Meanings
- broadcastingLess important or less hard-hitting material relegated to the later pages of a print publication or the later stages of a television broadcast.
Some magazines use the back-of-the-book merely for story “jumps” (continuations of articles from the feature well). Others fill the back-of-the-book with additional departments and columns.
2014, Christopher D. Benson, Charles F. Whitaker, Magazine Writing2 more examples
"Segment 3" established the daily presence of a five-minute back-of-the-book feature on network newscasts. Although previously the TV networks had usually featured soft news at the end of their evening news, on some days the soft-news feature did not make it on the air because of the judged newsworthiness of the hard news.
1999, Bartholomew H. Sparrow, Uncertain Guardians: The News Media as a Political Institution, page 97The change in the hard/soft news ratio has taken on several forms. In the print media, the change can be seen clearly by the expansion of "back of the book" sections, for example, about subjects as varied as science and gardening. Television has no formal back of the book, but there are now fewer sections devoted to domestic and international political news.
2004, Herbert J. Gans, Democracy and the News, page 29
Cite this entry
back of the book. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/back%20of%20the%20book
“back of the book.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/back%20of%20the%20book. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “back of the book,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/back%20of%20the%20book.
Source: back of the book on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.