Text, Talk, and Journalistic Quoting Practices.

This article explores journalistic quoting practices as an interface between written and oral modes of communication, or between text and talk. Examining both the prescriptive and performative dimensions of journalistic quoting across media, the article demonstrates that when quoting, journalists do not adopt modes of communication relative to the medium being employed but instead creatively mix and meld text and talk, regardless of the medium. The article suggests that this invocation of both modes of communication renders a distinction between text and talk invalid in contemporary news discourse. It further suggests that the cogency of news presentation might depend on the interchangeability of both modalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]