Changing Images of the Tourist South Since 1950

Southeastern Geographer Vol. 26, No. 2, November 1986, pp. 135-143 CHANGING IMAGES OF THE TOURIST SOUTH SINCE 1950* Stephen S. Birdsall INTRODUCTION. Most of what Americans know about distant places is accumulated through the written or broadcast reports of others. White non-Southerners' view of the American South, for example, was for many years strongly affected by Hollywood and by the creative literary efforts of the region's well-known novelists, playwrights, and poets. Furthermore, in his book on the role of the media in forming images of the South, Jack Kirby has argued that knowledge of the region was transmitted among image makers in a self-reinforcing circle of shared symbols. (J) The circle shifted only gradually from one set of symbols to another as new perspectives— or new truths—were brought to bear on established ideas of what the South was. Kirby suggests that even those who offered the images to a wider audience were likely subscribers to the validity of currently accepted imagery. Whatever images were used, the image makers chose them as means which would be effective in transmitting what was believed to be important knowledge of the region. Those who read the novels and poems or saw the plays and movies were exposed to shared symbolic representations of, at minimum, partial truths about the South. One information source not given much attention by Kirby, but necessarily affected by the symbolic representations of other media, is the source of what is happily called "news." News is, by definition, fresh and generally not very analytical. (2) However, which information to include and which to exclude from limited publication space or broadcast time is a judgement that has the same basis as those governing the symbolic characterizations found in other media. For a story to make it into print, it must be judged newsworthy. The content may be affected by such factors as timeliness, impact, and the story's fit with general expectations. To paraphrase Davidson, Boylan, and Yu in their study of the mass media, to be newsworthy a place "... * The UNC-CH University Research Council provided partial funding for this project; William Easterling is thanked for overcoming the tedium of microfilm data collection. Dr. Birdsall is Professor of Geography at the University ofNorth Carolina in Chapel Hill, NC 27514. 136Southeastern Geographer should fit in with the mental image of what one expects." (3) These are the same grounds for considering whether or not the story will be printed at all. Thus, the amount of information about a region presented in the news media also tells us something of the fascination that region holds for the news producers and the news consumers. To be newsworthy, an event should also ". . . be close in either a geographical or a psychological sense." (4) Thus, a distant place will require more impact, more timeliness, or more of the other factors for it to be covered than will a near place. In a study which attempted to evaluate the effects of mass communication on individual attitudes, Halloran pointed to the mediating influence of what was already believed to be true. "Apparently, most people—adults and children— most of the time erect high tariff walls against alien notions; they become free traders only when exposed to congenial ideas and values—or when they are completely bare of ideas and values." (5) This is especially pertinent to the view of one region offered to news consumers in another region. PURPOSE OF THE STUDY. The purpose of this research is to identify and analyze the changing coverage given to the American South as a travel destination by a non-Southern, nationally read newspaper, The New York Times, during the period 1950 through 1980. The accuracy of the coverage is not at issue, nor are the personal perspectives and knowledge of the reporters who authored the stories. Rather, the focus is on changes in the amount and pattern of coverage, its timing, and in a broad sense with its character. In spite of the Times' motto, (6) there are several alternative explanations for the selective attention given the South by the newspaper. First, the number of stories and their character may be an accurate indication...