These are books I return to when I need to think clearly about media. They are not necessarily the most recent, and they are not a curriculum. They are the ones that have stayed useful.
On what media does
Manufacturing Consent remains the clearest account of how institutional pressures shape what gets reported. It is not about bias in the conventional sense. It is about the structural conditions that make certain stories possible and others very difficult. Read it as a framework, not a conspiracy theory.
Amusing Ourselves to Death is about television but it is really about what happens when a medium optimises for entertainment. Postman wrote it in 1985. The specific medium he was worried about no longer dominates. The dynamic he described does.
On the internet specifically
The Attention Merchants by Tim Wu is the best history of the advertising-supported media model. Understanding where it came from makes it easier to see where it is going.
Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky was optimistic in a way that felt earned in 2008. Reading it now is instructive for different reasons. The tools he described arrived. The outcomes he predicted did not.
On the practice
The Elements of Journalism by Kovach and Rosenstiel is the clearest statement of what journalism is actually for. Start here if you are new to the field. Return here when you lose the thread.
Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott is about writing fiction but every useful thing it says about the practice of writing applies equally to journalism. Read it when you are stuck.
This list will change. It already has, several times.