Search

This paper analyzes the information that was disseminated in the Netherlands and Spain—and other territories connected to the latter such as Portugal and Flanders under Habsburg rule—about the taking by the Dutch of the city of San Salvador de Bahia in Brazil, and his subsequent recovery by a Spanish-Portuguese expedition (1624–1625). Despite the different communicative structures, these national journalisms shared professional strategies to inform about the conflicts that occurred in the distant Brazilian lands. Given the difficulty of informing promptly and truthfully, the discourse of the Dutch and Spanish newspapers about their colonies alternates between the information explosion and silence, depending on the alternation between victories and defeats in American territory. News was as connected as were the empires that controlled vast territories in Europe and America, despite the ideological and religious differences of the era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent contributions to knowledge about early journalism developed in different parts of Europe-Italy, France, England, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain ... -have made it possible to trace a fairly precise map for the historical origin of this phenomenon. However, the scope of work carried out with a view to developing frameworks of interpretation to explain the reasons for this appearance is not as far-reaching. This paper reviews the recurring theoretical models found to date in the specific bibliography and proposes a new framework of interpretation, capable of encompassing the complexity and pan-European nature of early journalism in history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]