Cultural and Critical Studies 2004 Abstracts
Cultural and Critical Studies Division
Producing Telenovelas In A Time Of Crisis: The Venezuelan Case * Carolina Acosta-Aizuru, University of Georgia * Currently, Venezuela is deeply polarized between those who staunchly support President Hugo Chavez and those who fervently oppose him. Drawing on the “circuit of culture,” I conducted in-depth interviews with Venezuelan telenovela actors, writers and media executives to provide a snapshot of how the telenovela industry is affected by the country’s political, economic and social crises, and how these production participants envisioned the future of Venezuelan telenovelas’ texts, production and circulation. The study suggests a gap between media executives who see telenovelas solely as an economic product, and writers and actors who believe that the genre carries an important ideological weight that could help ease the current crisis.
The Reality Of Black Women’s Images Informed by Mediated Representations: A Reception Study * Oluwa Tosin M. Adegbola, Morgan State University * A reception study was conducted on the portrayals of black women in women’s magazines. Audience are conceptualized as active readers of the magazine materials who recognize dominant messages present in magazines and possess different standpoints that are brought to bear on their reading of the images. Study consisted of a survey questionnaire, journal entries and focus group interviews. Using Hall’s (1980) encoding/decoding model positions of dominant, negotiated and oppositional, black women are not unified on their reception of these images, but are influenced by images in informing their identity on a continuum from acceptance to rejection images in question.
Quiet Control: How American Journalism Obstructs the Democratic Ideal: An Institutional Analysis * Seth Ashley, University of Missouri at Columbia * This paper is an institutional analysis of American journalism, reviewing and synthesizing the scholarly literature on media’s inability to serve democracy. American journalism obstructs the democratic ideal by neglecting the information and ideas necessary for citizenship and self-governance. One example of this is the marginalization of minor party presidential candidates, which provides the impetus for this review.
Conservative Nostalgia about the Economy of News: Repair vs. Reform * Isabel Awad, Stanford University * Based on a textual analysis of Columbia Journalism Review’s coverage of news media ownership and control during the last decade, this paper argues that critics’ prevalent view on the political economy of news is characterized by a conservative nostalgia. Instead of questioning the marketplace, they legitimize it and treat inherent flaws as deviations to be fixed. The repairing nature and means-orientation of this discourse underscores its limitations as a critical forum that could empower journalists.
“My Mum’s A Suicide Bomber”: Motherhood, Terrorism, News, And Ideological Repair * Dan Berkowitz and Sarah Burke-Odland, University of Iowa * This paper argues that the news media engage in the repair of society’s ideological beliefs, a process much like repair of the journalistic paradigm. Concepts about news as myth and the mythical archetype of the Good Mother are used to investigate a case study of media coverage about a Palestinian mother of two who became a suicide bomber. Textual analysis shows how this repair process took place by creating a boundary for acceptable motherhood behavior.
Native Storytelling: Dominant Narratives in the Lewiston Morning Tribune * Andy Boyan, Brooke Hempstead, Pat Hockersmith and Raul Moreno, Washington State University * Today’s Native Americans face the redefinition of their identities. This proves to be no easy task with stereotypical judgments from the mainstream, as well as media representations produced by non-Natives. This study explores stories from the Lewiston Morning Tribune. Using narrative analysis we explore the stones to observe what narrative emerges. This narrative rings true with societal attitudes toward Native Americans and continues to keep Native American histories on the sidelines of mainstream America.
Amassing the Multitude: Audience Powers Then and Now * Jack Z. Bratich, Rutgers University * This essay examines early and recent problematizations of “the audience” in communication studies. Using Michael Hardt and Toni Negri’s concept of the “multitude” and Michel Foucault’s term “problematization,” I argue that the audience is a product of discursive constructions, but that these constructions draw upon ontological practices which may be called “audience powers” or “mediated multitudes.” Comparing early problematizations of the audience as “mass” with current notions of the audience as networked and interactive, I contend that an ontology of media subjects and audience powers offers new perspectives on audiences and audience studies.
Going For The Gold (Member): Product Placements And The Construction Of Consumers * Bonnie Brennen and Margaret Duffy, Missouri School of Journalism * No abstract available.
The History and Meaning of the Election Night Bonfire * Mark Brewin, University of Tulsa * The paper examines a practice commonly associated with American political elections in the nineteenth century—the building of large bonfires by gangs of young boys on the night of the vote—in order to make a larger point about the meaning that an election ritual communicates to a voting public. I argue that the ritual message that elections send to public is more fluid, even contradictory, than is often acknowledged. The election night bonfire operated as a symbol of the polyphonic nature of the election ritual for nineteenth century urban publics. Its disappearance can be associated with the political culture’s more general attempt to control the meaning of politics in American democracy.
Coming to You “Live”: Exclusive News Reports and the Battlefield Reporter * Susan Brockus, Purdue University * Operation Iraqi Freedom marked an unprecedented partnership between the U.S. government and corporate media outlets. Some 600 journalists – sanctioned, select teams of reporters and camera crews – were given battlefield training and allowed to live and travel with U.S. troops. Embed accounts thus were exclusive, both as the purview of a given network and as a form of reporting that excluded more expansive coverage in favor of a highly individualized viewpoint.
The Reign of the Blues Queens:Cathartic Uplift in Women’s Blues in the Chicago Defender, 1920-1923 * Mark Dolan, University of Mississippi * The present study is a cultural history of advertisements for women’s blues recordings in the Chicago Defender from 1920 to 1923. The advertising is considered as a new, emotive uplift emerging in the black press.
Crisis notes: Journalism, globalization, and the Thai currency crisis of 1997 * Frank Durham, University of Iowa * This case study of The Financial Times’ coverage of the 1997 Thai crisis interprets the role of the financial press within the broader, transnational context of globalization. In a textual analysis, this essay interprets news coverage of that event by The Financial Times of London. Jameson’s concepts of cognitive mapping and the struggle for representation are considered as ways to understand how journalism might adapt to cover a post-structural world.
Sex in the transnational city: New discourses of sex and body in Indian popular culture * Meenakshi Gigi Durham * University of Iowa * Emerging Indian popular culture is rife with nontraditional, increasingly explicit representations of gender and sexuality. Contemporary film directors and cultural producers assert that these trends represent Westernization and modern sensibilities. In this paper I explore the ideological contexts of these texts’ production, developing a theoretical framework that locates these forms of popular culture in the realm of global politics and in relation to the East/ West neocolonial relations that underpin sex tourism, child prostitution and other forms of sexual commerce.
Women of a Certain Age, Magazine Advertising, & a Politics of the Unmarked * Kim Golombisky, University of South Florida * Examining visual representations of middle-aged women in magazine advertising, this critical-interpretive essay explores recurring themes of in/visibility. Perhaps lacking visual tropes with which to inscribe female midlife, advertisers seem to find ways to represent the middle-aged woman that do not necessarily require her photographic presence. Building on Phelan’s (1993) politics of the unmarked, the author argues that there is something resistant and subversive in remaining ambiguous, anonymous, and even invisible and that maybe playing the unmarked in advertising is preferable to a visibility politics that equates what is seen with reality.
The evolution of the makeover from print to television: An analysis of the social construction of female body image * Amanda S. Hall and Lisa Hebert, University of Georgia * Our paper discusses the cultural ideology that permeates our society surrounding female body image, socially constructed ideals of beauty and identity as they are represented in media texts—those of the makeover programs, A Makeover Story, What Not to Wear and Extreme Makeover. For this study, we conducted a textual analysis of selected episodes of each of these programs to examine the ideological impact of patriarchy, particularly as it relates to female body image.
Locke Meets Horatio Alger in the U.S.: Revisiting the Commercialization of America Radio Broadcasting * Youngkee Ju, University of Missouri at Columbia * The various political theories of American liberal tradition were examined to identify the ideological feature working on the commercialization of the American radio broadcasting system. The unique nature of American liberalism was delineated with such symbols or concepts as “Horatio Alger,” “humanist liberalism,” and “corporate liberalism.” Accordingly, this study identified Lockean individualism, humanist liberalism, and Algerism referring to a passion for wealth as the bases of the commercialization process.
Non-Profit Organizations’ Use of the Internet * Linda Jean Kensicki, University of Minnesota * According to previous research, the internet can potentially form a Habermasian public sphere that will improve public education, fundraising, credibility, volunteer recruitment, publicity, advocacy, service delivery, research and communication. Yet, there is very little research that evaluates the internet based on information from those actually attempting to use the technology toward these utopian goals. In this research, fifty-two people responsible for creating internet strategy and/or web content for non-profit organizations participated in seven focus groups across the country. This research found that claims of sweeping improvements in democratic participation through the internet are not supported.
A Lawyer in our Midst: Does Jerome Barron Deserve Canonic Status? * John F. Kirch, University of Maryland * In 2003, Katz et al. “nominated” thirteen articles from the field of communication for canonization. Their proposal — the first time a group of scholars suggested that a canon of media research be created — opened the door for debate over who should be included on this list of monumental texts. This paper contributes to that discussion by nominating for canonization a 36-year-old law review article by Jerome A. Barron that greatly influenced the debate over free speech in the United States.
“There’s a Little Rapper and a Little Dapper in All of Us!” Race Relations MTV Style * Kim LeDuff, Indiana University * During Mardi Gras 2003, MTV produced a network special surrounding the events. As part of the programming, rappers Redman and Method Man were invited to spend the night with the Metcalf family, a wealthy white family residing in New Orleans. Perhaps in an effort to show the American viewing audience that race relations in the deep South are not as bad as some might believe, MTV produced this mini reality show to illustrate that blacks and whites do have something in common after all. But after viewing the show with a critical eye and identifying dialogue and interaction laden with hegemonic reference, it appears that the show instead reiterates difference. Using semiotic analysis, the media text was carefully examined and questions the goal of the program when juxtaposed with the cast of characters, what they represent, and their interaction.
“Heaven, Hell and here:” Understanding the impact of incarceration through the rhetorical vision of a prison newspaper * Eleanor Novek, Monmouth University *Prison journalists reveal the realities of the pains of imprisonment and enlighten us about its consequences in ways that are seldom part of the dominant discourse. This article illuminates the world of a state prison for women through textual analysis of an inmate newspaper. It uses the lens of cultural studies to situate the newspaper as a tool of ideological struggle and uses symbolic convergence theory to provide a fantasy theme analysis of the texts and their meanings.
No Longer “Just a Word” from Your Sponsor: The Increasing Presence of Corporate Sponsorship on PBS Kids Television * Angela Paradise, University of Massachusetts * This paper provides a critical analysis of the increasing presence and power of corporate sponsorship on PBS Kids television. Drawing from PBS documents, the PBS Kids website, PBS Kids television content, historical analyses, scholarly critiques, empirical studies and popular press articles, the author traces the transformations within PBS Kids’ underwriting policy and examines recent corporate sponsorship segments that bracket PBS children’s programming. The findings suggest that PBS Kids is increasingly adhering to an advertising-driven, market-model of television, thereby positioning child viewers not as developing citizens but as consumers and commodities.
Parents’ Perceptions of the Commercialization of PBS Kids Television: A Focus Group Study * Angela Paradise, University of Massachusetts * In this paper, the author reports the results of an analysis of focus group interviews conducted with 36 participants in April 2003. The author identifies and assesses parents’ perceptions of children’s public television with emphasis on views of commercialism, distinctiveness, trust and status of PBS Kids television. Themes surfacing during the discussions include 1.) the heightened presence of corporate sponsorship, 2.) the branding, licensing and merchandising of PBS Kids, 3.) the blurring of PBS Kids with network and cable television, 4.) the ramifications to social class issues depicted on screen as a result of heightened commercialization, and 5.) the positioning of the young child as consumer. The findings of this study suggest that parents of child viewers of PBS Kids do not embrace the increasingly commercial nature of children’s public television.
Military Metaphors, Masculine Modes, and Critical Commentary: Deconstructing Journalists’ Inner Tales of September 11 * Radhika Parameswaran, Indiana University * This paper analyzes the rhetoric of trade publications that target journalism professionals in the United States. Borrowing insights from cultural approaches to journalists as an interpretive community, I examine the ways in which reporters and editors interpret and frame their experiences in producing news narratives on the events of September 11, 2001 for their audiences. I conduct a feminist and semiotic analysis of stories that appeared in the American Journalism Review, Columbia Journalism Review, Communicator, Broadcast and Cable, and Quill. The paper shows that journalists’ public memories of their work relied on masculine metaphors of military and sport, elevated male anchors, and privileged empiricist tasks of knowledge production over complex processes of internal reflection.
Anxieties of Self: The New York Tribune’s Radio Stories and the Fictional Imagination, 1925-1926 * Randall Patnode, Xavier University * The rhetoric surrounding new technologies exhibits a strong – some might say unavoidable – progressive slant, and nowhere is this seen more clearly than in America. In a 1998 interview, Leo Marx summarized the American attitude toward technology as general faith that “things were going to get better and better – not only materially but also morally, politically and socially – and this predominant view assumed that advancing technology was a sufficient basis for that progress.” When it came to the introduction of radio broadcasting in America in the 1920’s, this sort of technological optimism was rampant – in the public and in the chroniclers of the phenomenon.
Entering the Matrix: A Political Economic Analysis Of A Global Textual Event * Jennifer M. Proffitt and Dung Yune Tchoi, Pennsylvania State University * Hollywood blockbusters have become global textual events. One such global event, The Matrix trilogy, demonstrates the continuing economic power of media conglomerates. The aim of this paper is to explore how The Matrix trilogy constructs a mega text within the context of global Hollywood. The film’s primary producer, Time Warner, attempted to maximize the film’s profitability via multiple revenue streams, including tie-ins, a video game, animation, and special release DVDs. The Matrix saga as a global textual event produces the context within which Hollywood motion picture events take place and sets limitations on audiences’ interpretations of and experiences interacting with this event.
Late Modern Life and the Rise of the “Blogosphere”: Can New Media Meet Life’s New Challenges? * Lori Cooke Scott, York University and Ryerson University * This essay examines the new media practice of “blogging” within a specific view of late-modernity in an attempt to attach some meaning to it in terms of the reflexivity of individuals and “diseinbeddedness” of society. The weblog phenomenon can help us understand some important changes in the way identity is being worked out, the way people are forming relationships and creating communities, and how individuals use news and information to exert discursive power.
Constructing the Kurds in the Turkish Press * Diara Sezgin and Melissa Wall, California State University at Northridge * This paper examines how the leading Turkish newspaper, Hurri yet, constructs an image of the ethnic minority Kurds. Critical discourse analysis is used to assess how the image of the Kurds has changed from the end of the internal conflict with the PKK to the country’s bid to join the EU, finding that Kurds are not allowed to speak for themselves and their culture is mocked and demonized by the mainstream Turkish press.
A Postcolonial Interrogation of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide: An analysis of the New York Times * Denise St. Clair, University of Wisconsin at Madison * This paper looks to evaluate the New York Tmes’coverage of the Rwandan genocide through the lens of postcolonial theory in order to see if the representation of the conflict and the people accurately represents the history and context of the conflict, or instead perpetuates stereotypes and misunderstandings so often associated with Africa. By interrogating the type of history written and why, we can begin to deconstruct and critique how Africa is covered in the media.
When the media became the story: The New York Times’ national mediascape in the wake of September 11 * Sujatha Sosale, University of Iowa * This study examines a specific authoritative news site’s, The New York Times’ intense coverage of US culture industries’ reactions to the traumatic events of September 11, 2001, in the quarter following that eventful day. Drawing from theoretical intersections of journalism, popular culture, and media and nationalism during crisis, and through a textual analysis of the news, the study demonstrates how The Times news discourse worked to position media industries as vital sociocultural (national, global, linguistic, capitalistic, etc.) entities central to cultivating popular perceptions of the crisis.
An Eyewitness to a “Real” Miracle * Michelle Stack, University of British Columbia * This paper is a case study and a critical discourse analysis of how 20/20, and in particular its executive producer, Alan Goldberg, came to know and represent the Montreux Clinic for the Treatment of Eating Disorders, and its founder Peggy Claude-Pierre as a miracle. The paper will also examine how this knowing affected other media outlets and prospective patients.
Philanthropy as Public Relations: A Historical, Social and Economic Assessment of Cause-Related Marketing * Inger L. Stole, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign * This paper discusses the practice of cause-related marketing from social, cultural and economic perspectives and explores some of the political ramifications associated with business’ approach to charity. The paper looks at the criteria used to determine issues that warrant cause-related efforts and discusses why some social causes lend themselves more easily to cause-related marketing venues than others. It also explores some of the problems associated with linking the act of consumption to solving social issues.
Narratives of Job Satisfaction on the World Wide Web: Interpretations of Value and Reward Within the “100 Best Companies to Work for in America” * Douglas J. Swanson, University of Wisconsin at La Crosse * This research analyzed employee job satisfaction narratives on World Wide Web sites of companies named among Fortune magazine’s “100 Best Companies to Work for in America.” Fewer than one-third of WWW sites included narratives. Narratives were most likely to express job satisfaction in personal, emotional terms and least likely to identify job security, benefits, or compensation as important rewards of work. Narratives often appeared targeted toward new college graduates. Clichés were used excessively in Web sites and narratives.
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