History Forum: The History of Fake News in the US 

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The popular History Forum lecture series returns to the Minnesota History Center for its 2018-2019 season. Join six national scholars as they explore the history that might help us understand and unravel the issues we face right now.

In January 2019, join historian Michelle Nickerson for a presentation about the centuries-long history of fake news in the United States.

The history of partisan media in America stretches back to the partisan newspapers of the early republic through the sensationalized yellow journalism of the Gilded Age. Americans did not start demanding accuracy from news until the 20th century, when influential citizens grew tired of their privacy being violated by muckrakers and tabloid writers, and journalists established their first code of ethics.

Over the 20th century, elite newspapers like The New York Times became national civic institutions critical to the understanding of our national community. However, the recent rise of cable news and social media in the midst of the modern culture wars created a new kind of partisan news in which "truth" and "fact" remain elevated standards to which journalists and politicians both lay claim.

Michelle Nickerson is a professor of history at Loyola University-Chicago.