Naming and blaming: civic shame and slum journalism in late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century Manchester and Birmingham

O'Reilly, CA

Abstract

This study analyses slum journalism in the British provincial press and reveals that it continued to be a major theme until well into the twentieth century. Instead of the rather moralising reporting of the earlier nineteenth century, this journalism used the device of civic shame to pressurise local government into taking action on slums as a matter of public health. It examines the discourses that resulted from civic shame in two newspapers – the Manchester Guardian and the Birmingham Daily Gazette – and challenges the idea that interest in reporting local political matters decreased during this period.
Civic shame is shown to work in two ways – offering detailed vignettes of aspects of slum life based on personal observation and showing (some) slum dwellers as worthy of better living conditions; blaming the local authority directly for failing to address the problem. In this way, later slum writing sought to appeal directly to the reader in order not just to impart facts but to stimulate empathy and to develop a desire for action. Such in-depth studies of a particular social issue sought to address the local authorities directly, to apportion blame and to use slum writing as a tool for social action.

Citation

O'Reilly, C. (2023). Naming and blaming: civic shame and slum journalism in late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century Manchester and Birmingham. Journal of Urban History, https://doi.org/10.1177/00961442221127055

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Nov 15, 2022
• Online Publication Date: Dec 2, 2022
• Publication Date: May 1, 2023
• Deposit Date: Dec 6, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Dec 6, 2022
• Journal: Journal of Urban History
• Print ISSN: 0096-1442
• Electronic ISSN: 1552-6771
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/00961442221127055
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.1177/00961442221127055
• Additional Information: Additional Information : O’Reilly, C. (2022). Naming and Blaming: Civic Shame and Slum Journalism in Late Nineteenth-Century and Early Twentieth-Century Manchester and Birmingham. Journal of Urban History, Volume 49, Issue 3, pp. 505-519 https://doi.org/10.1177/00961442221127055