Michael Schudson discusses how news must be put into a format in which people are able to comprehend the message. "News is not fictional, but it is conventional. Conventions help make messages readable (97)." He discusses five conventions that reinforce stereotypes and assumptions about the political arena at large.
1. A summary lead and inverted pyramid structure are superior to a chronological account of an event.In using writing conventions to report about politics, journalists select the most important information, as they see fit, and take on the role of interpreting the news for the writer. Journalists become authorities on politics in this manner, and give politics a prestige that is not always evident according to the views of the general public.
2. A president is the most important actor in any event in which he takes part.
3. A news story should focus on a single event rather than a continuous or repeated happening, or that, if the action is repeated, attention should center on novelty, not on pattern.
4. A news story covering an important speech or document should quote or state its highlights.
5. A news story covering a political event should convey the meaning of the political acts in a time frame larger than that of the acts themselves.