Rise and Fall of the Media Establishment

A great book -- West does a tremendous job of culling together a ton of research and documenting the history of the U.S. news media. He breaks it down into five eras: Partisan (1790s-1840s), Commercial (1850s-1920s), Objective (1930s-1960s), Interpretative (1970s-1980s), and Fragmented (1990s-present). These boundaries make a lot of sense and help create a unified approach to the evolution of the news media. Packed with great examples (in case study form) for each era and extremely well researched. And most importantly -- quite unbiased. Leaves you feeling like he presented all sides of debates fairly.