Eric Deggans Authors Book Chapter The Knight Chair in Journalism and Media Ethics discussed his experience as an NPR TV critic in “Reading Media: How to Do Textual Analysis.”

By Lily Caldwell
February 23, 2026

Eric Deggans, Knight Chair in Journalism and Media Ethics at Washington and Lee University, recently contributed a chapter to the book “Reading Media: How to Do Textual Analysis.”

The book, which was published as part of the Critical Cultural Communication series by New York University Press, was edited by Jonathan Gray, professor of media and cultural studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Daphne Gershon, lecturer of communication studies at Gonzaga University.

The volume reaffirms textual analysis as an essential tool for engaging with the worlds that shape contemporary life while also advancing a vision that is adaptive and responsive to new media environments. Each chapter extends the scope of textual analysis to new genres and platforms, offering improved approaches by using specific case studies that function both as a step-by-step guide and as an example of textual analysis in action.

In his chapter, “Getting Critical: How NPR’s TV Critic Analyzes Media for a Mass Audience,” Deggans explains how he analyzes the text of TV programs and communicates trends in the media to his audience. The chapter explores Deggans’ process of selecting TV shows to cover and the different issues he examines in developing stories for NPR. The chapter closes the book with a story featuring how textual analysis works among the general public.

Deggans is in his first year as a faculty member at W&L. He is also a critic-at-large for NPR and chair of the Media Monitoring Committee for the National Association of Black Journalists. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, majoring in journalism and political science, at Indiana University Bloomington and served as an adjunct instructor at Duke University and Indiana University Bloomington before coming to W&L.

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