The Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, held in December 1978, was of great historical significance. It re-established the ideological line of emancipating the mind and seeking truth from facts, determined that the focus of the Party’s work would shift to socialist economic construction and ushered in a new era of China’s reform and opening-up, and socialist modernization. The reform and opening-up, together with the recovery and development of the national economy, allowed China’s press industry an “unprecedented leap forwards,” establishing a multidisciplinary, multilevel, multifunctional, and diversified media network, and creating a high-tech, modern journalism and communication system. The 40 years of reform and opening-up not only witnessed the great achievements and rapid development of Chinese journalism but also introduced journalism and learned from communication to establish the discipline of journalism and communication, and form a distinctive journalism and communication system in China. Furthermore, the research on journalism history in China ushered in a fresh new era in the field of academia. This new era saw the study of journalism history in China gradually restored (1978–1988), fully developed (1989–1999), forged ahead (2000–2009), and innovated (2010–2018). Journalism history, as a subdiscipline of journalism and communication, has undergone stages of establishment, maturation, reflection, and expansion, and has taken on a new dimension.