Whether you are a student on the Masters PR programme, or joining the Introduction to PR module, which are the key books, texts and articles you should be familiar with? PR@Newcastle has asked the teaching team and some of the UK’s leading practitioners which texts they view as essential to understanding PR and global communications in 2019.

Without a doubt, the book I would recommend is Tench & Yeomans’ Exploring PR. It’s the core text we use through the programme and supports both the compulsory and optional modules. Exploring is written very much with the student in mind, with excellent analysis, case studies and activities to enhance understanding of theory in practice.

There’s a new edition out in the coming months edited by our visiting professor Stephen Waddington and including a chapter written by Jonathan and Ramona. For now, you can pick up a copy at the Uni library or even better, try to get your own copy.

Others to consider would be Rethinking PR by Moloney and McGrath. There’s a new edition that has just been published by Routledge offering a critical perspective of PR and communications.

You should also start subscribing to various blogs and PR news-feeds, for example, PR Week, CIPR website, PR Moment and Stephen Waddington’s blog.

For students new to the concept of strategic planning, Anne Gregory’s Planning and Managing Public Relations Campaigns: A Strategic Approach PR In Practice is an essential 12-point practical guide to effective management of any PR campaign or programme. Published in collaboration with the Chartered Institute of Public Relations and supported by numerous case studies, the latest edition discusses critical aspects of PR planning including the role of PR in organisations; research and analysis; objectives setting; researching target publics; defining strategy and tactics; timescales and resources; evaluation and review.

My second recommendation is Pitch, Tweet, or Engage on the Street, Kara Alaimo (September 2016). To contextualise PR practice within different countries and cultures, Kara Alaimo’s Pitch, Tweet, or Engage on the Street addresses vital cultural differences practitioners have to consider in their approaches to planning and the management of public relations programmes globally. Packed with prominent case studies from Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, the Americas, and Sub-Saharan Africa, this book demonstrates how to adapt and implement PR strategies across the private, NGO, and government sectors to deliver highly impactful projects within intercultural context.

I recommend Journalism and Public Relations in the Digital Age. London: I.B. Tauris. Lloyd, John & Toogood, Laura (2015).

This book is the outcome of research by Lloyd and Toogood in the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford. It provides an overview of the history of PR and the contemporary PR industry, focusing on its changing practice in the digital age. However, the book is primarily based on the interviews of experts and does not engage with much existing literature. It should be read in conjunction with other key authors’ works on PR.

Anne Marie Lacey

Award-winning practitioner and CIPR Young Communicator of the Year Anne Marie name dropped our own visiting professor Stephen Waddington with her choices. Both of Stephen’s books with Steve Earl – Brand Anarchy and Brand Vandals – offer an insight into the impact social media has had on PR and marketing communications. She also agrees Wadds on Sheldrake’s book – I always refer to his ‘Six Flows of Influence’ when teaching.