnote – Text at the end of an article giving the writer's credentials. For example: Jan Jones is the senior correspondent for this newspaper.
Exclusive - A story given to only one news outlet by a source. Example: Our newspaper got the exclusive on the factory closure.
Fact sheet – A page of information, usually prepared by public relations staff, to help news media cover a special event, invention, etc.. Example: The fact sheet for the opening of the new mall says that it will employ 400 workers.
Feature story – A longer, more in-depth article, as opposed to hard or straight news.
Flash – A short news story on a new event.
Fluff – The lighter or soft news. Example: The story on the color of the queen's hat seems like a bit of fluff.
Follow-up – An update on a previous story. Also called a folo.
Freelancer – Someone who works alone, usually on a contract-to-contract basis.
Graf – Short for paragraph.
Hard copy – A copy of an article or photo after it runs in the paper, a physical (paper) copy of the final article.
Hard news - current news; in contrast to feature stories.
Headline – The main title of the article.
House style – A publication’s guide to style, spelling, and use of grammar. These are used to help journalists use a consistent style.
Inverted pyramid – The structure of a news story that reports the most important facts at the beginning and the less important facts and details at the end.
Investigative journalism – A story that requires significant, and sometimes complicated research to report facts that might be hidden or obscured by people who want to prevent those facts from being reported. Example: The story about water contamination in Flint, Michigan, was reported only after important investigative journalism.
Journalist – Someone who writes, researches and reports news, or works on the production of a news publication, either online, on the air, or in print.
Jump or jump line – A line of type at the bottom of a column that directs the reader to a place in the paper where the story is continued.
Kicker – The first sentence or first few words of a story’s lede, often set in a font size larger than the text of the story.
Kill – To cancel or delete a story.
Layout – How the page is designed and formatted.
Lead or Lede – The first sentence or first few sentences of a story, giving a key idea of the story.
Libel - Defamation through written words, damaging someone's reputation.
Mashup - A combination of data from multiple sources. An example of a mashup would be an online application that shows the locations of all the bank robberies in a certain area on a map. It is "mashing up" (putting together) one data source--the addresses of banks--with another source--the locations of those addresses on a map.
Masthead – A masthead can refer to three different things: 1) the main title section and name at the front of a publication; 2) the banner across the front page that identifies the newspaper and the date of publication, and 3), the publication information, usually listed on the editorial page.
News agency – A company that writes and sells stories to newspapers or magazines.
Objectivity – The quality of unbiased writing; not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice, that is, based on facts. Example: Good reporters go for objectivity in all their work.
Off the record – Information that is given by a source, but must not be included in reporting. Example: The mayor asked that the details of the meeting be off the record.
On the record – Information given by a source that can be used in an article.
Op-ed – A feature, usually by a prominent journalist or public figure, giving an opinion or argument about a current or topical issue.
Paraphrase – An indirect quote or summary of words.
Pitch – A story idea given to an editor by a reporter; or, as a verb, to give a story idea. Example: Did you get my pitch for the story on the new Olympics Village?
Plagiarism – Stealing the work of another person (either written words or ideas) and calling it your own.
Pool – A group of reporters (or one reporter) who represents other reporters. Example: The governor will have only a small room for her statement, so the press will be limited to a pool.
Press release - Publicity information, or a story given to the media for publication, usually by a company or organization about its activities. Example: We need to follow up on NASA's press release for the story.
Preview – A story about a future event. Also called an advance.
Profile – A feature story about a person; also called a personality piece.
Puff piece – A news story with editorialized, complimentary statements about someone or something. Example: The profile of the CEO was a complete puff piece--there was no critique at all of his business practices.
Pull-out quote – An interesting quotation from a story that is in larger text on the page to add visual interest and draw attention to the quotation.
Quote – Record of what a source or interviewee has said.
Reefer or refer– Something that refers readers from one story to a related story in another location.
Reporter – Someone who writes and researches news stories.
Retraction – A withdrawal of a previously published story or fact, usually withdrawn because of problems with the story, such as inaccuracies or false statements. Example: After writing that the president would not meet with the prime minister, the newspaper printed a retraction, as the story was not completely true.
Revision – A rewritten or improved story, often with additional quotations or facts.
Roundup - A story that pulls two or more events with a common theme together, such as traffic accidents, weather, and police reports.
Run – To publish a story.
Running story - Event that develops and is covered over a period of time. An election, for example, would become a running story.
Scoop – An exclusive or story published ahead of the competition. Example: Our magazine got a real scoop on the DNA evidence in the case. No one else has gotten the records.
Sidebar– A column of copy and/or graphics on the page to communicate information about the story. This may be extra information that wouldn’t fit into the main text.
Slander – Similar to libel, but spoken instead of written or published.
Slug or slug line – One or two words that specifically identify a story. Example: A story about a police department meeting where property crimes were discussed was slugged “PD Prop Crime.”
Social media -- The many types of content creation and consumption enabled by the Internet. Unlike traditional media, where the audience are the consumers of news written by journalists, social media generally allows three stages of interaction with content: 1) producing, 2) consuming, and 3) sharing. Social media encompasses blogging, wikis, video-sharing, photo-sharing, and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter.
Source – An person who provides information for a story.
Spin – The slant of a press source. Example: The press secretary's speech seemed like nothing but spin on the emergency.
Stringer – A writer or photographer who is not a full-time employee, and who is paid by the job or story.
Summary lead – The traditional journalism tool used to start off most straight news stories. It summarizes the event and answers the questions: Who? What? When? Where? Why? and How?
Subhead – A smaller one-line headline for a story.
Tabloid – This can refer to two different things: 1) smaller newspaper size, usually folded horizontally, like a magazine; 2) “supermarket” tabloid newspapers that focus on dramatic stories, celebrity gossip, etc.
Teaser – A term for promotional words and/or pictures that are usually above the name of the newspaper. Teasers encourage the reader to read a particular story or a special section. It is also called a skybox.
Tie in – Putting the facts of a new story in the context of past events.
Tip – A piece of information about a new story. Example: The reporter received a tip on the location of the fugitive.
Transparency -- Openness about information. Example: Journalists need to be transparent about their reporting practices and material by sharing sources of information with their readers.
Twitter -- A microblogging and social media sire where users can send out messages limited to 140 characters.
Wiki -- A website with pages that can be written and edited by visitors using their browsers. The best-known wiki is Wikipedia.org.
Wire or wire service – An up-to-the-minute source of stories. Wire services, such as the Associated Press, Bloomberg, etc., send reporters all over the world to gather international news and supply it to publications that cannot send their own reporters.
Glossary sources:
topofthefold.wordpress.com/2009/01/14/newspaper-journalism-glossary/
poynter.org/2010/digital-journalist-survival-guide-a-glossary-of-tech-terms-you-should-know/104015/
encoreleaders.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/WSJ-terminology.pdf