Reconstructing and analyzing the context in which the journalistic profession has developed in Brazil and the influences on it are the purposes of this article, which aims through the historical and dialectical materialism, to explain the process by which the contemporary situation is configured. This context is fundamental to understanding the conflicts of political and economic interests that determined the historical setting of this profession and the control over professional practice. The results indicate how technological changes altered its material base of production and have generated new concepts, which have become parts of its superstructure in different social, economic, and political periods.
work; journalist; history of the press