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Journal of Media Critiques
Vol.3 No.10, 2017
EDITOR
Arif YILDIRIM
P-ISSN: 2056-9785
E-ISSN: 2056 9793
© Journal of Media Critiques, Vol.3 No.10, 2017
doi: 10.17349/jmc117200
Vol.3 No.10, 2017
Journal of Media Critiques
www.mediacritiques.net
email: jmc@mediacritiques.net
Editor-in-Chief
Dr.Arif Yıldırım
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Asst.Prof. Arif YILDIRIM, is an Assistant Professor, working as Head of the
Departments of Journalism, Canakkale 18 Mart University, Canakkale, Turkey
holding a PhD in Informatics with the thesis subject as "Data Security Approach
in Information Technology and Cryptography: DNA Algorithm". Yildirim
established a faculty, two undergraduate departments, and one graduate
department. Additionally worked as Vice Director of Institute of Social Sciences
and the editor-in-chief of Journal of Social Sciences in Gaziantep University. He
is founder Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Cyber Security, Privacy and eCrime
(www.jcspe.org). Dr.Yildirim teaches lectures as "Neurohacking with Social
Media", "Social Media Journalism and Hacktivism", "Activism, Digital Activism
and Hacktivism" and "Community Media and ICTs for Development and Social
Transformation". His research focuses on social media, cryptography with
genetics, neurohacking with social media, marketing, activism, digital activism,
hacktivism, civil disobedience, privacy, P2P, online behavior and identity.
HONORARY EDITORS
Prof. Dr. Can Bilgili is an academician, researcher and founder WEC (World
Experience Campus). He was born in 1968 in Izmir. Bilgili completed his B.A. at
Istanbul University, Deparment of Journalism and PR, his M.A. and Ph.D.
degrees at Institute of Social Sciences, Deparment of Journalism at the same
university. He worked as faculty member of the Faculty of Communication at
Istanbul University, (1991-1994), at Galatasaray University (1994-2008), at
Yeditepe University (2008-2012) and Istanbul Commerce University (2012-
2015) he also undertook administrative duties. Bilgili, who prepared many
sectorial reports in the field of advertising, radio and television in Turkey, still
gives communication consultancy services to various public and private
institutions. He is the author of the book “Görsel İletişim ve Grafik Tasarım”
(Visual Communication and Graphic Design) and editor of the book series
“Medya Eleştirileri” (Media Critiques). He has several works and gives lectures
on media management and organization, media industry, media economy,
media ethics, marketing communication, competition strategies, health
communication.
Richard Vickers, is the Deputy Head of the Lincoln School of Film and Media at
the University of Lincoln in the United Kingdom. He is an experienced digital
media producer having undertaken leadership of complex projects, working
with diverse multi-disciplinary teams, and has industry experience as a
producer and consultant developing interactive projects for businesses and
arts organizations, from concept through to launch and beyond. Richards’s
research has two main focuses; the first is at the intersection of media and
technology, focusing on the area of networked convergent/emerging media,
exploring the creative opportunities and societal/cultural impact. The second
focus of his research is that of exploring and utilizing digital technologies for
innovations in learning. He is currently working on a number of projects that
aim to develop more open, interdisciplinary and collaborative pedagogical
frameworks. Much of this is work is undertaken collaboratively between
Richard and the co_LAB team at LSFM, as well as a network of national and
international partners.
ADVISORY BOARD of JMC
Prof.Dr. Angeles Moreno, University Rey Juan Carlos, Spain
Prof.Dr. Bernard D. Frischer, Department of Informatics, Indiana University, USA
Prof.Dr. David J. Gunkel, Northern Illinois University, USA
Prof.Dr. Erik Malcolm Champion, Curtin University, Australia
Prof.Dr. Frank E Parcells, Austin Peay State University, USA
Prof.Dr. John Chetro-Szivos, Fitchburg State University, USA
Prof.Dr. Lars Rademacher, h_da Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences, Germany
Prof.Dr. Lutz M. Hagen, Technische Universität Dresden, Germany
Prof.Dr. Mike Friedrichsen, Stuttgart Media University, Germany
Prof.Dr. Noha Mellor, University of Bedfordshire, UK, United Kingdom
Prof.Dr. Paaige Kelle Turner, Webster University, USA
Prof.Dr. Toby Miller, Cardiff Univeristy, United Kingdom
Prof.Dr. Urs Dahinden, University of Applied Sciences Chur, Switzerland
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Anthony Moretti, Robert Morris University, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Charlton McIlwain, New York University., USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Geri Alumit Zeldes, Michigan State University, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Gordon Calleja, University of Malta ITU Copenhagen, Malta
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Judith Simon, IT University Copenhagen & University of Vienna, Austria
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Stephanie Ricker Schulte, University of Arkansas, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Victoria Panova, MGIMO-University, Russian Federation
Asst.Prof.Dr. David Harris Smith, McMaster University, Canada
Asst.Prof.Dr. Erin Schauster, Bradley University, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Lauren Jaclyn DeCarvalho, University of Arkansas, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Rick Sheridan, Wilberforce University, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Robert Mckeever, University of South Carolina, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Ryan Rogers, Marist College, USA
Dr. Margarita Kefalaki, Open University of Greece, Greece
Dr. Panayiota Tsatsou, University of Leicester, United Kingdom
SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE (REFEREES) of JMC
Prof.Dr. Angeles Moreno, University Rey Juan Carlos, Spain
Prof.Dr. Bernard D. Frischer, Department of Informatics, Indiana University, USA
Prof.Dr. Bonnie Rohde, Albright College, USA
Prof.Dr. Erik Malcolm Champion, Curtin University, Australia
Prof.Dr. Erhan Akyazı, Marmara University, Turkey
Prof.Dr. Frank E Parcells, Austin Peay State University, USA
Prof.Dr. Georgeta Drulă, University of Bucharest, Romania
Prof.Dr. Gilson Schwartz, University of São Paulo, Brazil
Prof.Dr. John Chetro-Szivos, Fitchburg State University, USA
Prof.Dr. Lutz M. Hagen, Technische Universität Dresden, Germany
Prof.Dr. Mike Friedrichsen, Stuttgart Media University, Germany
Prof.Dr. Paaige Kelle Turner, Webster University, USA
Prof.Dr. Stevenson Kohir, Osmania University, Hyderabad, India
Prof.Dr. Toby Miller, Cardiff Univeristy, United Kingdom
Prof.Dr. Will Straw, McGill University, Canada
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Anthony Moretti, Robert Morris University, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Charlton McIlwain, New York University., USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Debra Harkins, Suffolk University, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Geri Alumit Zeldes, Michigan State University, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Gordon Calleja, University of Malta ITU Copenhagen, Malta
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Gregory G. De Blasio, Northern Kentucky University, USA
Assoc.Prof. Kirk Hazlett, Curry College, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Natalia Piskunova, National Research University, Russian Federation
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Stephanie Ricker Schulte, University of Arkansas, USA
Assoc.Prof.Dr. Victoria Panova, MGIMO-University, Russian Federation
Asst.Prof.Dr. Asta Zelenkauskaite, Drexel University, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. David Harris Smith, McMaster University, Canada
Asst.Prof.Dr. Erin Schauster, Bradley University, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Lauren Jaclyn DeCarvalho, University of Arkansas, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Rick Sheridan, Wilberforce University, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Robert Mckeever, University of South Carolina, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Ryan Rogers, Marist College, USA
Asst.Prof.Dr. Timothy James Pasch, University of North Dakota, USA
Dr. Carolina Oliveira Matos, City University London, United Kingdom
Dr. Margarita Kefalaki, Open University of Greece, Greece
Dr. Panayiota Tsatsou, University of Leicester, United Kingdom
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
11
HUDA ALSAHI
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and
North Media Memories
25
DAVID KATIAMBO
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
41
MUJIE LI
Privacy as a Cultural Phenomenon
55
GARFIELD BENJAMIN
Medicalisation of Media; Mediatisation of Medicine: Towards an
Illness Society
75
SERTAÇ TIMUR DEMIR
The New Nature of Cultural Diplomacy in the Age of Online
Communication
87
HASAN SALIU
The Impact of Courtroom Cameras on the Judicial Process
101
SCOTT CAMPBELL - THOMAS GREEN - BRYAN HANCE - JAMES LARSON
Men Are Stronger; Women Endure: A Critical Analysis of the Throne of
Glass and the Mortal Instruments YA Fantasy Series
115
KATHERINE CRUGER
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
133
VALTERLEI BORGES DE ARAÚJO - LEANDRO DE PAULA SANTOS
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample
(2009-2014)
151
FATMA YEŞIL
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of
the 2011 Egyptian Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
173
PATRICK FITZGERALD
Communication and “Theatralization” of the Italian Crisis in the
Dialectic between Dario Fo, Beppe Grillo and Gianroberto Casaleggio
193
ARMANDO ROTONDI
Book Review: Danielle Knafo and Rocco Lo Bosco: The Age of
Perversion: Desire and Technology in Psychoanalysis and Culture.
London: Routledge, 2017.
205
JACOB JOHANSSEN
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117201 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
SATIRE AS A CYBER-MEDIATED PRACTICE THE CASE
OF “NOON ALNISWA”
HUDA ALSAHI
ABSTRACT
This paper intends to shed some light on what constitutes a new cyber-mediated practice in
the context of Saudi Arabia, that is the use of satire as a communication strategy and a new
mode of feminist cultural production, through examining the case of “Noon Alniswa” which is a
satirical YouTube show that has been running since 2012. Thus, by focusing on “Noon Alniswa”
as a concrete example, I seek to examine the case as a vivid example of the struggles which
women are currently facing in the Middle East and beyond, while seeking to address the
following questions: (1) what are the prominent issues that have been featured and discussed in
“Noon Alniswa”? (2) what are the overall consequences of the emergence of YouTube in
particular, in relation to feminist action (3) and thirdly what is the role of producing and
consuming online satire as a cyber-mediated practice?
Keywords: Satire, Internet, Women, Cultural Production, Micro-resistance.
INTRODUCTION
The histories of feminisms and cultural production have intimately been
intertwined, where cultural production as manifested by (literature, films, art) all
contributed together to advance various feminist causes. Echoing that, it was stated
that Gulf feminism has been more radically manifested in writings and art than it is in
scholarship or activism; examples of radical feminist writers would include Kuwaiti Laila
Al-Uthman, Saudi Umayma al-Khamis, Bahraini Fawzia Rashid, and Emirati Salma
Matar Sayf, among others (Al-Nakib, 2013).
Yet, the rise of the Internet and the increasing significance of web 2.0 technologies
in the recent years, have expanded the frontiers of feminist activism and provided a
fertile ground for women to produce alternative political and sociocultural content that
is accessible, relevant and diverse, facilitating by that the emergence of a new
configuration of “feminism-cyberfeminism” (Plant, 1996).
Consequently, contemporary feminism is now often referred to as located in the
cyberspace (Alfonso and Trigilio, 1997), where Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, blogs are
just few examples of the ways contemporary feminism has taken to the Internet. And
while some feminist scholars debate the efficacy and inclusiveness of online feminist
PhD student in Political Science and Sociology at Scuola Normale Superiore, Italy. huda.alsahi@sns.it
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
12
activism, some consider women’s online-based activism as influential in both
transnational and local settings (Sassen, 2002).
Departing from that, this paper intends to shed some light on what constitutes a
new cyber-mediated practice in the context of Saudi Arabia, that is the use of satire as
a communication strategy and a new mode of cultural production in the realm of
cyberspace, through examining the case of “Noon Alniswa” which is a satirical
YouTube show that has started back in 2012 and continues to run till today.
What makes this particular case an interesting case to study, is the fact that “Noon
Alniswa” was created and hosted by Dr. “Hatoon Kadi”, Saudi’s Arabia’s first ever
female satirist, in an attempt to utilize YouTube as a social networking platform, to
tackle major political, social and cultural issues within Saudi Arabia from a female
perspective, with the deployment of satire and light humor.
Thus, by focusing on “Noon Alniswa” as a concrete example, I seek to offer a
comprehensive analysis of the usage of satire as a cyber-mediated practice, in a
context which is characterized by an underdeveloped civil society structure, and a lack
of channels for public engagement.
Hence, this paper is situated at the intersection between the Internet, satire, and
feminist cultural production, while seeking to address the following major questions:
(1) what are the prominent issues that have been featured and discussed in “Non
Alniswa”? (2) what are the overall consequences of the emergence of YouTube in
particular, in relation to feminist action (3) and finally what is the role of producing and
consuming online satire as a cyber-mediated practice?
Thus, using a combined method of cyberethnography and qualitative analysis, I
firstly analyze and map out the most prominent women’s issues that are featured
online in the show, focusing specifically on how these episodes question the norms
and push the existing societal and cultural boundaries.
In that respect, I argue that employing satire represents a micro-strategy of
resistance towards the local impositions of patriarchal order (Stratford, 1999). Hence,
these incremental moves are not assembled from direct confrontations but rather
operate as distinct traces within a plurality of resistances, as the form of resistance is
not always "radical" but sometimes needs to be subtle: composed of indirect rebellions
and subversions.
Additionally, I also argue that the emergence of the web 2.0 platforms such as
YouTube could function as an alternative space of cultural production and expression,
and a site of articulating counter hegemonic discourses, by the enabling of counter-
publics spaces (Fraser, 1990), that can possibly work to the benefit of women, and
others who have traditionally been excluded from the public sphere.
SATIRE AS A CYBER-MEDIATED PRACTICE
Satire in its modern sense, is an obscure term that is difficult to define. As Connery
and Combe (1995:9) argue that, ‘it remains less an identifiable genre than a mode,
with an astonishingly wide range of vastly varied works that have been placed under
its rubric’. Nevertheless, Nicols’s (1971:27) view it as ‘systematic exploitation, with
aggressive intent, of what are, or are made to seem, deviations from the norm within
a context’.
Echoing that, many scholars point out to the fact that satire is a peculiar expressive
form of art as well as a critique, which reveal and criticize human and social vices,
follies, and shortcomings by the use of parody, irony, mimicries and diversions (Boler,
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
13
2006). Thus, it is loaded by sub-meanings that contain ‘masked criticism’ towards
some existing relations of power (Follmer, 2013), in an attempt to raises questions,
provokes doubts, and draws attention to social problems
In this context, Boler (2006) argues that satire speaks truth to power while
challenging the powerful. Similarly, Connery and Combe (1995) indicate that satire is
potentially 'a site of resistance to cultural and political hegemony', that exemplifies an
intellectual subversion on its own, as it spreads subversive ideas (Griffin, 1994).
Consequently, the raise of the Internet tied with the popularity of its advanced
applications such as Facebook and YouTube, have liberated satire from the monopoly
of professionals and placed the apparatus of cultural production in the hands of
Internet users, as it enabled them to create, receive and circulate online satirical
content and accordingly, challenge the boundaries of the dominant established norms
(Berthon et al. 2008).
Nevertheless, despite the fact that the satirical public culture is considered to be a
relatively modern phenomenon in Saudi Arabia, where feminist satire can be referred
to as what Lorraine M. York has termed a “no-woman’s territory, the case of “Noon
Alniswa” provides a peculiar case for the the subversive role of satire as a cyber-
mediated practice, and demonstrates how resistance to the existing patriarchal power
relations is being deployed. Thus, the satirical cultural production in this sense can be
perceived as an intervention in the process of producing meaning, where the Internet
could be used to transform the most basic processes of doing it.
NOON ALNISWA
The popularity of the YouTube show “Noon Alniswa”, speaks to the Saudi thirst for
honest commentary, as the restraints on Saudi society have created a uniquely captive
audience for web-based produced content, filling a void in a country where
government-controlled state broadcasters have failed to engage young viewers.
Thus, with a population of 32 million and 64.7% Internet penetration rate by the
year of 2016 (Internet live stats, 2016), Saudi Arabia is now the biggest user of
YouTube per capita in the world (Financial Times, 2014), as it accounts for more than
90 million daily YouTube views making it one of the top countries in this category,
where almost 50% of Saudi Arabian YouTube users are women.
All of this is reflected in the fact that each episode of the show, which on average
last between five-to-seven-minute attracts an average almost one 1 million views, in
addition to thousands of written comments and likes. Furthermore, in an interview with
Saudi Gazette (2015), Dr. Hatoon Kadi, the host of the show commented that:
‘YouTube offers young Saudis entertainment choices not available on mainstream
television, including locally produced content made by young Saudis who know how to
speak to that audience, and who have more freedom to tackle their issues compared
to mainstream TV where the field is full of red lines’.
The show in its current format is in its third season, with a total of 29 episodes at
the time of writing this paper. Moreover, the topics which are featured in the show are
numerous, ranging from the daily life encounters, the social pressure that women face
in society, the recent phenomena in society, to the ban on driving. It is currently
professionally produced by “UTurn”, a leading Saudi digital production house.
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
14
Yet when Kadi initially approached “UTurn”, they needed some convincing: ‘during
that time the Saudi YouTube scene was already booming but I didn’t doubt my ability.
There’s a stereotype that women cannot be funny, that women are only good at
drama but humor is a talent. If you’re funny, you’re funny’ (Greene, 2014).
Still, Kadi takes an active role in the writing, production, and presenting stages in
each episode, where ‘she usually writes down an objective for every episode, though
she doesn’t expect that her aim will reach everyone, but if the episodes managed to
engage people in related public debates and discussions, then the series would be
making a difference even if that was on a very small scale’ (Arab News, 2013).
METHODS
I rely on what is referred to as ethnography of cyberspace or cyber-ethnography
(Gajjala, 2002, Gajjala and Altman, 2006), which is now an established research
method in the qualitative paradigm that is generally used to examine blogs, chat
rooms, and other forms of online communication. A fundamental feature of cyber-
ethnography is observer participation, that requires a degree of reflexivity both in the
observation and the subsequent analysis and writing (Hammersley and Atkinson,
1989), where interpretation remains open to constant renegotiation.
Alongside other realms of cyber-studies, computer-mediated communication
constitutes an appropriate topic for ethnographic effort to research the culture of
cyber-communities, and indeed to theorize the types of community which are present
in cyberspace (Escobar, 1996). The most crucial point to consider from the debates
surrounding cyber-ethnography, is to remember that both cyberspace and the Internet
are profoundly cultural.
Echoing that, Escobar (1996) implies that ‘the study of cyber-culture is mainly
concerned with the cultural constructions and reconstructions on which the new
technologies are based and which they contribute to shaping. The point of departure
in cyber-ethnography is the idea that technologies stand for a cultural invention, as
they emerge out of specific cultural conditions and in turn contribute into the creation
new social and cultural responses’.
Hence, adopting a cyber-ethnographic approach allows researchers to fully
comprehend various social issues that are embedded within a complex digitalized
sphere. Furthermore, Star (1999) considers ethnography to be highly rewarding, even
“tempting” for observing online interactions because this approach is strengthened by
listening to the often-neglected voices, balancing diverse meanings, and linking
between meaning, speeches and actions. It is also easier for researchers to remain
unseen over the course of cyber-ethnographic work, allowing for a true objective
observation of the targeted subject/object to take place.
In cyberspace though, the action of being a hidden observer is often referred to as
“lurking” in reference to the individuals who read messages on cyber platforms but do
not actively contribute to them. Consequently, lurking is ethically permitted ‘if the
online community which is being studied is considered to be public’ (Bruckman, 2002).
Additionally, researchers can freely collect and analyze online data if the following
three criteria are met: 1) It is officially and publically archived 2) No password is
requested for archive access 3) No site policy forbids it. (Cited in James and Busher
2009), which was the case in “Noon Alniswa”.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
15
Thus, after taking all these factors into consideration, adopting cyber-ethnography
as a method seemed feasible to me as it resonated with the type of research that I
was conducting and the research questions that I had in mind.
Therefore, to assess the content of the YouTube videos—my approach was to use a
holistic interpretive lens guided by the research questions after Saldana (2009),
through conducting an inductive analysis of the satirical content of the episodes, for
the sake of detecting the verbal, nonverbal and production elements to understand the
content, context, and offer insight into the purposes of each episode, followed by a
descriptive coding of the content.
Accordingly, each episode in itself was defined as the unit of analysis. Taking into
consideration its respective title, the description provided by the creator (when
available), and in certain instances, other contextual elements. Where, in total, this
paper analyzed the content 29 episodes spanning the period between May 2012 and
May 2016.
ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION
In analyzing the topics that received most attention in “Noon Alniswa”, two major
issue categories appeared: namely the sociocultural and the sociopolitical. What has
distinguished the former from the later, is the reference to the state, government and
its institutions in those episodes.
Consequently, the episodes that satirized sociocultural issues were dominant,
comprising 89% of the research corpus. While the second issue category and the least
satirized, at least quantitatively- the sociopolitical- constituted only 11% of the data
and included reference certain divisive issues in Saudi Arabia such as women’s driving
and the nature of women’s rights activism.
Table 1: The episodes’ classifications.
Episode’s ID
Date
Title1
Classification
1
5/6/2012
A leap of coolness
Sociocultural
2
6/5/2012
The provoking mother
Sociocultural
3
11/12/2012
Social stroke
Sociocultural
4
18/12/2012
Cool baby
Sociocultural
5
27/01/2013
The loop of happiness
Sociocultural
6
24/02/2013
edding nightW
Sociocultural
7
23/04/2013
Whatsapp
Sociocultural
8
27/05/2013
Drivers
Sociopolitical
9
25/06/2013
Housemaids
Sociocultural
10
28/07/2013
Calm down baby
Sociocultural
11
9/3/2013
Beautiful people
Sociocultural
12
10/6/2013
You …curvy!
Sociocultural
13
11/3/2013
Be yourself
Sociocultural
14
3/4/2014
I don't want to get married
Sociocultural
15
4/10/2014
Career women
Sociocultural
16
25/05/2014
I want divorce
Sociocultural
17
23/07/2014
During Ramdhan
Sociocultural
18
27/08/2014
at did you eatWh
Sociocultural
1
The titles have been translated from Arabic.
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
16
19
25/09/2014
The students abroad and their stories
Sociocultural
20
25/11/2014
Girls and university
Sociocultural
21
17/12/2014
Women's behaviors
Sociocultural
22
22/01/2015
Those foreigners
Sociocultural
23
16/02/2015
Love and be loved
Sociocultural
24
3/11/2015
Activism
Sociopolitical
25
4/8/2015
Let's travel
Sociocultural
26
14/02/2016
Adam's world
Sociocultural
27
17/03/2016
Searching for a male
Sociopolitical
28
4/10/2016
The insignificant hijab
Sociocultural
29
18/05/2016
Doubts..my darling
Sociocultural
Table 2: Descriptive statistics of the episodes. N= 29
The Episodes
Mean
SD
Min
Max
Number of views
876,578
457,228
93,583
1,762,444
Number of likes
12,960
5,683
4,773
29,024
Number of Dislikes
1,650
952
285
3,388
Number of comments
1,603
1,174
457
3,698
In light of these general patterns, the upcoming section will provide a threefold
response to the research questions stated earlier; where the first sections will seek to
analyze the content of the episodes, followed by the second section which will discuss
the utility of satire as a micro-strategy of resistance, while the last section will
concentrate on examining the overall consequences of the emergence of YouTube as a
counter- publics space in relation to feminist action.
THE EPISODES
The focus of the first episode which was uploaded on the 6th of May 2012, was to
criticize the manifestations of consumerism, materialism, and the associated influences
of Westernization, with a reference to the consequences of women’s embracement of
western values and their abandonment of their own culture and language, by an
emphasizing that westernization is not equivalent to modernization.
Following that, it did not take long for the show to tackle the controversial
sociopolitical topic of women’s driving, as the host began the 8th episode with this
following provocative opening:
Dear man, you have been fooled when you have been told that you are the most
important man in the house. That is not true! The most important man in the life of a
Saudi woman is the diver!
The same episode also addressed the social stigma that mock women who can’t
afford hiring private drivers, while featuring a targeted criticism against the public
transportation infrastructure in Saudi Arabia, as the country lacks local city bus lines
that are dedicated to women.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
17
It is worth mentioning though that this episode was the only episode in the series
which in fact displayed English subtitles, which carries significance in terms of the
intended targeted audience and the transnational echoes and dimensions of this
debated issue.
The show also dedicated several episodes to address the struggles of average
Saudi women, who find themselves forced to act and feel in a certain way due to
societal pressure. Hence, starting from the 12th episode which is titled as “You
…curvy!”, the episode discussed the amount of pressure placed on women to be slim,
and how friends and close family members can be a source of negative body images.
In that respect, the stereotypes that target over-weight women was highlighted, who
are often portrayed as lazy, silly, and emotional.
While the 14th episode which is titled as “I don’t want to get married”, picked up
on the patriarchal expectations placed on women to fit into certain society’s norms.
Thus, steeped in satirical humor, the episode turned into a powerful critique of the
society that stigmatizes single women over the age of 30, and the expectations many
families have for their daughters to get married by a certain age before hitting their
‘expiration date’.
The 24th episode on the other hand, tackled the nature of women’s rights activism,
and the usage of the word “Huqooq” which is the equivalent Arabic word for “Rights”,
as a broken record devoid from any substance by certain groups. Hence, the episode
raised the question of what does being a women’s rights “activist” actually mean? In
this respect, the episode featured an acting scene of a girl shouting:
No independence without us driving cars. I drive... therefore, I am independent!
Wow I got 100 retweets on Twitter within half an hour, my mission has been
accomplished.
This was followed by a subsequent scene of the same girl, relaxing on the sofa in
her house, while demanding from the housemaid to bring her a glass of water. Those
two contrasting scenes were intended to highlight the embedded hypocrisy of those
who call out for independence while subscribing to the exact similar patterns of micro-
oppression and patriarchy that reinforce the status quo. Hence, the calls for activism
and independence can’t be considered as more than mere rhetoric in this case.
Consequently, the second part of the episode was dedicated to provide satirical
advice to women on how to become prominent activists.
Fight everyone, raise your voice, if you are bored or sad, just go on Twitter and call
yourself an activist, be radical, reject everything, hate men, they are the enemies,
except those who are wealthy. Be friends of those, so they can support you and
support your #hashtags, Oops I meant your… causes. Don't educate yourself and
don't read books, just focus on Twitter, create a virtual chaos, be hypocrite with
wealthy prominent men, and don't forget to bring the element of drama. Yes, be a
drama queen. just follow these steps and you will be a prominent activist, a well-
known one with more than 1000000 followers, so everyone will end up retweeting you.
The host later elaborated on a further point which might sound contradictory to
what has she just said before, stating that there is a real legitimate need for activism,
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
18
as women face many challenges that need to be fought, such as the discriminatory
treatment that women get, and the flaws of Saudi’s Arabia current male guardian
system.
Subsequently, the episode ended up with a note mentioning cases of women who
didn't take the majors that they wanted in university because their brothers told them
no, in reference to the fact that women are unable to enroll in an educational
institution without their guardian’s written approval. Or in the instances when some
fathers do not let their daughters get married so they can benefit from their salaries,
reaching to the status of widowed and divorced women. At this point, the host
declares that she now understands why women need activism, as the scene ends up in
her being converted to an activist, tirelessly repeating the words "Huqooq", rights,
rights!
While, the 27th episode touches of one of the subtopics which was mentioned on
the 24th episode, that is Saudi Arabia’s male guardianship system, that requires every
adult Saudi woman, regardless of her economic or social status, to obtain written
permission from her male guardian to work, travel, study and to get married. It also
deprives women from making decisions on behalf of their children such as opening
bank accounts, or to travel with them without written approval statement from their
father.
Echoing that, the host began the episode by sarcastically stating that being a Saudi
woman implies having impossible missions, as you need to find a male who should act
on your behalf and be responsible for you.
There is a constant need for a male, whether you are a mother of ten children, or a
University professor, as it seems like you don't know what is best for you.
Where she later elaborated on the following:
As a kid, you only have one legal guardian, but they increase in number when you
grow up’, this is evidenced by the fact that, a woman's first guardian is her father,
followed up by her husband when she gets married. While, if widowed or divorced, a
male relative must step in. Sometimes the duty even falls to her own son, which many
women find demeaning.
It is not surprising though that due to the fact that the implementation of this
system is conditioned by the guardian's personality, the system creates opportunities
for abuse.
As your guardian can ban you from travelling abroad to study, not for the sake of
banning you, but for the sake of controlling someone, where they can justify that with
the excuse that the government had given them the authority to decide our matters on
our behalf. They keep saying that women are inferior than men. However, they
sometimes feel intimidated and overshadowed by you when you become better than
them. Hence, life as a Saudi woman is constrained by your male guardian, if he turns
out to be a good person, your life will turn out to be good and vice versa.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
19
The episode also tackled the issue of the constrained access to justice that victims
face, as the legal system is dominated by conservative male judges, which makes it
difficult for them to get rid of their male guardians by law.
Whilst the 28th episode on the other hand, discussed the embedded meanings of
hijab, the different trends that is associated with it, while focusing on raising big
question to the viewers, like: Does hijab lead to morality, or morality is caused by
wearing the hijab? Does it express who we are? Or we are the ones who give it a
meaning? If hijab is just a piece of clothes, where are morals? Hence, this episode
carried more questions than answers, and intended to leave this topic up to viewers to
think about it more thoroughly.
COUNTER PUBLICS
Given the dearth of channels for civic engagement and media freedom, in a country
that heavily restricts the activities of civil society organizations, websites like YouTube
open up public space for Saudi women to engage in social, cultural and political
discourses.
In this sense, YouTube allows the production of original and appropriated relevant
material (Strangelove, 2010). Where the launching of YouTube back in 2005 made not
only watching video online considerably easier, but also lowered the barriers of
uploading and distributing videos, inviting each of us to “broadcast himself/herself.”
Consequently, Nancy Fraser's (1990:67) conceptualization of “counter-publics” in
which ‘members of subordinated social groups find it advantageous to constitute
alternative publics to circulate counter-discourses which in turn permit them to
formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities, interests, and needs’, seems
appropriate in this case as it offers a theoretical framework which provides exploratory
possibilities to the study of the cyber-mediated dimension of satire.
Moreover, counter-publics serve dual functions. On the one hand, they operate as
spaces of withdrawal and regroupement; while on the other hand, they also function
as a training grounds for upcoming projects targeting wider publics. It is precisely in
the dialectic between these two functions that their emancipatory potential resides,
which allows those counter-publics partially to offset, although not entirely to eliminate
the extent of women’s disadvantage in official public spheres (Fraser,1990).
Hence, the “parallel discursive arenas” that emerge in response to exclusions within
dominant discourse as described by Fraser, not only expand the discursive arena, but
also oppose the monolithic and dominant public sphere.
Thus, the case of “Noon Alniswa” provides an example of how these counter-public
spaces offer an alternative space for women to contest the stereotypical images of
Saudi women and to create counter new liberated subjectivities. As it provides women
with the means to deconstruct the “socially dominant discourses” (Wimmer, 2009),
and even form counter-hegemonic discourse in direct reaction to dissonance with
mainstream representations of women. As these counter-publics differentiate
themselves through their speech genres and mode of production that include humor
and satire tools of social critique.
It is clear though, the episodes deal with women’s issues in a language that makes
clear the ambition to function as alternative publics. As these episodes are being used
to provide social commentary, raise awareness, or to target coverage of the
established mass media in order to enforce their own standing.
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
20
SATIRE AS A MICRO-STRATEGY OF RESISTANCE
Resistance theorists have pointed out that resistance does not have to be formal or
collectively organized to qualify as resistance (Fisher and Davis, 1993). As resistance
can take place on both collective and individual levels (Padavic and Stombler, 1997).
Echoing that, it has been argued that, ‘everyday micro- resistance is informal, often
covert, and concerned largely with immediate, de facto gains’ (Scott, 1985:33).
This is applicable to satire as an innovative artistic genre, where satire can
constitute a form of cultural resistance, through its engagement with an ongoing
process that seeks to challenge cultural hegemony. Subsequently, satire takes reality,
injects it with irony and witty humor, and stretches it beyond the scope of familiarity,
so as to open a window of time, in which the audience publicly, consciously, and
critically engages with that reality. Through that, satire serves a social function as it
facilitates bonding through collective ridicule at a shared target.
For these reasons all together, satire became an appealing genre of feminist
resistance, at a time when feminism has often been associated with humorlessness, as
public displays of satire and humor are not typically compatible with the traditional
notions of feminisms. Nevertheless, feminist satire and humor do exist and have in
many instances been employed as a form of resistance against women’s current
cultural situation (Walker, 1988).
This is applicable to the case of “Noon Alniswa”, where we can observe how satire
as a cyber-mediated practice is being deployed to resist several patriarchal norms,
allowing Saudi women to disrupt the patriarchal scripts of discourse that discourage
them from speaking up, to a context where they can speak on their own terms.
Besides, satire contributes in challenging the one-dimensional representations of
Saudi women who are often framed within a rhetoric of victimization and submission
(Mohanty, 1988), by showing that women can be both active and vocal towards
changing the common preconception and stereotypes regarding them. Offering by
that new tactics that redefine women’s representation in the public eye.
Moreover, satire also represents a micro-strategy of resistance that is directed
against certain hegemonic gender norms and patriarchal definitions of masculinity.
These hegemonic patterns of masculinity are not necessarily manifested through
aggression (though aggression could be used); but through culture, institutions, and
persuasion (Connell and Messerschmit, 2005), and then sustained though the
exclusion or demeaning of women.
Conveniently, satire as a micro-strategy of resistance operates through the
occurrence of gradual moves that function as discrete traces within a plurality of
resistances (Stratford, 2002), as the the nature of resistance is not viewed as radical,
but subtle.
Hence, satire as a cyber-mediated practice embodies in its content, modes of
production and consumption, a cultural product that takes a life on its own, entailing a
process of resistance.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
21
CONCLUSION
The case of “Noon Alniswa” demonstrates that the advent and development of the
internet has expanded the frontiers of feminist activism, as it carried significant
implications for Saudi women to engage in feminist cultural production practices, both
in multimedia and textual forms.
Moreover, it provides an example of how YouTube could function as counter-public
space that offers an alternative space for women to deconstruct the “socially dominant
discourses” (Wimmer, 2009), by allowing them to negotiate their identities, through
satire, social critique and commentary.
Furthermore, the cause study under consideration also illustrates how satire as a
cyber-mediated act of resistance can be deployed to articulate some women’s stories
in their own voice rather than through the filter of one media representation or
another. Where women in Saudi Arabia in particular have been often portrayed in
mainstream media as passive, voiceless victims of their structural patriarchal
environment, due to the historically rooted discourse of the “other” that precedes the
colonial era, which in fact fails to account the complex multifaceted situation of of
Saudi women and their forms of agency.
Satire as A Cyber-Mediated Practice the Case of “Noon Alniswa”
22
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The URLs of the episodes on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uk6erlkiSxo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUs6cm22QyY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DK6TL_iAbXs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJNm64tG1Zs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CC9bv0CFgAs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1_z22tL_I0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCI9whRmfDI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oafqAjT5_dw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gb2e3GtWC6o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RV0GNbstqb8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVGI4PSPeac
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5ZM4MAGJis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF4pK6lyXSA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uDU7k16tIw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub4hly9tUJg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWOZWkMk9Yo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOOZyxFt_uA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNklKdT1kSo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0ObpX_tsVM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKL6Mc6L6bQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9CYEvuXJK8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKpWlZsdzM4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4Ze2sVRJrs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pvRPNUnfgw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JhXWDVS6RY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62XEHrVBmog
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWjwym4I_uU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lsl5r91XQA8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWlnCXv9oOM
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117202 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
#SOMEONETELLCNN: THE AGONISTIC
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SOUTH AND NORTH MEDIA
MEMORIES
DAVID KATIAMBO
ABSTRACT
The international media stand accused for creating a negative retrospective memory about
Africa through misreporting. Social media is providing an alternative channel to air counter-
narratives. Through Discourse Theoretical Analysis this paper uses the agonistic democracy
theory to explain how Twitter is enabling Kenyans to create an optimistic prospective memory as
a counter narrative to Western media’s negative retrospective memory about Africa. Mouffe’s
concept of “agonism” will be utilized to conceptualize how uncivil attacks are enabling Kenyans
to fend off international media misreporting. The paper unpacks how Kenyans on Twitter (KOT)
used incivility against CNN to to create a national agonistic memory ahead of the 2015 Africa
visit by President Obama. The paper analyses incivility at #SomeonetellCNN as a form of
collective remembrance, meaning not only remembering what CNN had already said, the
retrospective memory, but also remembering what CNN was expected to do, the prospective
memory.
Keywords: Agonism, memory, prospective, remembrance, misreporting, incivility, social
media.
INTRODUCTION
Misreporting of Africa by international news media channels is a common
occurrence. Such misreporting happened in July 2015, ahead of President Barack
Obama’s visit to East Africa when CNN called Kenya a “hotbed of terror”. The article on
the CNN Web story's opening sentence as well as a tweet from the news network's
Twitter read: “President Barack Obama is not just heading to his father's homeland,
but to a hotbed of terror." This was followed by a television news feature and short
studio ‘expert’ discussion.
The news item enraged a group of Kenyans who write on Twitter through the
hashtags #KOT. The instantaneous reaction as it has happened to similar issues was
the re-launch of #SomeonetellCNN by #KOT who used the hashtag to attack CNN
through satirical and uncivil statements.
Department of Communication, University of South Africa. dkatiambo@gmail.com
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and North Media Memories
26
After several weeks of continued attacks by #KOT, Tony Maddox, the CNN
executive vice president and managing director, flew to Nairobi to apologize, agreeing
CNN could have covered the story differently (Mutiga, 2015). In his apology, Maddox
said:
It wasn’t a deliberate attempt to portray Kenya negatively, it is regrettable and
we shouldn’t have done it. There is a world at war with extremists; we know what
a hotbed of terror looks like, and Kenya isn’t one (CNN Executive Flies to Kenya to
Apologize for “hotbed” comment, 2015, Mutiga, 2015).
The apology was welcomed by triumphal press releases from government agencies.
For example the Kenyan High Commission in UK posted on its website a picture of the
CNN executive standing next to the Kenyan president, the story explained how “Tony
Maddox, travelled from Atlanta to Nairobi to pay a courtesy call on His Excellency
President Uhuru Kenyatta, C.G.H. at State House, Nairobi, to personally apologize on
behalf of CNN International and [express] deep regret after portraying Kenya as a
‘hotbed of terror’...”(CNN Executive Flies to Kenya to Apologize for “hotbed” comment,
2015).
#SomeonetellCNN is not the only recorded antagonistic engagement by #KOT,
similar social media antagonisms are a common trend. For instance months before
#SomeonetellCNN, the president of the Republic of Rwandan, Paul Kagame had
engaged a in a heated exchange with a popular Kenyan blogger who urged him not to
extend his term of office. This was followed by creation of a hashtag
#someonetellkagame, which was used by #KOT to attack the long serving Rwandan
president.
The influence of #KOT is due to high demand and unique internet use by Kenyans.
Despite the county’s low per capita income, Kenyans have developed affordable
internet access options —mobile phones. It should be noted that providing internet
accessibility to all, the popular model in developed countries, only solves part of the
problems of hindering internet use since accessibility must be matched with demand,
lack of which will render the networks underutilized.
Through mobile phone access and other innovative approaches, the population
using internet services reached 52.37% in 2013 and with an annual growth of 18.8%
(Communication Commission of Kenya, 2013:26), it is expected that all Kenyans will
have access to internet services in the next two years. From a demand perspective,
the Communication Authority of Kenya attributes the rapid increase in internet use to
increased use of social media especially through mobile phones (Communication
Commission of Kenya, 2014, 2015). In fact, telecommunication service providers often
have their capacity overloaded due to periodic surges in use. This has made the
leading service provider, Safaricom, to provider to regularly offer promotional
discounts for off-peak use (Browse All Night, 2015).
Use of mobile phones to access Twitter and other social media has increased
frequency of use since Kenyans have internet wherever they go. This is partly of the
reasons for the popularity of hashtags such as #KOT. This has created a permanent
Twitter presence of #KOT.
Twitter hashtags have become a tool of playful civic engagement by Kenyans.
Hashtags are created to make it easier for users to find messages. Creation of
hashtags is done by placing hash character in front of key word or phrase. Although
users, often in a non-serious environment, create hashtags as entertainment spaces,
the hashtags can become serious social and political discussion spaces.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
27
REMEMBERING AFRICA: A NEGATIVE RETROSPECTIVE MEMORY
CASCADED BY DEMAND FOR A POSITIVE PROSPECTIVE MEMORY
Through memory we remember the past and the future. Remembering the futures
is developing a ‘prospective memory’ which is different from ‘retrospective memory’,
remembering the past (Meacham and Leiman, 1982). Retrospective memory has been
defined by McDaniel and Einstein (2007:1) as ‘remembering to carry out intended
actions at an appropriate time in the future’, while Marsh, Cook, and Hicks (2006: 115)
define it as ‘memory for one’s intentions’. Prospective memory enables us to fulfil daily
schedules by remembering the right things we are supposed to do at right time
(Masumoto, 2011:30).
Unfortunately, historiography has emphasized retrospective memory when
discussing Africa as if Africa has no prospective memory. The imagination of Africa is
shaped by the pessimistic retrospective memory of slave trade, several historical
misfortunes, and the artificial poverty amid plenty that cannot be utilized due to the
imperial structure of the world economy. This has led to construction of Africa as a
scene of suffering, often mocked for collapsed of state infrastructure, medical care,
education among others. The bad situation has been worsened by the current informal
political systems that litter Africa which are different from the hegemonic Western
democracy. This has made it difficult for westerners to understand Africa of today. The
complexities of African occurrences have created a memory of Africa as a subordinate
to other continents. It is based on such historiography that the image of Africa in the
international media socializes the world to see the continent as subordinate to others.
This socialization has not only been directed at others, but Africans themselves.
Africans have been feed international media images that emphasis their suffering and
subordinate conditions.
What the international media has done to Africa is to create Afro-pessimism, what
Leys (1997) fears is the “faintly racist doom mongering”. This has been brought out by
the media reports that depict the entire continent as an orgy of starvation, ethnic
pogroms, and economic collapse (Soske, 2004:18). The situation is best summarised
by a headline run in the Canadian National Post “Africans Going Extinct?”
Misreporting of Africa fails to recognise the ingenuity of individual Africans in
developing locally appropriate solutions to the problems they are facing. Africanists
like Chabal and Daloz (1999) warns against resorting to simplistic explanations since
“what is happening in Africa is in this respect no different from what has happened
elsewhere”. After all tribal politics mirrors, real politics which is “a process of
legitimation of how to organise and regulate power and allocate scarce resources
(Louw, 2010:8-10).
The overemphasis of retrospective memory and suppression of the Africa’s
prospective memory has been worsened by lack of African media—media channels
that are not just located in Africa but also understand Africa. Indeed, many media
channels in Africa, including those owned and operated by Africans do not know Africa.
Instead they know a post colony (see Mbembe, 2001). Therefore, both the
international media and the colonized African media stand accused for creating a
negative retrospective memory about Africa. This retrospective memory has been
aggravated by lack of counter-narratives from conventional African political leaders
whose rhetoric reflects colonised mindset than what is required achieve what Ngugi wa
Thiong’o (1986) terms ‘re-membering’ Africa.
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and North Media Memories
28
Fortunately, growth in information and communication technology is providing a
tool that serve Africa’s postcolonial media needs. Nevertheless, the narrative of lack of
access and the resultant digital divide is the retrospective memory the world has about
information and communication technology in Africa. What is not told is how Africans
have overcome the technology barriers. For example, the M-Pesa technology (“pesa” is
a Swahili word for cash) that uses common mobile phones to transfer millions of
shillings daily and has provided banking services to the previously unbanked
population. According to Runde (2015) the success of M-Pesa has reshaped Kenya’s
banking and telecom sectors, providing financial inclusion to nearly 20 million Kenyans,
and created thousands of small businesses. Therefore, in Africa ICT infrastructure is
only a small part of how people use ICT which can be well understood by focusing on
the people and contexts. The world should consider uses of ICT that are playful but
serious at the same time, civil and uncivil. This will broaden understanding of how
Africans have adapted their needs to available technologies.
Africa is remembered more for what is has been from the 20th century and less of
what it will be in the coming years. Just as we remember or forget what happened in
the past, we also remember or forget what we need to do in the future (Tenenboim-
Weinblatt, 2011:213), but it is unfortunate that colonialism wiped out Africa’s history
and the resultant coloniality has concealed Africa’s future. This has left Africa with dim
retrospective and prospective memories.
Although the success of the independence struggle was a triumph over Western
hegemony, this independence reproduced coloniality albeit imperial colonisation in
which colonial powers control Africa through what Althusser called Ideological State
Apparatus, among which is the mass media. Resistance to direct colonialism in the
1950-60s incorrectly conceptualized freedom as self-rule. Such incorrect understanding
of freedom neglects the fact that the end of colonial rule gave way to postcolonial
states that are still controlled by dominant states of the West. To Ndlovu-Gatsheni
(2015:485) the domains of culture, the psyche, mind, language, aesthetics, religion,
and many others have remained colonized.
The term coloniality refers to colonial-like power relations existing today in states
that were directly colonised (Quijan, 2000). The authors identified several types of
coloniality among them control of knowledge and subjectivity. To Maldonado-Torres
coloniality is different from colonialism because coloniality survives colonialism and “it
is maintained in books, in the criteria for academic performance, in cultural patterns, in
common sense, in the self-image of peoples, in aspirations of self, and so many other
aspects of our modern experience.” To this concern, there is need to decolonize the
mind (Ngugi wa Thiong’o, 1986:3) since the imperialistic power relations of power and
conceptions of knowledge in the colonial world are were not ended by the anti-colonial
resistance of the 1960s. To decolonize is to bring to light the silenced views and shows
the limits of imperial ideology disguised as the true interpretation the modern world
(Mignolo, 2005:33).
But the question that many decolonial thinkers did not answer is how possible it
was for Africa to decolonize without having its own media institutions. The process of
changing the continent’s collective prospective memory by re-interpreting retrospective
its collective memory should be supported by the mass media. This is what Africa has
lacked for long. It cannot be denied that before the coming of social media we didn’t
have African media institutions, we had media institutions in Africa.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
29
Conventional international media, like the BBC and CNN serves the ends of the
dominant states (Herman & Chomsky, 1994:01) but Twitter incivility discourse of
#SomeonetellCNN indicates reduced control by conventional media. Conventional
media are the propaganda machine for dominant states and elites. Herman and
Chomsky (1994) noted that domination of the media by elites and marginalisation of
dissenting voices through the news media are powerful constraints built into the
system and “occur naturally” that alternatives are hardily imaginable.
THE #KOT ‘TWITTERTARIAT’
The influence of #KOT rejuvenates the long-standing debates in the social
sciences—the structure/agency debate. The concept of agency is used in reference to
the capacity of individuals in Africa for independent and free choice while structure
refers to the social arrangements that can sometimes limit individual freedom. The key
problem has been the assumption that the international media hegemony structures
influence individual actions.
The influence of #KOT means the agency has taken over the structure. Indeed, the
agency is about the relationships between an individual human organism and everyone
and everything that surrounds it (Gardner, 2004:1). The paper argues that #KOT are
agents initiating action even when constrained by social structures. The study avoids
falling into the trap of Althusserian structural determinism that treats individuals as
being controlled through simple ‘interpellation’, opposing the ability of the agency to
control its own consciousness.
By underscoring agency, this paper looks at how individuals’ actions are changing
the way Africa is represented in international media. The agency-centred approach
brings out the power of individuals and their purposeful behaviour over social
structures in influencing the image of Africa in international media. Indeed, social
media enables participation in news media by agents who were previously silenced by
structures of traditional media.
In the push to redeem the image of Africa by #KOT, the decolonization agents are
common people since the states and mainstream media have maintained a colonial
strategy. As it was argued earlier, the mainstream media in Africa is not African, but a
colonised media.
Twitter has given Kenyans an opportunity to retell the Kenyan story and minimize
loss of the nation’s heritage due to persistent misreporting by international media.
The suitability of Twitter is because of its architecture enables individuals to freely
contribute in an informal background. In particular #KOT are using incivility and to
construct a positive national cultural representation in the international arena by
redefining how Kenya is represented by international media.
The user friendliness of Twitter and access through mobile phones has led to
extraordinarily high levels of audience participation making the human agency
dominant and social structure subordinate. Therefore, Twitter has handed over the
media power to the people; this is enabling Africans to explain their stories. For
instance, the hashtag #SomeOneTellCNN empowered Kenyans to remind dominant
forces like the international media what they should report about Africa. Through
social media people in Africa are actively engaged in shaping the prospective memory
of the international media by making them aware of what Africans expect.
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and North Media Memories
30
Although news occurrences and their coverage are spontaneous, news can also be
seen as representing the past. News producers know they are creating the past that is
interpreted with a futuristic mind. Unfortunately, Africa has lacked the power to
influence news coverage about Africa by making Africa’s prospective memory known.
Fortunately, this power is being provided by social media networks like Twitter and
Facebook. For instance, twits after negative news coverage by CNN are among what
commonly on “to-do list” of the increasingly internet surfing Africans.
Although news can naively be thought of as being retrospective, since it is
information about the past, all news has prospective memory dimensions. The
prospective dimension of the primarily retrospective memories, argues Tenenboim-
Weinblatt (2011:217), in turn influences the selection of contemporary issues and
events that constitute the media agenda.
Twitter comments emphasises the need to remember what is yet to happen: the
good image of Africa based on the significant changes witnessed in the recent past.
Indeed, based on the natural wealth, the land resources and youthful population Africa
is waiting to happen. This is what the African ‘twittertariat’ is trying to say.
Social media has strengthened the ability of individuals to participate in political
action even though scholars neglect such roles. Scott (1989:33) lamented about the
“narrow and poverty-stricken view of political action” which overlooks the politics of
subordinate groups, the “everyday forms of resistance”, that constitute the most vital
means by which lower classes manifest their political interests. Individual uncivil
participation in political action such as “acts as foot-dragging, dissimulations, false
compliance, feigned ignorance, desertion, pilfering, smuggling, poaching, arson,
slander, sabotage, surreptitious assault and murder, anonymous threats, and so on”,
according to Scott (1989:33), are important political actions that can lead to change.
The narrative of the individual and the subaltern masses has been obscured as the
role played by ‘great men’ is emphasised. But acts by common people individually
when engaging in political action can, as Scott (1989:35) hypothesises, “add up almost
surreptitiously to a large event”. This is what KOT achieved through
#SomeonetellCNN.
It is unfortunate that Africa’s postcolonial historiography has emphasized
participation in organized, open confrontations at the expense of the equally important
“everyday forms of resistance”. Additionally, the narratives of resistance give
prominence to the role played by ‘great men’ at the expense of the ‘subaltern masses’
(Makombe, 2011:01), the other people who remain undocumented but contribute in
various ways on their own. The subaltern “everyday forms of resistance” can be
compared to those participating in a process of cascading military desertion, in
contrast to open confrontation that is similar to open mutiny aiming at eliminating or
replacing officers (Scott (1989:34).
The subaltern expression in social media is indirect attack on the dominant
international media, a strategy different from approaches used by organised political
actors, to express the similar issues more openly. The common people act individually
when engaging in social media incivility because as subalterns they are unable to
engage in large-scale collective action as they lack organizational capability. However,
a collection of these single individual uncivil events may, as Scott (1989:35)
hypothesizes, “add up almost surreptitiously to a large event”. Therefore, everyday
forms of resistance do not end as individual actions, instead the resistance can
“become sufficiently generalized to become a pattern of resistance”. Although
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
31
“everyday resistance” is individual actions, this does not mean the actions lack
coordination, rather the concept of cooperation can define political organization in
small communities with dense informal social networks (Scott, 1989:51).
In Africa, what might seem common individual behaviours are tactics used by
subalterns to navigate the political which is more informal than formal. Resistance is
found in “informal” places unlike the Western type found in trade unions, NGOs and
churches. Chabal (1999::xii) warns against definition of African politics with reference
to politics of the West, suggesting Africa should be approached from a different, more
local angle—the perspective of the “informal” and “agency”— “what can be observed
on the ground. The author recognises that resistance in Africa, the opposition by
individual or collective agency, is not where it is lies in the West, therefore we need a
bottom up approach when dealing with Africa. A critique of how power is exercised in
African cannot be found where Western theories have directed scholars, but in
informal acts of “disobedience and avoidance”. More important, it is incorrect to view
Africans as
..helpless in the face of twin evils of state oppression and globalization [since]
their obvious ingenuity and resilience points to myriad informal instances of
successful resistance (Chabal, 1999:xix).
Chabal (1999: xvi) mentions the “vocabulary used by ordinary people when they
mock or insult the elite” as conducive to undermining elites’ political legitimacy. The
‘twittertariat’ is thus a form of subaltern resistance, a tool used by ordinary people in
confrontation with the dominant groups through rebellion and insurgencies. Such
forms of resistance, argues Willenms and Obadare (2014:9) “encompasses a wide-
ranging collection of cultural practices such as rituals, gossip, humour, dress, and
behavioural codes”.
The sarcastic messages and incivilities by KOT can grouped together with other
“everyday forms of resistance” that have attempted to take over from where the fight
to end direct colonial rule stopped, a struggle against the postcolonial state. Such
resistance is considered by Ndlovu-Gatsheni (2014:28) are attempts by Africans to
make sense of the murky present that is confined by historically-structured capitalist,
patriarchal, Western-centric, Christian-centric, heteronormative, racially hierarchised
and asymmetrically organised postmodern world system created by imperial designs
and underpinned by colonial matrices of power.
These incivilities on #SomeOneTellCNN created a memory and a construct of Africa
different from that of postcolonial Africa. #KOT are constructing an imagined
community by sharing a common ‘outsider’, the enemy who has been absent in
postcolonial Africa. KOT are creating knowledge that reminds people of their national
pride by creating an ‘us’ against ‘them’. This has enabled ordinary people to establish
an affirmative collective memory narrative in the context of international media.
Although individual uncivil social media comments can be equated to normal every
day antagonistic news, in the long term the aggregate of these comments evolve into
themes that capture and frame reality unconsciously creating a counter-hegemonic
news-flow that can shape the society’s memory.
Uncivil twits are a heretical challenge to conventional international media discourses
that emphasizes civility. Twitter is outside the ‘official’ symbolic universe, providing an
opportunity for #KOT to legitimate deviant versions of politics as a challenge to the
naturalized imperial world order. Twitter is enabling Kenyans to create an alternative
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and North Media Memories
32
symbolic universe which is a threat to the previously taken for granted postcolonial
world. The confrontation of CNN by #KOT implies a problem of power, in such
confrontation, winning depends more on power than on the theoretical ingenuity of
the respective legitimators.
Denaturalisation of legitimated reality is a fight against machineries of universe-
maintenance (Berger & Luckman, 1966:126). The negative perception of Twitter
incivility is because the world has be trained to be objective and ‘absorbed’ into the
universe-maintenance machinery. Under such caging people forget that the universe
of international media hegemony that emphasises civility is based on socially
constructed reality.
THEORY AND METHODOLOGY
Continuous misreporting of Africa has created a fixed image about Africa by closure
of the discursive field. Africa’s negative image has been constructed by establishing
rules by which the world is interpreted. Therefore, the image of Africa is a product of
hegemony not essence. As emphasized by Sayyid and Zac (1998:262) hegemonic
projects can be judged successful when they achieve two things: success in making
hegemonic rules the ‘natural’ rules and its limits the ‘natural’ limits of the community;
and success in contributing to ‘forgetting’ other projects against which it was
struggling. The image of Africa is in this state of affairs since the rules that are used to
evaluate its image have been made to look natural making the world to have a limited
knowledge about Africa. Additionally, the world has been made to forget alternatives
to the negative image created by the international news media.
The study deconstructs the taken-for-granted, commonsensical memory created by
misreporting of Africa. The collective memory created by the international media lacks
a fixed meaning, instead of closure as it has been previously, #KOT are transforming it
through discursive struggle. Consequently #SomeonetellCNN Twitter handle is
analyzed from two traditions of discourse analysis: Foucault (1972) interdisciplinary
social constructionist view of how discourse influences power structures in the society
and how individuals are trained to become part of the common masses and Laclau and
Mouffe (1985) discursive conflict which emphasize the struggle between conflicting
– or antagonistic– discourses, each discourse striving to impose its own system of
meaning. A basic premise common the two approaches to discourse analysis is that
language is a medium through which power is abused, dominance created, and
inequality enacted, reproduced, and resisted in the social and political context.
The memory created about Africa is discourse which according to Laclau and
Mouffe (1985:105) is a structured totality resulting from articulatory practice.
Discourse is creation of reality and making this created reality to appear natural.
Objectivity according to Discourse Theory is constructed through the discursive
production of meaning (Jørgensen and Phillips, 2002:33). Through discursivity Laclau
and Mouffe (1985:108) transform the Marxist tradition by abolishing the division
between base and superstructure, abolishing the determining role of the economy as
proposed by classical Marxism. Nevertheless, where a particular discourse is dominant,
then such domination is as a result of a hegemonic process. This is the situation of the
collective memory created about Africa. Luckily hegemonic processes are in
antagonistic relation and can never be fully settled.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
33
A discourse is formed by the partial fixation of meaning around nodal points, the
privileged/master signifiers, similar to Lacan‘s point de capiton (see Laclau & Mouffe
1985:112). These are points at which “signifier and signified are knotted together”
temporality limiting their slippage (Lacan, 1993:268). Other signs acquire meaning
from their relationship to the nodal point. They give meaning to a chain of signifiers by
partially fixing meaning within those chains, yet the meaning arise from the play of
differences instead of being a priori privileged (Laclau & Mouffe, 1985:112). A
discourse is a reduction of possibilities given that it is established as a totality in which
each sign is fixed as a moment through its relations to other signs by the exclusion of
all other possible meanings that the signs could have had (Jørgensen & Phillips
2002:27).
Discourse Theory equates objectivity to ideology since what has been naturalised
through objectivity appears as given and unchangeable and seems not to derive its
meaning from its difference from something else (Laclau 1990: 89). Objectivity hides
the fluid nature of meaning thereby masking the alternative possibilities that would
otherwise have presented themselves (Jørgensen & Phillips 2002:37). The collective
memory created by the international media masks alternative collective memories
about Africa. This masking collective memory is the type of power that KOT
#SomeonetellCNN are fighting. Objectivity is also a form of sedimented power since it
hides the traces of power making us forget that the world is politically constructed
(Laclau 1990: 60).
The international media has produced discourse used to control the world by
encouraging forms of self-direction by the different nations. The presentation
interprets the international media from a Foucauldian understanding as tools used to
create “rules, opinions, and advice on how to behave as one should [creating] a
framework of everyday conduct” (Foucault 1985: 12). These are tools that covertly
give dominant states power to govern the world.
#SomeonetellCNN: an agonistic collective memory constructed by KOT
‘twittertariat’.
#KOT developed counter memories that were strongly antagonistic, creating a re-
imagined Kenya. Thus, African are no longer muted victims. Previous retrospective
memory created by the international media had constructed Africa as a victim without
individual agency. Africans have for long been equivalent to victims describe by Levy
and Sznaider (2002:103) as the ‘non-acting victim’. In the international media, the
African victims had no voices and no faces; they were mute subjects whose stories
were CNNnised by the international media. It was assumed that muted, anonymous
and damaged victims “need mediating third parties who articulate their suffering and
advocate their claims – they need civic or professional representation (Giesen,
2004:69). However, through #KOT this is no longer the case, Kenya is being
remembered since #KOT have enabled their country to become a victim with a voice
and agency.
The twits listed below were sampled as is the tradition in Discourse Analysis, to
locate the most relevant cases for researching the phenomenon under study (Flick,
2007:29). The twits can explain how social media incivility in influencing the
construction of an agonistic prospective memory. Howarth (2005:19) proposes that the
criteria for selection should be the specific problem being investigated since it is the
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and North Media Memories
34
problem which strongly determines the appropriate context and limits of a particular
research project.
The twits were not only made by Kenyans, they came from all over the world, from
people of different national identities. What was common is the antagonism towards
CNN. Below are samples of the twits, arranged in no specific order.
Tweet 1. Hell hath no fury like an African scorned: #someonetellcnn,
#davidguetta, now: #LintonLies. Yet, we are inseparable
Tweet 2. K24 TV follows
Maya Hayakawa @MayaHayakawa Jun 29
guys remember #SomeonetellCNN an example of how Africa has taken control over
their narratives #TaxJusticeMedia2016
Tweet 3. CurateKE | Mwende @CurateKE Jun 30 Did you know that @winmitch
was the originator of the #SomeoneTellCNN tag, way back in 2012? #KOTThrowback
#SMDayKE
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
35
Tweet 4
Tweet 5 K24 TV follows
Maya Hayakawa @MayaHayakawa Jun 29 guys remember #SomeonetellCNN an
example of how Africa has taken control over their narratives #TaxJusticeMedia2016
Tweet 6 Alex Omari @alexomaril #AhsanteKenya7s We are a hotbed of World
7s Rugby, #SomeoneTellCNN
Tweet 7 patrick mayoyo follows
Joseph Riro @RiroJoe Apr 14
Retweeted TRENDING (@TRENDINGKENYA): #SomeoneTellCNN that the last time
a Kenyan made a bed hot in Hawaii, it... http://fb.me/5fI59K4et
Tweet 8 Michael Cheruiyot™ @Mikeknapz Apr 12 Kesses, Kenya
#KenyaIsBestKnownFor #SomeOneTellCNN #someonetellnigerians
#kenyansvsnigerians tweefs.
Tweet 9 Laura Seay @texasinafrica Apr 7 @timnjiru Here's betting they cover
the story with a map mislabeling South Sudan as "Kenya." #SomeoneTellCNN
#SomeonetellCNN: The Agonistic relationship between South and North Media Memories
36
Tweet 10 Thee_Dantez @danricky254 Apr 7 #KOTBestTBTCollections that time
when CNN tried to joke with the mighty #KOT on #SomeoneTellCNN hehe they felt
the wave
Tweet 11 Laura Seay @texasinafrica Apr 1 Bono, voluntourism, map quizzes,
Toto, Ebola, #SomeoneTellCNN, & @AfricasaCountry in 1 post. Our work here is done.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
37
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117203 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
MACHINE LANGUAGES AS MEDIA INFRASTRUCTURES
MUJIE LI
ABSTRACT
This paper argues that through affording communications between machines and humans,
machine languages become structures of media. To examine the argument, the paper selects a
virtual city model of the Alphatown as a case study and draws on Roman Jakobson’s linguistic
theory, at first analyses how the metalanguage functions via the mediums of listing and
navigation in the Alphatown, then looks at how the affects of boredom, being lost and
strangeness arise from the media infrastructures based upon metalanguage, and analyses where
the poetic function lies in the transmission of affects and how the sensual and the material
aspects of machine languages emerge thus functioning as poetic. With analysing the metalingual
and poetic functions in a diagrammatic thought of machine languages, different levels of
machine languages can be considered as media structures, while media structures manifest
themselves as material and processual in the meantime.
Keywords: Media, machine languages, metalanguage, poetics.
INTRODUCTION TO THE ALPHATOWN
The Alphatown project is an excess product of the Douban online community that
was launched in 2010. By excess I refer to a kind of energy of active users overflowing
from Douban to Alphatown, hence the Alphatown was built and configured in this
background. Regarding the construction of the Alphatown, its basic structure is based
on listing, following the structure of the Douban website; for example, the categories
(books, films, music, etc.) of Douban are composed of lists of data objects, such as
book cover images, book names, contents, comments and reading notes, and users
are able to add information on any of these components and make further lists of what
has been read, what is being read, and what is going to be read, etc.; while the
Alphatown is arranged in a list of urban blocks, in which lists of streets, shops and
apartments are laid out (See Figures 1.1, 1.3 and 1.4, below).
At its first stage, the beta test of the Alphatown only opened to Douban-registered
users, allowing active users to generate qualities of virtual streets, apartments and
shops by data; for example, users are able to name streets as well as add images and
texts to shops and apartments; these names, texts and images formulate the qualities
of streets, apartments and shops. Only permitting the elites from Douban to access it
PhD candidate of Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Sussex. 0muer0@gmail.com
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
42
limits yet also constructs the style of the Alphatown, and it also becomes the first and
main cause that limits further interactions by the general public. Hence, the motivation
for production runs out, leading to the gradual obsolescence of the virtual city.
With the Alphatown opening to the general public, whereby the game designer
intended to bring in more users to play the game, Alphatown showed a change in the
map pattern at the interface from blocks to a honeycomb shape (See Figure 1.2,
below). This new map allows more users to “live in” and gives a greater capacity for
interactions in the game, hence navigation bars are introduced into the infrastructures
of streets, shops and apartments, allowing users to mobilise themselves to construct
structures of the virtual city. However, these navigational functions in a way
counteract the interactions from users as users are easily lost in the navigation, while
also the overall design of the virtual city does not generate more interactive
experiences by users, especially when the game designer found that the change of the
map pattern did not work in bringing in more active users. Thus, they stopped fixing
the bugs in the game and let the virtual city grow under the force of users. This
became the second cause for the obsolescence of the Alphatown. It leads to the fact
that users began to communicate about the affects of being lost as well as the
strangeness and boredom within the structure of the virtual city, such as using talking
boards in the neighbourhoods to exchange information on the rules of play or
inventing new rules of play. Hereby, the information these mediums carry is not about
what the virtual city model intends to produce according to the game rules, it rather
becomes noise redundant to the game production process, but is then turned into
another kind of information for users’ playing and inventing new “rules” of
communicating and visualising effects within the same structures.
Although later, when the game designer recognised the obsolescence of the virtual
city, they introduced a metro transportation network, added amongst the nodes of the
streets, in order to mobilise users’ activities and generate more traffic. This structure
failed to do so in that it functioned as a navigation tool that again made users
confused and isolated users’ activities, hence it accelerated the obsolescence of the
virtual city. Amongst the sense of isolation, users began to exchange information for
communicating new rules of play: sourcing from the affects of being lost, strangeness
and boredom, users in the Alphatown intently left a massive quantity of messages on
the talking boards, waiting for the automatic erasing mechanism of the system to
produce the empty form of the street, hence generating the affect of obsolescence
through users’ experiences.
THE MEDIA INFRASTRUCTURES OF THE ALPHATOWN
Alphatown as a case study allows us to think whether a building of data structures
can be seen as structures and forms of media and mediations, allowing forces to
circulate within and among this. Machine languages provide a way of understanding
themselves as structures of media through affording communications between human
and machines. By machine language I mean a pragmatic way of operating symbols
within machines. In the context of the Alphatown, the construction of data structures
at the interface is a form of machine language; data structures’ construction
communicates user input and the design of computational technologies. However, this
socially interactive level of machine languages belongs to only a part of machine
languages. This paper aims to clarify and analyse machine languages on both
mathematical and mechanical as well as socially interactive levels.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
43
In order to analyse how machine languages become structures of media, I first
propose that there are two major functions of machine languages, drawing upon
Roman Jakobson’s linguistic theory: the metalingual and poetic functions. Because a
diagrammatic thought deriving from Charles Sanders Peirce and Gilles Deleuze’s
linguistic thoughts is helpful to understand the functions of language at different levels
of machine languages, this paper will move on to explain how the functions of the
metalanguage and poetics work in a diagrammatic thought process of machine
language. To examine the argument, the text then puts the theoretical framework into
the case study of the Alphatown, first analysing how the metalanguage functions via
the mediums of listing and navigation in the Alphatown, then moving on to look at
how the affects arise from the media infrastructures based upon metalanguage and to
analyse where the poetic function lies in the transmission of affects and how the
sensual and the material aspects of machine languages emerge, thus functioning as
poetic. Through analysing the metalingual and poetic functions in a diagrammatic
thought of machine languages, different levels of machine languages can be
considered as media structures, while media structures manifest themselves as
material and processual in the meantime.
MACHINE LANGUAGES AS STRUCTURES OF MEDIA
The argument this paper would like to construct is that machine languages become
structures of media in distributing forces while also making media material and
processual. To develop this argument, a definition must first be made of a machine
language: language is a system of symbols as a method of both verbal and non-verbal
communications, while machines in digital cultures refer more to digital and
computational machines. Because the execution of code is the mechanism of digital
and computational machines, it can be considered as a way of operating symbols.
Hence, the operations of symbols can also be seen as a method of communication
both between machines themselves and between machines and humans.
There are different layers of machine languages. On the mathematical and
mechanical level, machine language is a set of codes consisting of instructions that are
executed directly by the computer’s processing unit, like when a machine language
works at the hardware dimension. Regarding the software dimension, programming
languages are designed to communicate instructions to machines, specifically,
assembly language corresponds to a particular architecture of the computer, and
interpreted language in programming implements command subroutines already
compiled into machine code. Therefore, machine languages here not only denote the
execution of code on a hardware dimension, they also cover the software dimension in
the execution of code. Following this, I propose they also work at the level of social
interactions of code. Because the operation of software relies on users’ feedback as
input, it also works under the social circumstances in which particular operational
functions of software by users directly cause the command and implementation of the
programme; for example, the upgrade of a software is determined by its exposure to
bugs in social use. Such a formulation on the definition of machine language suggests
that the execution of code is inseparable from the transmission of a message in
communications and, henceforth, machine languages become essential to understand
media and forms of mediations.
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
44
Then the question to be asked is how machine languages become structures of
media. To approach this question, we first need to understand the structuralisation of
machine languages in relation to linguistic theories of structuralism. This
understanding requires us to know the changes which language is undergoing in the
context of digital and computational machines. From linguistic theories of
structuralism, the study of signs is composed of the signified and the signifier, as
developed by Ferdinand de Saussure (1959), which corresponds to thought and sound.
In machine languages, however, thought and sound are detached from humans and
internalised into machines. Thought becomes processes of reasoning while sound
becomes a series of actions effectuated by operations. Code in the middle of reasoning
and action on the one hand executes processes of reasoning; on the other hand, it
simulates actions in the implementation. Such an elemental analogue between signs of
natural languages and those of machine languages illustrates a condition of applying
linguistic theories of structuralism to machine languages. Furthermore, the work of
Roman Jakobson combines the functions of languages into the communication model
of code and message (Jakobson, 1960; Geoghegan, 2011). This development in
linguistic theories in turn offers a view of looking at machine languages based upon
code and message, suggesting there is the potential of machine languages being the
structures of media and forms of mediations.
Within this context of machine languages, this paper proposes to use Jakobson’s
linguistic formula as an entry point to analyse and think about how machine languages
become structures of media. The formula (Jakobson, 1960) states that the metalingual
and the poetic functions are two major functions of verbal communication among the
other four functions: referential, emotive, conative and phatic. The metalingual
function addresses the code itself in verbal communication, while the poetic function
addresses the message in verbal communication. Machine languages internalise code
into the execution process, and this execution of code is not only manifested in
informing about commands or engagements, but also in effectuating specific and
immanent acts. Such a process reflects the metalingual and poetic functions of
machine languages, because either commands or further acts work within the
operation of code itself, while code becomes communicative in informing commands or
engagements and effectuating acts.
To further illustrate the functions of metalanguage and poetics in machine
languages, the diagrammatic thoughts of Peirce and Gilles Deleuze respectively give
some outlines in relation to different levels of machine languages. To reiterate the
analysis above, machine languages can be seen as a compound of different levels, the
mathematical and mechanical level including the function of code at the hardware and
software dimensions, and the socially interactive level based on code and message.
Regarding today’s digital cultures, what are manifest as phenomena of machine
languages are those social activities involving the operations of software. In relation to
the case of the Alphatown to be discussed in the following part of this paper, its data
structure among the website interface is the object conjuncting between the design
iterations by the game designer and the inputs and feedback from the users. Before
investigating the metalingual and poetic functions of the building of the data structures
of the Alphatown, a diagrammatic thought is helpful for us to understand the major
functions of machine languages in an overall sense of different levels of machine
languages.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
45
Speaking of the mathematical level of machine languages, Peirce’s diagrammatic
thought explains the way of understanding how such a level of machine language
works in the context of the operations of signs. For Peirce, thought process is
formalised by speculation through a process of reasoning, which is conceived as a
diagrammatism, the process of thought’s self-control (Vellodi, 2014). This
diagrammatic thought is a system of signs that are aligned with their practical effects
on the world. Such a practical semiotics consists of dynamic elements constituting
semiotics as a process: objects, signs and interpretants. The sign is determined by the
representation of objects, and in turn determines an effect, its interpretant. This
principle of diagrammatic thought can be considered as the operation process of
machine languages, where the machine simulates an object by operating signs, hence
effectuating acts through execution and implementation. In this process of
diagrammatic thought, thought deals with logical truth in a way of speculative
reasoning, that is, “the role of the diagram is as generator of the laws that permit the
determination of the future with increasingly greater clarity, to aid the movement of
logic from the vague (particulars) to the definite (general), the movement of thought’s
‘self-controlling’ towards its ultimate destination: truth” (Vellodi, 2014). Therefore,
such a process functions as metalingual, addressing code itself.
However, the level of social interactions of code is also included in machine
languages, and it opens up space for machine language to engage with the outside of
machine reasoning and in turn actualises machine languages as material and sensual.
Deleuze’s construction on diagrammatic thought gives a demonstration of this. Based
on Peirce’s pragmatic semiotics, Deleuze develops diagrammatic thought in
constructing new reality as modes of being of material existence, which is in contrast
to Peirce’s logical possibility. The theory of signs thus orients towards their practical
bearings on the production of life, it is an asignifying semiotics stressing semiotic
materials that cannot be reduced to linguistic forms. The diagram hence is a pure
difference in itself, and signs are passages of deterritorialisation and reterritorialisation,
“they mark a certain threshold crossed in the course of these movements” (Deleuze &
Guattari, 2005). Deleuze’s diagram acts as an “abstract machine”, a pure matter
function with no form or substance of its own. “‘Abstraction’ designates rather the
intensive (differential, prior to the distinction interior/exterior), ‘machinic’ (immanently
and non-deterministically functional) and genetic (immanently creative/constructive)
plane of forces that ‘precedes’ formalisation and from which ‘a real that is yet to come,
a new type of reality’ emerges” (Vellodi, 2014). In relation to machine languages, signs
operated by codes directly trigger the implementation of acts and internalise further
exterior actions into renewed coding and commanding, such a deterritorialisation and
reterritorialisation combines codes with attributes of real things to construct reality.
This process can be considered as the functioning of the poetics focusing on message
itself, message in this context referring more to a form of communication generated
between machine and human.
From the functions of machine languages focusing on code and message, machine
languages can be considered as the structures of media. In addition, the diagrammatic
thought process of machine languages draws on reasoning as well as the opening of
signs; it indicates that the structures of media are constantly shifting in differentiating
relations, which I will explain in the following parts. In relation to the case of the
Alphatown, the machine language is the building of data structures. The following
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
46
parts will analyse how the metalingual and poetic functions work in this virtual city
model, and this process in turn demonstrates that media are processual and material.
THE METALANGUAGE OF DATA STRUCTURES IN THE ALPHATOWN
This paper provides a reading of the Alphatown by analysing the metalingual and
poetic functions of the data structure construction. In the initial stage of model
configuration of the Alphatown, the list as a basic way of data organisation
accumulates a certain amount of data together with the navigation bar. For example,
the patterns of street, shops and apartments in the virtual city are built upon the logic
of lists. With the aid of the navigation bar, users are able to add data to selected
streets, shops and/or apartments. Lists map out the patterns of the virtual city, and
especially when the Alphatown project was in its beta test, the structure of the virtual
city was still based on lists of the names of streets, and the visual representation of
the virtual city was lists of links rather than a honeycomb shape graphic. Therefore, list
is one of the conditions determining the structures of the virtual city. In the meantime,
navigation becomes another condition causing the structuralisation of the Alphatown.
Navigation gives an overall grasp of the different layers of the virtual city, and it is a
way of distributing data among an existing structure, thus it formulates another layer
of structure within. According to Jakobson (1960), the metalingual function focuses on
the code itself in language, that is to say, the addresser and the addressee pay
attention to the same code when transmitting a message. In the initial stage of the
Alphatown, the game designer as the addresser intended to build the data structure on
the basis of users’ interest, while the users as the addressee did so through the
mediations of list and navigation. List and navigation here as ways of coding no longer
formulate significations, but programme certain instructions, in a sense.
Here it is necessary to distinguish that listing and navigation, as ways of coding,
perform different functions at the initial stage of data accumulation and the later stage
of transmitting affects in the Alphatown, and these functions directly differentiate the
functions of the metalanguage and the poetics in the data structures of the Alphatown.
As stated above, list and navigation programme certain instructions as ways of coding
between the architecture designed by the game designer and modified by the user.
This belongs to a metalingual function because the addresser (game designer) and the
addressee (the user) mediate lists and navigation tools to communication instructions.
This metalingual function offers a foundation for data accumulation and paves the way
for transmitting further affects that perform the poetic function. Yet, at the later stage
of transmitting the affects of boredom, being lost and strangeness, listing and
navigation serve as the communication of messages: this on the one hand generates a
sense of isolation in playing the game, triggering a form of inactivity; on the other
hand, these inactivity produces excess energies, hence listing and navigation encode
the affects in the data structures of the Alphatown. Overall, listing and navigation as
ways of coding are operated as a selection and combination process of signs, such an
operation lies in the relationship of sign, code and symbol. In addition, the diagram of
the relationship of sign, code and symbol helps us to understand how the affects and
volition emerge in the basic game play based upon the metalingual function.
SIGNS, CODES AND SYMBOLS
First of all, it is important to distinguish the works of sign, code and symbol in the
building of the data structures of the Alphatown. Signs, in terms of Saussure (1959),
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
47
stands in-between the signifier and the signified, and acquires value and meaning
through having relationship between the signifier and the signified. If thinking about
the reasoning process of Peirce, the sign as a representation of an object effectuates
an interpretant as an ongoing and continuous process. In analogue with this, it can be
considered that machine languages operate signs by a set of codes, whereby signs
occur as the symbolic, the effects of themselves, and the set of code as an approach
operates in the transition from signs to symbols. In relation to the building of data
structures of the Alphatown, the set of codes is designated by game designer as the
instructions of the game, while signs accumulate data and present attributes of things
via mediations of lists and navigation tools, and are actualised as symbols. This
process from sign to symbol operated by code reflects upon the metalingual function
of machine languages.
The fact that signs enter into the symbolic is important because signs directly come
into relationship with actions on the plane of the symbolic, and actions bring qualities
of things to machines, which offers condition for the poetic function of machine
languages to work within the metalingual functions. In the process of the work of
signs, there are two tendencies that give conditions for signs to occur as symbols: the
reification of signs and the actualisation of symbols. To analyse the work of the
reification of signs and the actualisation of symbols, it is important to relate them to
data materiality, which offers circumstances for the doubled process to occur.
Data materiality is manifested in the accumulation of data. Based on the mediations
of listing and navigation, data in the architecture of the Alphatown is according to the
operations of users’ interests, hence the structure mediated by users shows the
distribution of data. In the structure, the distribution of different streets, shops and
apartments shows patterns of quantities of data added by users, and these quantities
form sensible objects for users’ experiences. For instance, the street with the name of
Fugue Alley gives the sense of experiencing the street through a sense of music. The
role of the sign here is as a process of recognition; it interacts with things and assigns
value. The sign is “a process of selection, the selection of a set against a background…
their selections change with circumstances” (Williams, 2016). It is worth noting that
sometimes signs and symbols are easily mixed with each other, such as the name of
the street can be a sign as well as symbolic, it is a sign when users sense the value of
things, while it is symbolic when it denotes a thing after affecting users’ experiences;
the symbols are what have been actualised and are the result of signs, while the signs
are processes of actualisation.
Then what is the reification? If actualisation is in the relationship with symbols,
reification concerns the sign itself, the very process of selection. Regarding Jakobson’s
(1980) metalingual function, any verbal message in the selection and combination of
its constituents involves a recourse to the given code. Selection and combination as
elements of metalingual function are operated by code, which correlates with the
structures of the virtual city of the Alphatown. For example, how the “style” of the
street is presented is coded into the selection and combination of lists of shops along
the streets; to add data onto the existing model, one needs to decode and recode
symbols within the structures of the virtual city. To state these operations of code in
selection and combination is to show that the process of signs allows sensations to
assign value on things, specifically, one needs to recognise signs and experience the
qualities of them in decoding and recoding. Regarding the issue of data materiality, as
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
48
the symbol in one sense is the representation of the data substance, it contains certain
quantities of data; in another sense, it stands for certain attributes of real things, for
instance the symbol “Fugue” contains a certain amount of data added by users to this
street structure, and also suggests the attribute of music to the amount of data. In
relation to the process of recognising signs, it appears that symbols are on the way to
becoming signs in order to generate differentiated actions of data adding. Hence the
reification of signs formulates and generates symbols that effectuate further actions,
which in turn make symbols become signs in differentiating further actions of adding
data.
THE EMERGENCE OF THE POETIC FUNCTION IN THE ALPHATOWN
Based on the above analysis, a doubled process of the reification of signs and the
actualisation of symbols articulates data materiality. Here, particular attention should
be given to the differentiated actions of data adding on the plane of the symbolic,
because they cause the new reification of signs and actualisation of symbols. Actions in
the case of the Alphatown refer to the users’ acts in interacting with data structures, or
more precisely, actions in this context mean intra-actions in the terms of Karen Barad
(1996). The matter of data is a substance in its iterative intra-active becoming, “not a
thing, but a doing, a congealing of agency” (Kleinman, 2012). Hence the reification of
signs and the actualisation of symbols can be encapsulated into a process of mattering
operated by intra-actions. Such a formulation of matter processing is within the
structures of media. The reasons are as below: on the one hand, the reification of
signs and actualisation of symbols belong to a kind of metalanguage operated by code,
as well as a poetic function enacted in transmitting message, which I will explain later
in the following part; on the other hand, intra-actions engender actions of mediating
codes and messages in differentiating relations in structures. Hence, matter processing
becomes inherent to structures of media. This level of matter processing offers the
conditions for machine languages to generate differential relations of mediations; it
demonstrates that the structures of media first of all are material, and then malleable
and processual. In the meantime, the matter processing opens up space for volition as
an agent to operate in the data structures of the Alphatown. The following part will
analyse how matter processing offers the conditions for allowing the volition to arise
and distribute.
The matter processing lies in the function of the poetic of machine languages, and
to understand this, it is necessary to investigate how matter is distributed and formed
in the reification of signs and the actualisation of symbols. As illustrated above, the
sign becomes a process of sensing and assigning value to things. This explanation
corresponds to what Deleuze terms as a sign, an intense individuated sensation
(Williams, 2005). Individual does not mean an individual person or subject, but refers
to the circumstance of making parts and processes singular by differential agents. The
process of signs on the one hand is operated by a code’s selection and combination,
on the other hand it brings the function of the poetic that focuses on the message.
This formulation of message from addresser to addressee is instead manifested in the
process of sensing enacted by the observers and effectuated by the actualising
symbols. Therefore, the poetic is the sensual, enactive function engendered by the
selection and combination of coding in reifying signs and effectuating symbols. It is the
poetic function that introduces the sensual and opens up space for intra-actions to
operate on data structures and hence makes matter processing possible.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
49
To summarise what has been outlined, the process of signs brings sensations in
effectuating symbols, while symbols involve further actions triggered by the sensations
to differentiate relations in structures, hence producing new selections and
combinations of code in the new reification of signs. Based on this, two consequences
on the plane of the symbolic condition the potential that media infrastructures store
and transmit affects. The first consequence is that the symbolic implies the
rearrangement of relations in structures. Because sensibility works with data
materiality and signs are no longer constrained by signification between the signified
and the signifier, there is free operatability regarding structuring data. The second
consequence is the reciprocal determination in relations based on the rearrangement
of relations in structures. This reciprocal determination in relations depends on the
intra-actions in the poetic function of machine languages and is inscribed in the
relations between the observer, data and media. To be specific, list, as the basic
element of the architecture of the Alphatown, constitutes the rule of play: city streets,
apartment blocks, the arrangements of shops and their interiors are designed based
upon listing and one has to follow the orders of the lists to visit. However, the function
of list is carried out in relation to the change of data structures and users’ actions of
mediation; for example, the navigation bar enables users to mobilise themselves from
specific locations built on the list, offering the possibility of redistributing and
restructuring data. On the other hand, the navigation bar isolates user operations and
this sense of isolation is further mediated by lists, where users share their isolated
experiences via communication tools. Such reciprocal determinations of complex
relations between data, media and users allow the emergence and configuration of
affects of boredom, being lost and strangeness in the structures of media.
CONCLUSION
In order to construct the argument that machine languages are structures of
media, this paper first clarified what machine language is and then explained the
different levels of machine language. Machine language is the operation of symbols. At
its mathematical and mechanical level, its set of codes is executed directly by
machines, while at its software and social interactive level, codes are selected and
combined to communicate with the programming of the machines. There are two
factors leading to thinking about machine languages as structures of media: signs of
machine languages are analogue to signs of natural languages, and code and message
in information and communication theory were introduced into linguistic theory to
place languages in the studies of communication. With this context, code internalises
the commands and acts of machine languages, while the informing of commands and
the effectuating of acts of machine languages make code communicative.
Such processes reflect the metalingual and poetic functions of machine languages
in terms of Jakobson. To better understand these two major functions at an overall
level of machine languages, a diagrammatic thought of machine languages based
upon the thoughts of Peirce and Deleuze is required: At the mathematical and
mechanical level of machine languages, because the operation of signs shows a
speculative reasoning process involving hardware and software, whereby the machine
simulates an object by operating signs hence effectuating acts through execution and
implementation, this level of machine languages mainly act as metalingual function. At
the social interactive level of machine languages, machine languages are actualised as
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
50
material and sensual in the sense that social interactions bring about constructions on
attributes of real things within software. This enacts different relations within realities,
hence the process mainly focuses on the communication of messages that involve
human and machine, i.e. the poetic function of machine languages. Here it is
important to note that it is neither the mathematical and mechanical level only
expressing the metalingual function, nor the socially interactive level only presenting
the poetic function. Because of the interactive nature of software between human and
machine, there needs to be a doubled process of coding: the algorithmic process of
coding as well as the coding according to the rules of play that generates input for
algorithmic coding. The latter process already shows a poetic function going through
human activities and interior machines, hence the two major functions of the
metalanguage and poetics co-function with each other under most circumstances.
Then the paper moved on to analyse the metalinguistic and poetic functions of
machine languages in the case of the virtual city Alphatown. In the analysis of the
media in the construction of data structures, listing and navigation as ways of coding
are operated as a selection and combination process of signs. They distinguish
different stages of the data structure construction, from the initial stage of data
accumulation according to the designer’s intention and users’ interest, to the
generative stage of affect transmission. During these stages, the reification of signs
and actualisation of symbols mediate data structures: signs as processes are
recognised and effectuate the generation of symbols, while further actions of
mediations on symbols make symbols become signs and cause new reification of signs
and actualisation of symbols. Such a process of signs transiting to symbols operated by
code is within the diagrammatic thought of machine languages, and reflects the
metalingual function of machine language. Furthermore, under the circumstance of
data materiality, the actions generating the reifications of signs and actualisation of
symbols lead to a matter processing, which shows the poetic function of machine
language. These analyses indicate that machine languages become structures of
media, while media are material and processual.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
51
FIGURES
Figure 1. The original block layout of Alphatown. Screenshot from Alphatown web
page, alphatown.com.
Figure 2. Overview of the graphic map of Alphatown. Screenshot from Alphatown
web page, alphatown.com.
Machine Languages as Media Infrastructures
52
Figure 3. Street, metro station and navigation button list out mobility that eludes
user operations. Screenshot from Alphatown web page, alphatown.com.
Figure 4. The attribute of boredom is structured and expressed in shops for rent,
apartment buildings, message box of residents on the street. Screenshot from
Alphatown web page, alphatown.com.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
53
REFERENCES
Barad, K. (1996) “Meeting the Universe Halfway: Realism and Social
Constructivism Without Contradiction”, in Nelson, L. H. and Nelson, J. (eds.)
Feminism, Science and the Philosophy of Science. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic
Publishers, pp. 161-194.
Jakobson, R. (1960) “Closing Statement: Linguistics and Poetics”, in Sebeok, T. A.
(ed.) Style in Language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 350-377.
Jakobson, R. (1980) “Metalanguage as a Linguistic Problem”, in The Framework of
Language. Michigan Studies in the Humanities, pp. 113-132.
Kleinman, A. (2012) “Intra-actions: Interview of Karen Barad by Adam
Kleinmann”, Mousse 34, pp. 76-81.
Saussure, F. d. (1959) Balley, C. and Sechehaye, A. (eds.) Course in General
Linguistics. New York: Philosophical Library.
Vellodi, K. (2014) “Diagrammatic Thought: Two Forms of Constructivism in C. S.
Peirce and Gilles Deleuze”, Parrhesia, 19, pp.79-95.
Williams, J. (2005) “Poststructuralism as Philosophy of Difference:Gilles
Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition”, in Understanding Poststructuralism. Chesham,
Bucks: Acumen.
Williams, J. (2016) “Process Semiology: A Simple Version”, A Process Philosophy
of Signs. Available from <http://www.jamesrwilliams.net/docs/Process-semiology-
simply.pdf> (Accessed: 16 March 2017).
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117204 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
PRIVACY AS A CULTURAL PHENOMENON
GARFIELD BENJAMIN
ABSTRACT
Privacy remains both contentious and ever more pertinent in contemporary society. Yet it
persists as an ill-defined term, not only within specific fields but in its various uses and
implications between and across technical, legal and political contexts. This article offers a new
critical review of the history of privacy in terms of two dominant strands of thinking: freedom
and property. These two conceptions of privacy can be seen as successive historical epochs
brought together under digital technologies, yielding increasingly complex socio-technical
dilemmas. By simplifying the taxonomy to its socio-cultural function, the article provides a
generalisable, interdisciplinary approach to privacy. Drawing on new technologies, historical
trends, sociological studies and political philosophy, the article presents a discussion of the value
of privacy as a term, before proposing a defense of the term cyber security as a mode of
scalable cognitive privacy that integrates the relative needs of individuals, governments and
corporations.
Keywords: Privacy, information technology, digital culture, social media, communications.
INTRODUCTION
Privacy has become a convoluted, murky, and often contradictory term in the
information age. The complexities and counterarguments to any position on privacy in
contemporary society hark back to a divided history of the term and herald the
potential for even greater confusion and exploitation in the future. New modes of
using technology to organise society often run counter to privacy on both technical
and social levels. For example, Tapscott and Tapscott’s (2016) proposition that ‘the
Internet of Everything needs a Ledger of Everything’ leads to pseudonymity at best
and a buzzword-laden trap for the uninformed and the unwary. Similarly, the burden
of privacy falling on users themselves can create unusual and seemingly paradoxical
results. One study (Mamonov and Koufaris, 2016) found that with the ‘spectre of
government’ on their minds, participants were actually less likely to create a secure
password. The scale at which people presume their privacy is infringed has led to a
culture of helplessness in which it does not seem worth bothering with personal
security online. The failure of governments to foster a positive culture has instigated
an existential crisis of privacy, thereby exposing citizens to criminal as well as state
PhD. University of Birmingham. g.8enjamin@gmail.com
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
56
threats. The media too participates in this culture of fear, feeding us the image that
this situation will only get worse and there is nothing we can do about it. Indeed, key
influential cyberculture figures such as Cory Doctorow (2016; 2007) paint a bleak
picture of the future in the context of the Internet of Things and the new pervasive
role of the server log, supported by an almost constant stream of news articles
reporting botnets, vulnerabilities, information leaks, and hacks of digital devices and
infrastructure at all levels. And yet, in such a cultural and technological environment
defined by the economic context of big data, privacy becomes ever more important
both socially and existentially. When the CIA are willing to ‘kill people based on
metadata’ (Johns Hopkins University, 2014), the need for privacy extends far beyond
the scope of any individual or any specific technology. A systemic shift is required in
the culture of privacy for a more informed and more secure digital future for everyone.
The current state of research on privacy has yielded both broad and deep
discussions across technical and social contexts. Yet there is a tendency to remain
rooted in one field and, consequently, a proliferation of increasingly complex
taxonomies, examples and specific applications of the term. Thus, the concept of
privacy remains muddled and, particularly for the average layperson whose awareness
of privacy is ever more mediated by a fear-mongering and sensationalist press, often
obfuscates many of the underlying antagonisms and importance of the issue(s) at
stake. This article presents a higher-level analysis of privacy in terms of its functional
effect on human behaviour and subsequent systemisation and inclusion in broader
political and technical instances. Rather than a detailed taxonomy, privacy will be
redefined into two overarching interdisciplinary categories: freedom, corresponding to
the influence of fear on techno culture, and property, underpinning the relations
between humans and their digital selves. These terms will be traced through the
history of privacy to inform the specifically digital context of the culture of privacy both
today and in the future.
The article will ask: How long a culture of privacy last? What will replace it? And
how can we ensure that the positive values it protects continue to remain an essential
component of future collective culture in an ever more technologically mediated world?
BACKGROUND
The current debate over privacy has proliferated between academic and public
disciplines, resulting in often conflated and/or contradictory conceptions of the concept
and its impact. As a term, privacy has perhaps received most attention in the study of
law, as well as politics, with scholars such as Daniel Solove (2006; 2008) and others
(Scholz, 2016; Bambauer, 2013; Halbert, 2016). The necessary precision required for
legal debates - the need for detailed definitions that can be applied to niche
circumstances in order to provide clarity in situations of great complexity - has tended
towards ever more elaborate taxonomies focusing on specific legal applications, or the
application of existing legal and political systems to issues of digital privacy. While
providing incrementally greater accuracy, these definitions are not necessarily related
to the actual available digital technologies, nor to how they are used in practice, but
rather to an abstract system of potential use in the context of public and civil legal
processes and frameworks. Progress in this area has entailed reducing the argument
to a basis in fundamental rights in order to penetrate the web of intricate layers of
legal structures that impede a rapid response to evolving digital technologies (Ojanen,
2016). This is, however, reliant on a clear system of rights that are not always present
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amidst national and international constitutions, treaties and other directives. Such
studies still fail to overcome the problem of current laws being ill-equipped to deal with
the architectures and behaviours of cyberspace, not least due to the fundamental
dilemma of laws being rooted in nation states and thus unable to respond to the global
structures and activities of digital networks. A cultural perspective thus offers a
broader and more widely applicable mode of viewing behaviours beyond the traditional
geographical-legal boundaries with which law as a field must concern itself.
Computer science approaches generate similar terminological problems when
discussing privacy. The exponentiation of taxonomies is here derived largely from
different attacker models that require specific technical responses. There has
historically been a tendency to simply oppose privacy and security (Liu, Ryan and
Chen, 2014; van Schoonhoven, Roosendaal and Huijboom, 2013), although others
have been involved in attempts to move past this dichotomy (Kwecka, Buchanan,
Schafer and Rauhofer, 2014). The confrontational model of privacy and security
exemplifies the technical constructions that are commonly at odds when defending the
interests of the individual citizen versus the interests of the nation state. As will be
discussed below, this problem of scale risks conflating issues of freedom and property,
cascading into a series of potential inconsistencies and personal or ideological biases.
One such example is that of Bruce Schneier who - along with many other technologists
known for promoting the advancement of the scientific method and progress towards
an increasingly digital society - counterintuitively objects to online voting at both the
practical and conceptual levels. Despite his famous critique of fear-based decision-
making (2003), Bruce Schneier’s vehement opposition to electronic voting (2016)
demonstrates the limit that plagues even the hardest techno-utopian: a loss of control
when scaling from the individual to society as a whole. A decade after Beyond Fear,
Schneier’s focus on trust, risk and uncertainty risks closing avenues of research based
on current fears and a nostalgic reliance on a lost sense of security rather than
developing new approaches to improved privacy for all levels of technology and
society. For example, the overemphasis on trust risks limiting the development of
‘trustless’ systems that could bypass many privacy issues and provide individuals with
greater freedom, anonymity and control over their data. While he acknowledges that
technological and societal issues do not necessarily coincide (Schneier, 2012), a
regressive attitude towards the familiarity and apparent certainty of the paper ballot is
echoed in further examples of archaic models of physical security, such as bemoaning
the decline of handwriting in an age of typing (or tapping) and standardised testing
that could lead to more easily forged signatures rather than pushing for new modes of
proving identity that harness ubiquitous computing technologies. Further fear-based
texts (Schneier, 2015) aimed at a broader and interdisciplinary readership feed off a
culture of privacy that has already been subsumed by that of security. Such
approaches not only risk closing off the individual as a self-protecting isolationist but
actively harm future technological development that might arise from collective
activities and a more socially aware approach (let us not forget that a large proportion
of research conducted today is collaborative). The all-or-nothing approach espoused
by technologists such as Schneier when they reach perceived technical limits closes off
a productive connection with actual social problems. While technology cannot
necessarily produce a positive culture of privacy, it can at least strive not to harm it.
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
58
Despite this need for socio-cultural interventions in the development of privacy, the
field of cultural and media studies has tended to limit its focus to very specific
instances or issues of privacy rather than the trends and cultures as a whole. This is in
part due to the complexity of the issue and its many contradictory arguments, such as
the dilemma of privacy for feminism that will be discussed below, in which privacy
itself can be both positive and negative for women’s rights. It is also in part due to the
inherent bias when discussing social and cultural phenomena, such as the paper by
Fuchs (2011). On the one hand, this work broadens the privacy debate into critical
political economy. On the other hand, however, the use of a Habermasian
methodology projects its explicitly socialist ulterior motives with a Marxian reduction of
the entire issue to economic forces of capitalist systems, denying the anti-statist and
anti-corporate possibilities within the libertarian (broadly conceived) and ‘liberal’
(capitalist and post-capitalist) conceptions of privacy that played an actual role in
defining the early development of the internet. It is not only ideological perspectives
that can limit a cultural approach. Media/cultural studies allow for an
acknowledgement and discussion of international issues, beyond the legal structures of
individual nations. Studies undertaken in this area (Millhan and Atkin, 2016; Liang,
Shen and Fu, 2016) have made great progress in demonstrating the intricacies of
cultural shifts in privacy. However, a focus on the impact of specific existing cultures
on privacy, rather than a discussion of global (cyberspace) trends and a culture of
privacy itself, creates a tendency towards emphasising cultural differences. While
individual cultural issues must be taken into account, this difference-based approach
risks limiting the development of broader positive attitudes towards privacy by
entrenching traditional socio-economic identities and divisions within a micro-political
agenda.
Despite this, it is the socio-cultural impact of privacy that has the most profound
effects, influencing not only public opinion but the formation and definition of the
future of privacy, a collective psychology that will guide the development (or not) of
positive attitudes and the demand for change across technology, law and other fields.
In the psycho-social sphere, the privacy versus security antagonism can be translated
into a dilemma of anonymity and responsibility. It is the behaviour (that is, individually,
the psychology or, collectively, the culture) of companies, governments and individuals
- indeed any and all can be at fault - that is under scrutiny or not as the case may be.
For example, a company may sell user data or block disclosure of vulnerabilities, a
government may conduct illegal surveillance or interfere with the democratic process
of another state, or individuals may be engaged in online trolling including even
children being responsible for online bullying. The implications of all these can lead to
the ruin of the victim, whether it be undermined sovereignty, damaged reputation,
financial loss, contravention of human right, or being driven to suicide. While there has
been work undertaken on the impact of specific culture(s) on privacy (Li, Kobsa,
Knijnenburg and Nguyen, 2017), there remains the need for a discussion of the
underlying culture of privacy. Furthermore, this study uses, for example, demographic
cultural data points that risk falling into the trap of being privacy-invasive. The use of
data collection and analytics to predict users’ privacy views is inherently problematic in
promoting privacy awareness and an open debate. The interdisciplinary approaches
available to contemporary researchers, combining social, legal and technical
perspectives, must also take a more self-reflexive view in which systemic biases are
taken into account. Indeed, historically it has been the pre-existence of physical world
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ideologies, attitudes and biases that have led to the fear-based privacy culture in
which many individuals now live.
To illuminate the root of the term, and in order to strip back its increasingly
complicated applications that often too quickly become too specific for any overarching
cultural analysis, it is first necessary to discuss the history of privacy. Privacy is a
recent invention. When humans lived in settlements no larger than a village,
everybody knew everybody and there was no need for or conception of privacy.
Indeed, this is the historical background to and social truth of McLuhan’s global village
(2001 [1964]): at all times, your activities are known to all. But where in contemporary
‘village’ models of global networks the constant observation is seen as a threat to
privacy, in the primitive village or tribal society such notions as privacy and even
individualism did not enter into the collective culture. Demonstrating the lack of clear
cut shifts from one cultural epoch to another, this attitude persisted until at least the
19th Century CE, where urban working class living in large industrial cities such as
Birmingham, UK, included shared gardens and access, close proximity, and a class-
based identity based on locality and familiarity. Often the tensions between
communities (whether geographical, national, class or ethnicity) devolve out of a fear
of the unknown, while a lack of privacy is to a certain extent inherent to the culture of
a close-knit community. This stems from a scaling of subjectivity from the individual to
the group onto which it displaces its identity. The interactions with external entities
therefore follow the logic of the Lacanian big Other (Lacan, 1977). This concept is the
psychological function of radical alterity beyond identification. It is simultaneously the
fundamental ‘otherness’ of our experience of the world and yet also the position from
which we view ourselves and our desires. It is no wonder, then that an encounter with
perceived outsiders, the threat of an often-illusory adversary, is the cause of decisions
based on fear. These psychoanalytical structures are inherently bound to the role of
the symbolic order, to the structures of language and semantic codings that give
meaning to human consciousness. Thus, language as the externalisation of memory
places the individual in a position of vulnerability as their internal thoughts become at
risk of being revealed and/or used by the Other.
The invention of writing, followed by the printing press and mass literacy, therefore
acted as an enabler of the shift towards a concept of privacy. This externalisation of
memory that supported greater powers of communication over both space and time is
not without its own ‘side channel attacks’. Indeed, the first call for a legal protection of
privacy in 1890 (Warren and Brandeis) was a direct call for the law to adapt to the
pressures and social implications of new communication technologies, emphasising the
need to protect both people and their (material and intellectual) property. Since then,
theft of important or secretive documents has given rise to a multitude of issues
concerning persistence, data loss (or collection), censorship, copying or plagiarism,
and security. These forms of personal and political espionage underpin the need for
privacy, for when our innermost thoughts are recorded (whether by our own hand or
others) we have something to fear from their being revealed, and a culture of privacy
develops. From the seemingly petty accusation of ‘hands off my diary’ between
siblings, through to high-stakes classified documents between nation states, the
permanence of writing was the first step on the road to privacy.
The history of privacy, even before it became concrete as a specific term, can be
generally defined as the relative impact of two pre-existing behaviours that span
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
60
politics, economics, society and technology: a gradual shift from freedom to property.
The following discussion will present this history and its relation to the cultural
functions of fear and exploitation. In its present state, and the context of digital
technologies, our culture displays a conflation of both aspects of privacy. Indeed, it is
this relation between two different definitions that gives rise to many of the persistent
issues and lack of clarity in discussing the term, particularly between disciplines. Yet
the two forms of privacy are not necessarily counterposed. Rather, their increasingly
complex interaction has had a profound impact on the contemporary culture of privacy
and the particular emphases of different actors and perspectives. Thus, the conflict is a
product of the specific uses of the term, a cultural phenomenon that defines its
interpretation and the attitudes it engenders, rather than a quality inherent to its
technological or legal framework. Between freedom and property rests the basis of
privacy as a cultural phenomenon, as well as the key to understanding its potential
future(s).
FREEDOM
Privacy as freedom is the basis for the historical antagonism with security, the
perpetuation of Hobbes’s dilemma of the contract between individual and state, liberty
and authority, risk and safety. Freedom is also thus linked directly to fear, and indeed
privacy was originally the necessary requirement of those deemed outcasts, deviants
and traitors. Until the long transition was complete from tribal or village mentality into
individualism, metropolitanism and enlightenment, privacy remained the domain of
criminals, assassins and usurpers, as well as a defence against persecution and fear of
the establishment or the regressive masses. Followers of dark or marginal gods,
adherents of upstart religions such as Christians under the Roman Empire,
practitioners of witchcraft or alchemy, all had need for clandestine behaviours to keep
their shunned activities secret. Even homosexuals historically needed to hide their
identity, and when talking of security and privacy one cannot but think of the tragic
impact of this situation for Alan Turing. Indeed, the history of computing and
encryption has become inextricably bound to this outsider status and violation of
human dignity, even as it developed to assist surveillance and code-breaking in the
state military agenda and in the name of ‘freedom’.
This alterity, a binding of privacy to fear as the threatening Other, aligns with the
history of writing in its use by the state to collect data on its citizens. Long before big
data, the census enabled records of individuals that could be used for control and to
assert homogeneity upon a conquered or subjugated population. In Mediaeval Britain,
the very name of the great census of 1086 - the Domesday [Doomsday] book, also
known as the Book of Judgement - conjured up apocalyptic connotations of location
tracking, the inescapability of the state and the reduction of a conquered nation to a
collection of data for manipulation and exploitation. This great ledger represented the
inevitability of death and taxes rolled into one. Similarly, the Biblical Roman census
that formed a backdrop to the nativity myth represented an obligatory upheaval
followed by a period of restricted movement in order that the populous be counted for
tax purposes. The earliest census can be traced even further back to at least ancient
Egypt in the fourth millennium BCE, and the roots of data collection stems from the
origins of written language - a technology that enabled record-keeping for the
economic or legal control of expanding settlements. Yet the economic argument
always belies a function of control, a fixing of the individual to limit their freedom
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through increasingly constant monitoring. Indeed, the contemporary state census, and
even data collected and held by supranational bodies such as the World Health
Organisation, ostensibly for positive purposes, is always at risk of transforming into an
authoritarian regime in which knowledge of each and every individual is a source of
great power. The US government, for example, has stated its intention to use the
Internet of Things to track people, spreading the reach of state collection of data
beyond the official census into commercial and private domains. Technology has
enabled a universal panopticon, full state surveillance on the assumption that all
citizens are potential criminals mitigated by the fear that any individual could be being
monitored at any given time, an inherent discipline within surveillance (Foucault,
1991). Even the genesis of the contemporary digital computer - such as Colossus at
Bletchley Park, arguably the first programmable computer - was entwined with state-
based surveillance, espionage and the application of military might.
However, the internet has its basis not only in defense contracts but in openness, a
countercultural phenomenon committed to sharing and the pursuit of knowledge. The
roots of connectivity in building research networks gave rise to the view of cyberspace
as a separate dimension with its own rules and governance, and early internet
utopians making declarations as such (Barlow, 1996). But opposition to state limits on
freedom and the desire to create an alternative model for society predates the
information age. The following passage by Pierre Joseph Proudhon demonstrates this
counter-surveillance tendency and critique of government as an information-collecting
entity at least as far back as the industrial revolution:
You know it, and you permit it. To be GOVERNED is to be kept in sight, inspected,
spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at,
controlled, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither
the right, nor the wisdom, nor the virtue to do so.... To be GOVERNED is to be at
every operation, at every transaction, noted, registered, enrolled, taxed, stamped,
measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, forbidden,
reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under the pretext of public utility, and in the
name of the general interest, to be placed under contribution, trained, ransomed,
exploited, monopolized, extorted, squeezed, mystified, robbed; then, at the slightest
resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, despised, harassed,
tracked, abused, clubbed, disarmed, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot,
deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and, to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, outraged,
dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality. (Proudhon,
2007 [1851])
Today, the anarchist critique takes on new relevance, with the Investigatory Powers
Bill in the UK and Rule 43 in the US demonstrating the state’s continued need for a
“monopoly on the legitimated use of physical force” (Weber, 2004 [1919]) in the cyber
realm. Whereas conventionally the state functioned according to such a monopoly over
a given geographical area, in a globalised world with an internet that stretches both
across and beyond physical locations this concept breaks down. Overly restrictive and
increasingly authoritarian cyber legislation can therefore be seen as an incredibly
problematic and worrying, yet perhaps predictable and understandable response to the
global digital medium by the archaic psychopathologies of the state. It is a one-sided
arms race, a cold war against an imaginary adversary, the ultimate non-linear warfare.
It is also a strategy that is ineffective on two counts. Firstly, its negative impact on
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
62
culture, stemming from a sense of overwhelming helplessness in the general
population, propagates an insufficient culture of privacy that also serves to enable
criminal and state actors. Secondly, it gives rise to stronger counter-cultures embodied
in privacy campaigners such as the EFF and companies such as Mozilla, Opera or
Apple, whose promotion of accessible privacy would impede and eventually undermine
the systems of legislation that seldom keep pace with technological and social
developments.
The issue(s) of digital freedom itself has a problematic history. The counter-cultural
background of the outsider status of early computer scientists and programmers has
become entrenched in the technologies and their further cultural development. As
Kwecke et al. (2014) state, “Most approaches to PET reflect the individualistic,
libertarian origins of privacy law as an individual right”. Freedom is, as far as possible,
built into both the technical architectures and their cultural tropes. The very basis of
the internet is an open network, yet openness and freedom is at odds with true privacy
as the secrecy within which to conduct free behaviour. How can one’s own freedom be
compatible with the freedom of a malicious Other? The ideal of privacy as freedom, in
relation to the potential state control of overarching structures such as
telecommunications networks or specific technologies such as the constant threat (or
prominent illusion) of NSA or GCHQ backdoors, thus reveals an internal dilemma in
privacy culture, a technophobic kernel of libertarian techno-utopianism. This underlying
fear of technology even by those who are responsible for its creation is disseminated
throughout society, borne by the apocalyptic warnings of Schneier and others before
mutating through different ideological positions into nostalgia, analogue fetishism and
reactionary conservatism. At this point misinformation runs amok with the technically
ignorant and privacy takes on an air of white male privilege - a boon for the l33t
hax0rz that form the elusive technocrats who mysteriously control technologies beyond
the grasp of the layman. The trust required of this outsider community places
technologists and other privacy experts as the big Other of a global anonymous
computer network striking fear into the hearts of average citizens and the existing
establishment. The fear of technology becomes therefore a fear of loss of status and
control, a fear of Otherness embodied in both the networks of digital devices and
those seen to be controlling them. This Otherness works in both directions, as the
traditionally alter group of technologists loses its own controlling, outsider in the
gradual diversity of the technology industry. While the industry itself may purport to
embrace diversification and inclusion of, for example, women, the culture it propagates
is not always so progressive or adaptive. The gamergate situation demonstrates the
broader impact of the technocratic community for, while it is not necessarily
technologists themselves who engaged in the abusive hateful activities, the white male
privilege combined with a prized outsider status led to an aggressively defensive
cultural identity for a select group of gamers who feared their own loss of status amid
the changing culture of technology as a whole. While not explicitly a privacy issue, the
anonymity prized by this culture provided an apparently safe space from which to
launch attacks stemming from trolling to death threats, and the unmasking of those
involved appeared as an affront to their sensibilities. It revealed the negative aspects
of privacy culture, with abusers having latched onto a perceived identity emboldened
by a sense of power derived from anonymity. They are a far cry from the original
members of the outsider groups involved in generating the technologies and their
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cultures and certainly diametrically opposed to groups such as the EFF which place
great emphasis on diversity and inclusion in privacy technologies.
The gamergate scandal highlights a further dilemma in the freedom debate for
privacy - that of women’s rights and gender equality more generally. As far back as
Aristotle there has been a division between public and private life, where private life
concerns the internal affairs of the family. This suggests a strong argument for privacy
in feminism, allowing women freedom over their own bodies and sexuality without the
invasion of social pressures or governmental regulation. However, this assumption of
privacy that tends towards a social system in which the private family life remains free
from scrutiny works to protect not only the otherwise oppressed but also their
oppressors. Historically, the family unit has supported the perpetuation of overarching
patriarchal structures, concealing oppression in this system of the privacy of family
affairs (MacKinnon, 1989). There is here a “darker side of privacy” that becomes “a
shield to cover up domination, degradation and abuse of women and others” (DeCew,
2013). . Between these two extremes, instances such as gamergate and the more
general persistence of male privilege in technology demonstrate that digital forms of
privacy often serve only to amplify pre-existing societal issues. The issue of freedom
for online privacy, as for society in general, is far from resolved, but it remains a
defining feature of the culture of privacy and a core value for those who seek to
promote both the technologies for and awareness of digital privacy throughout society.
PROPERTY
Where the freedom aspect of privacy has developed slowly over the long history of
philosophy and indeed human society, the rapid rise of widespread privacy as an
explicit concept, and the assumption of rights thereof, has been an effect of the
invention and cultural development of literacy, capitalism, electrical media and then
finally into the digital or information age. This link to techno-economic developments is
derived from the term ‘private property’. In this sense, privacy takes on the role of
ownership. The exclusion of outsiders (thieves, etc.) from prime farmland or a factory
in order to ensure the economic viability of the asset as a means of production finds its
fulfilment via writing as the development of intellectual property through the printing
press through to computational media. Control of one’s informational assets has
gradually overtaken the more concrete ownership of material capital to the point
where immaterial or cultural capital has become a dominant force in contemporary
economics and culture. Thus, finally, copyright and intellectual privacy have become
the new form of private property (Bard and Söderqvist, 2012), no longer protected by
moats, fences and physical force but by cryptography. While secret information has
always held the potential for economic benefit - from blackmail to shorting the market
or simply getting an edge over one’s competitors - the contemporary economy involves
personal, conventionally private information as a key business model. This engages
with privacy not just of property but as property, and as inherently linked to
exploitation. Just as the factory owner exploited their workers in the industrial
revolution or stolen information has been used throughout the ages to blackmail those
in positions of power, today private information is itself a means of production. What
was once the purview of illegal business dealings or political corruption have now
become the basis for multi-billion-dollar industries with companies such as Google or
Facebook. It is their cultural impact in particular that has given these technology giants
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
64
their social power, to the point where the oppressed masses even consent to their own
exploitation. The socio-cultural obligation to post to twitter or facebook, and the
pressure from all sectors to conform to common digital tools that collect ever more
data, has rendered the populous of the entire world a new self-sustaining means of
production. The maxim “property is theft” (Proudhon, 2014 [1840]) takes on new
meaning where it is control over one’s own personal identity that is being taken,
exploited and repackaged as a marketable commodity. The totalising (or even
totalitarian) nature of this socio-economic shift is a fulfilment of cyberculture as
a“romance of finance capital” (Jameson, 2005).
Indeed, the cultural paradigms of the internet have their origins bound with privacy
not only as freedom but also as property - from Neuromancer onwards the cyberpunk
battle against (states and) corporations has raged across the real world in line with its
expression by William Gibson and Neal Stephenson through to Cory Doctorow and
Ernest Cline, along with many other writers and thinkers. Perhaps paradoxically, in its
valorisation of the “heroic pirates of cyberspace” (Jameson, 2005), this culture is often
opposed to private property, particularly that held by corporations - hacker culture,
cypherpunks, anti-DRM, through to outright piracy - while at the same time asserting
the privacy of the individual. This is due to a binding together of freedom and
property: for example, personal data is both the property of the individual and a mark
of freedom. Thus, the underlying trends that instigated many facets of contemporary
privacy culture are pro-freedom and anti-property. This displays an expression of
anarchic, or at least libertarian undertones, with ideologies such as Proudhon’s
mutualism forming an unspoken founding principal. The resolution of the antagonism
therefore attempts to emerge in this culture through an opposition to the exploitation
inherent to property in the Marxist/Anarchist sense of the term as the means of
production, rather than opposing the notion of individually owned items/information. It
aims for structures that should be open in order for freedom, yet need measures in
place to restrict exploitation. This is the technical dilemma of privacy as property. If
privacy were only concerned with freedom, then it would be comparatively simple at
the systemic or ideal level (although of course the notion of negative rights - freedom
from external constraint - generates tension between opposing interests). It is when
property is added that the situation becomes contradictory and a complex set of
interactions must be enabled to allow for freedom without exploitation. For example,
companies own any data that they legally and legitimately collect, just as individuals
own their own memories. Short of anonymity to the point of solipsism - or the
technocratic use of VPNs, onion routers and so forth - it is perhaps neither practical
nor desirable to achieve an absolute level of privacy, insofar as it undermines the very
connectedness that the internet enables and upon which it is founded. Radical
accessibility of complete digital freedom leaves users open to direct exploitation by any
and all attackers, reinforcing the inequalities embedded in cypherpunk culture whereby
the privacy aware and technically competent can achieve their ideal of privacy at the
expense, or regardless, of the average user.
The problem of freedom in the context of property and competing claims to
ownership thus becomes an issue of ‘security’, expressing for the individual an attack
akin to national security ‘leaks’. New approaches are now being sought to designing
privacy enhancing technology in the context of a radically different cultural context -
promoting a system of social relations whereby privacy is considered a common good
and its protection an essential collective endeavour (Kwecka et al., 2014). While such
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models call for a breaking down of divisions towards a collective defense of anonymity
- producing strength through a (distributed, obfuscated) unity - it must be wary of
being reversed into a fear of unknown forces by those who are slower to adopt such
technologies. Perhaps a less divisive term can in fact be found already in one that is
often used specifically for issues of national defense and protecting corporate
interests: the oft-maligned phrase ‘cyber security’. The separated origins of this hybrid
term suggest not only security within (or from! to a conventional state actor)
cyberspace, but in cybernetics as the act of ‘steersmanship’. Thus, cyber security
becomes taking control of one’s own security and one’s own informational property,
emphasising the need for everyone to be aware of their own privacy concerns and
equip themselves accordingly. While this too risks fuelling an individualised society
based on fear of Otherness, rather than collective technological development, it does
offer a scalable conception of the need for privacy between the interests of states,
companies and individuals. Privacy thus is security, even if it must be understood in
terms of psychology (including paranoia and ‘in-security’), ethics (the moral status of
data) and intellectual property (ownership of the data that constitutes selfhood in a
digital age). The balance between - and relative importance, emphasis or priority of -
scales therefore becomes an ideological matter, reflecting broader cultures of
technology and beyond. For example, a liberal cyber security would emphasise
individuals followed by corporations, a socialist model would emphasise the state as
protector of the individual, a capitalist cyber security would emphasise corporations
and other ‘property owners’ (which could include the individual), nationalism would of
course emphasise the state, and an anarchist conception would de-emphasise the
state in favour of either the individual or society as a whole. The relative neutrality of
the term cyber security in itself can therefore be reappropriated to emphasise any
particular group, and indeed when privacy technologies themselves become property
to be exploited this becomes a further aspect of the business model. While this term is
scalable and adaptable over time to adjust to prevailing concerns, it is unsuitable as a
universal framework, remaining caught between the needs of freedom and privacy.
The role of property in privacy adds economic complications to political and social
concerns, intruding further on issues of freedom as state and corporate interests
become increasingly entwined in the broader cultural logic of late or digital capitalism.
The outsourcing of security and data collection by nation states to private firms (even
here the term private property returns to signal the closing off of our own data from
such protections as Freedom of Information that enforce a degree of accountability for
many state actors) can be seen in such extreme circumstances as counter-terrorism
surveillance (de Londras, 2014) to the extent that property wins out not only over
freedom but even over un-freedom as corporate interests outway both individuals and
states. This bypassing of the state in an increasingly globalised world drives property
to control freedom, not only by corporations but also by other transnational
organisations, even those originally aimed at tackling these issues. WikiLeaks, while
beginning from a noble cause has seen increasing problems in its execution, to the
point where it has elevated certain individuals (Julian Assange, for example, but also
Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden or the journalists to whom they disclose the
‘private’ information) to the status of ‘global actor’ on a level with states and
corporations while entrenching the majority of people in their perpetual role as the
fearful herd. WikiLeaks reinforces the flawed mentality often used by states when
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
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developing stricter security and privacy legislation that having nothing to hide means
you have nothing to fear. Anyone who stands out can be subjected to exposure, with
an ideological inconsistency that is echoed in the work of Anonymous (or, at least,
those claiming use of the label). The average citizen, who is not a security or even
technology expert, sees only a series of attacks at the structure of society. A legitimate
mission towards equality and freedom of information thus becomes another form of
control through intimidation. Despite its best intentions and original vision, WikiLeaks
is therefore, at base, simply a new mode of asserting power: a totalitarian technocracy
ruled by fear replacing one damaged and corrupted system with another.
PRIVACY TODAY
In the context of WikiLeaks, increasing surveillance legislation, the possibility of
state attacks on other countries’ democratic processes, and the new crypto-wars,
privacy maintains a continued surge as a topical issue. Indeed, Andy Grove, Chairman
of Intel, stated in an interview that “privacy is one of the biggest problems in this new
electronic age. At the heart of the Internet culture is a force that wants to find out
everything about you” (Sager, 2007). And yet this anti-privacy momentum is the same
force that drives increasing openness of information - such as WikiLeaks (on both sides
of the coin), open access publishing, or increased VPN usage to enable file sharing
(using anonymity for openness) - and indeed allows the internet itself to function. The
digital society is based on the antagonism of privacy with openness as well as the
tensions within privacy between freedom and property.
A politics of privacy
In an age described as ‘post-truth’, the value, veracity and manipulation of
information has reached new depths of defining culture. Today, privacy culture is
political culture as the digital world takes precedence over the physical and the
conflicted inscriptions of privacy and its inverse in the technical architectures of the
modern world are played out in all spheres of human activity. Returning to WikiLeaks,
Julian Assange (2006) provided an ideological basis for an effective critique of privacy
as power in the formulation of conspiracy as government , and the WikiLeaks project
offered the tools by which the anonymous collective of the people (here the parallel to
the increasingly politicised and decreasingly neutral hacker group Anonymous must be
drawn) might assert control and hold those in power to account. However, as
discussed, the execution has proven to be flawed and WikiLeaks is now merely another
form of technocracy ruled by ‘cypherpunks’. There has been a split between the
medium and its original culture or purpose, a corruption of intent, for if all power
corrupts then organisations such as WikiLeaks that exert a radically different form of
power are still not immune to its seductive call for greater power and its use for
ideological or personal gain. This failure can be pinned in part to the persistent
assumption that tech is ‘neutral’ until it is used by humans. Indeed, commentators
continue to worryingly assert that “WikiLeaks’ initial self-presentation was as merely a
conduit, simply neutral, like any technology...The problem is, WikiLeaks is not just a
technology. It’s humans too” (Fenster in Ellis, 2016). Against this prevailing naivety is
the structure by which technology is always a mediator, always redefining the message
it carries (McLuhan, 2001 [1964]). If by no other reason than the fact that technology
is built both by and for humans, the apparent ‘human factors’ and non-neutrality will
always-already exist with any technological system. Even the apparent neutrality of the
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
67
internet is a constructed quality, for openness and even free speech are still ideological
points of view even if they are widely held and accepted. Indeed it was WikiLeaks’
ideological commitment to a warped form of openness that contravened the privacy
many of its creators and supporters would hail as an essential right in cyberspace. This
same issue can be seen further in the racial bias that plagues facial recognition
software based on the ethnicity of face samples given to the algorithms, or the
machine learning techniques that amplify existing human prejudices in search engines.
Technology is a defining characteristic of humanity, yet is also a product of it, and will
always be tainted by pre-existing cultures and their antagonisms.
A digital generation
If the transition to a fully digitised society has transferred prior cultural problems,
both of privacy and more generally, what then of the new generation of those raised
more completely within the grasp of ubiquitous devices and radical data collection?
The contemporary youth have been described as a “new privacy paradox” (Blank,
Bolsover and Dubois, 2014) in their seemingly contradictory behaviours and attitudes,
yet their responses to technology can perhaps be traced to the culture of privacy
within which they have developed. There is a persistent public image of young people
as flagrantly ignoring the perils of a lack of privacy. It often appears as though young
people simply do not expect privacy in the information age, fatalistically accepting that
they will be monitored at all times, and indeed there is some truth to that notion. This
is demonstrated culturally by a shift from the relative privacy of blogs, by default
viewed only by the technorati engaged in a privacy through lack of either interest or
access to technology, towards the potential for limited privacy settings on facebook
and then to the mass publishing of twitter and instagram. It can seem as though
contemporary attitudes to privacy in an age of hopelessness concerning total
government surveillance relies on being a needle in a stack of needles (anonymity
through sheer quantity of data) or through the often false assumption of superior
capability and/or interest (versus parents or schools). This technocratic, or netocratic
(Bard and Söderqvist, 2012) assumption is false, for while the attentional economy
might drive media sales there remains the possibility of technologically superior actors,
such as organised criminals or nation states, coopting one’s personal data for illicit and
exploitative purposes. The apparent laissez-faire attitude of the youth backs up the
prevailing concerns of older (possibly outdated and certainly fear-based) digital
migrants supported by the appearance of younger people in casual surveys as less
security or privacy aware.
However, counter behaviours are developing. For example, social media in teens
can be as much about ignoring others as it is about collecting information on them, for
when it is possible to stalk all of one’s friends at any given moment a new social
capital is given to those who appear aloof, rising above what has apparently become
not a vicarious new experience but rather a mundane part of everyday existence (Choi,
2016). Similarly, there are new cultures of privacy that adeptly manipulate the various
platforms available. For example, many young people use facebook only as their most
outwardly facing, public persona, with the more private instagram reserved for friends
and the even more private ‘finstagram’ (face instagram) reserved for close trusted
friends with whom one might share photos of parties involving socially frowned upon
or illegal behaviours (Safronova, 2015). There is here a fluid negotiation of public and
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
68
private identities that, while superficially appearing as a willing desire to show all to all
at all times in fact belies a shrewd use of technology to achieve a variegated privacy
structure and complex online identity. It could also be that in at a time when
traditional authority figures such as presidential candidates are developing tactical
approaches to ‘post-truth media, the lack of concern for a more fundamental privacy is
genuine. With increasingly ironic postmodern culture, teenagers may well be more
worried about privacy in relation to their teachers and parents than they are in relation
to Russia undermining a constitution they have never been convinced to believe in.
New cultures of privacy are certainly developing, and it may be impossible for those
not at its forefront to penetrate the layers of outwardly contradictory attitudes that
make up this potentially increasingly self-aware collection of innate technology users.
In a society that is completely mediatised, and in which the expected level of
interactivity necessarily contradicts privacy for the computer to see what you are
doing, it is not only other humans that are actors defining the culture of privacy.
Privacy from the machine
Felix Guattari (2013 [1989]) has hailed the age of planetary computerisation as the
development of new machinic subjectivities. While his conception of abstract machines
has developed over decades of philosophical enquiry in collaboration with Gilles
Deleuze, outlining the role of machinic thinking within human subjects and society, it is
increasingly a literal machine that is producing new forms of subjectivity. David Gunkel
(2009) highlights that humans most commonly see digital media as a tool to
communicate through, whereas the computer is also a tool to communicate with.
Indeed, the majority of traffic on the internet, particularly in the context of Industrial
Control Systems, the Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence, is either human to
machine or between two or more machines. It is thus not only new human cultures
that are of concern to privacy but also machinic cultures as well as the impact on
human culture of machines as actors. The fulfillment of the big Other of computer
systems is now occurring as machine learning challenges all limits of privacy.
Facebook, for example, are using machine learning to determine the contents of
images, and combining their AI with satellite imagery to build the most accurate map
to date of population density in rural and conventionally closed off (private) countries
and areas. With AI cartography, even existence can never be private, no matter what
physical separation one might seek. Humans will need to adapt to such further shifts
and reorganise their privacy culture accordingly. Both Luciano Floridi’s (1999)
information ethics and David Gunkel’s (2009) machine ethics are founded on the
principle that ethical consideration should be afforded to any entity that exists as “a
coherent body of information” (Gunkel, 2009). This acknowledgement of the socio-
political power and necessary legal consideration of machines as both actors and an
equal part of privacy culture will become increasingly important in the wake of neural
networks that can teach themselves encryption that lies beyond human technical
capabilities (Abadi and Anderson, 2016). Perhaps the future for privacy is indeed
bright, but it may not belong to humanity.
CONCLUSION: THE FUTURE
This article has presented a new model for privacy as freedom and property that
enables a broader, interdisciplinary theorisation of the concept. It thus overcomes
many of the complexities of specific legal, technical or social taxonomies by
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
69
emphasising the role of privacy as a culture in and of itself. While the model is, as with
all such socially orientated research, not free from its own ideological biases (such as:
a tendency towards an anarchist critique of the state in relation of freedom; and a left-
leaning or post-capitalist economic perspective in relation to property) the aim has
been to utilise these perspectives as conceptual tools for their critique of the present
situation of privacy without imposing an explicit agenda for the future. But a
conceptual method is only as good as its ability to predict, or at least set out guidelines
for, the future. What, then, of the future of privacy? The need to relive, relearn and
readdress 90s PC privacy issues in the plethora of insecure IoT devices currently on
the market suggests that the future perhaps holds an inevitable lack of privacy. Should
we then simply adopt some form of denialist, nihilistic, or voyeuristic acceptance?
Perhaps AI will overcome the current technological and epistemological limits of big
data rendering privacy moot in the face of the machine, yet relevant in its exploitation
by other humans? Perhaps a culture will develop whereby data itself is viewed as a
‘victim’ to be protected, giving new meaning to the term ‘information security’? Or, as
argued here, new cultures will form that adapt to the complexities of perpetually
unresolved issues and competing concerns.
Post-digital subjectivity
Guattari (2013 [1989]) states that the act of enunciation is based on the
perpetuation of the individual as a subjective position from which one speaks, and that
“one cannot connect it and disconnect it as one would a computer”. Indeed, one
always retains the option to unplug or turn off the device. However, there are
increasing socio-cultural and economic costs involved in such detachment, and as
shown, there are methods being developed such as Facebook’s population density
map, or the new image recognition cameras and advertising screens in London’s
Piccadilly Circus that will track our activities regardless. We no longer have the option
to unplug, surveillance is everywhere. We have finally reached a full state of constant
digital subjectification, inherent to data collection and now enabled through cyber-
physical systems, big data and machine learning. We are forced to continually speak to
the big Other of computer networks. And yet, young people are showing the ability to
effectively manage their disconnections, using a mix of digital and physical methods of
communication to adapt to the specific contextual privacy needs, a less black-and-
white and more subconscious negotiation of privacy throughout the various aspects of
their lives (Livingstone and Sefton-Green, 2016). It is not that young people are
unconcerned, but differently concerned, and are developing new modes of thinking
and new cultures of privacy. If the rest of the world is to keep up, it must negotiate
not only the traditional issues of privacy but develop new cultures across society that
support positive attitudes towards both freedom and property that might allow us to
negotiate an ever more digitised future. In an age of increasingly invasive government
surveillance laws, cheap and rushed to market consumer devices, and corporate
interest in big data, the need for privacy enhancing technologies and an effective
privacy culture will only increase. But like the touchscreen and augmented reality
interfaces that are permeating our mediated lives, new forms of privacy must function
seamlessly and become functionally invisible. Like the inherent integration of the
Signal protocol to messaging tools such as WhatsApp or the Signal app itself, privacy
must become an expected necessity for any user, a standard marketing strategy for
Privacy as A Cultural Phenomenon
70
any successful company, and an essential component of an ethical technoculture.
Technology and culture must develop hand in hand not only to protect the value of
privacy but to ensure that it adapts to the changing landscape of information as a
driving force in human and computer society.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
71
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117205 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
MEDICALISATION OF MEDIA; MEDIATISATION OF
MEDICINE: TOWARDS AN ILLNESS SOCIETY
SERTAC TIMUR DEMIR
ABSTRACT
In recent years the media has focused more on health issues and plays a crucial role in
constructing illness society that is purified from death. Popular specialists on media diagnose
continually through deadly-dangerous symptoms and offer new formulas in a changing sense.
Each trouble and its solution pave the way for selling new products and new beginnings. Indeed,
in this regime, each cure proves the existence of a different virus. For this point of view, all
health manners can and should be debated in the media and consumerism relations. To put this
differently, health is an academic area not related primarily to medicine but sociology. This
paper deals with the reciprocal connection between medicine and media as components of the
traumatic modern society and individual. According to the argument of this study, in the
present-day society, medicine marks virus rather than cure, while the media refer to lack of
meaning instead of wisdom.
Keywords: Media, modernity, medicine, body, digitalised health.
INTRODUCTION
The thought that modern societies are bodily or at least based on body has been
discussed for a long time by different academic disciplines from medicine to sociology,
from philosophy to art, and from media to pedagogy (Kern, 1975; Blacking, 1977;
Polhemus, 1978; Brain, 1979; Featherstone, 1982; Freund, 1982; Armstrong, 1983;
Turner, 1984; Shilling, 1993; Crossley, 2001). All these studies, which hypothesise the
body as non-natural and fictional asset (Grosz, 1994), dealt with it mainly in the
theoretical contexts of onthological question, civilisation paradox, socio-political and
economical representation, sense of community, consumerism and culture change. On
the other hand, especially for the last decade, the body has been analysed as a matter
of health, so much so that body and health have replaced each other consciously or
unconsciously (Broom and Tovey, 2009; Ettorre, 2010; Stewart and Sutton, 2012).
This is perhaps because the body within health and vice verse reveal the references of
modernity as a whole.
However today, the case gets more complicated as new parameters are added to
the triangle of the body, health and modernity. Moreover, new links and deadlocaks
Asst. Prof., Sertaç Timur Demir, Gümüşhane University, Turkey. stdemir@gumushane.edu.tr
Medicalisation of Media; Mediatisation of Medicine: Towards an Illness Society
76
emerge between medical knowledge and social relations (White, 2009, p. 21).
Accordingly, while the body refers more to enslavement than freedom, health implies
to illness rather than wellbeing. This may be interpreted as the nature of capitalist
culture in which everything turns into a property and generates its own opposite with
itself. Now health as well as body goes beyond medical sciences. Rather, it constitutes
the essence of global politics and money economy that penetrate into every corner of
everyday life. Health that turns into the meaning of life is now a lucrative industry, just
like other meanings of life (Eagleton, 2008, p. 28). Health as a sector and a strategy
get disconnected from the body that becomes vague at the hands of mediatised
medicine and of medicalised media and thus that is a slippery ground open both to
enlightenment and to misinformation.
The myth of “the healthy body” evolves to impossible love for those who design
envyingly and ardently their existence in compliance with contemporary body and
health trends. Hence, each step taken to reach perfection by the mediatised masses
reproduces itself as a new mental or physical illness form. Health under these
circumstances stands for a sort of social pathology rather than medical issue. The
tendency of idolising health and body can and should be read as a fragment of the
pleasure-based and speed-oriented modernity. Even though life and death involve an
existential unity and wholeness (Kearl, 1989, p. 7), according to the worldview living is
accepted as intrinsic, natural and ordinary, but dying is seen as extrinsic and marginal.
As Baudrillard underlines (1993), ours is a culture in which the philosophy of
healthiness is canonised whereas death is removed from life. For the very reason,
‘bodyness’ is not merely an aesthetic but onthological manner for simultenously
medicalised and mediatised individuals who look for better body for better life that is
able to ignore the thought of death. No wonder that this strategy stimulates and is
stimulated by mass media that broadcast health programs and that commercialise
health products through body ‘experts’. However, these programs as well as products
that become determinative over the sense of perfect body have a strong potential to
generate a collective illness, called as illness society. This paper examines this potency
within cause and effect relation.
METHOD AND APPROACH
This paper benefits from debates reflected not only from policies or body-and-
health related texts and also from visual sources such as film (Moartea domnului
Lazarescu) and television programmes (The Chew, The Doctors, The Dr. Oz Show,
Mystery Diagnosis, Unhold Stories of the E.R., Everyday Health, The Weight of the
Nation). This is because the modern culture is based essentially on visual presentations
and surfaces, and moreover, global trends on the body as well as health discourses are
encoded and decoded visually. In this respect, analysis of illness society, necessitates
observing visual images without separating them from theoretical text and without
getting lost details. Therefore, this study does not gain insight into scenes, episodes or
dialogues. Instead, from panaromic view, it sees and depicts overall picture that gives
some important clues about liquid modernity we live in collectively. Also, it aims to
conceptualise the mediatised medicine and the medicalised media terms without
placing media and medicine, body and spirit, health and happiness separately. In other
words, this article as a whole tries to expound modernity through some relevant
concepts of body, place, media, medicine, health, life and death. For this purpose, in
analysing these ambivalent and dialectical topics, two significant methods come to the
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
77
forefront. The first is to to concentrate on ‘impressions’ in spatial and social ground, as
taught by Georg Simmel. In this paper, these are television programmes, experts,
prescriptions and hospitals. The second method is to establish some links between
social issues and theoretical background and between discourse and practise.
MEDIA AS MODERN CLINIC
The Romanian film Moartea domnului Lazarescu (The Death of Mr. Lazarescu,
2005) directed by Cristi Puiu zooms in the story of an old, poor and sick man who
seeks a remedy for his sufferings. Throughout the film, he is seen either in front of
television, while desperately watching health programmes, or in an ambulance and
hospital. The neighbours and relatives around Lazarescu, the main character, make
diagnoses and give advices about his sickness. Health services are provided by
arrogant and sullen faced doctors and regulated by rigid procedures. Accordingly, the
hospital evokes illness rather than cure.
Media that convert individuals to masses by using seductive tools and discourses
are today one of the most remarkable elements of the modern health regime. In other
words, media have a crucial role to make health both a private and public issue. At all
hours of the day and night, and regardless of where the place is, the global health
industry distributes rapidly-changing trends through all forms of media. As a result
perhaps of this, individuals feel themselves obliged to claim their rights to health on
their own. Namely, in health-oriented affairs, the State’s mechanism is implicitly
dominated by media-based global body-industries (Farmer, 2003; Mann, et al. 1999
cited in Ozbay, Terzioglu and Yasin, 2011, p. 19). This is also the essence of the
loneliness that Mr. Lazarescu faced in the film.
The modern individual is on the one hand hustle and bustle without interrogating
breath of life, and on the other is encircled with spare time activities. But the spare
time, which turns into an absolute action in itself, enable people to examine,
concentrate and reform their bodies that stand for identity beyond appearance. Health
programmes on television nourish and are nourished from the spare-time
understanding that gives inspiration to the audience about how to create new body
forms and health formulas. Although this interaction between media and individuals is
totally concrete and body-based, the notion of the relationship resembles a spiritual
ritual. The audience whose dedicated faith in medical knowledge practises the duties
that media characters preach. News and programmes about healthy bodies are
watched and accepted as sine qua non because it is believed that they disclose the
secret of possessing eternity in the ephemeral world. More precisely, these
programmes sell the promise of having a healthy (smooth, ageless and immortal) body
that normally tends to decompose. Namely, they highlight the terror of death and so,
ontologically are nourished from Thanatophobia despite the fact that this escape is
futile.
It is futile because neither media nor medicine can write a perfect prescription to
enable a person to overcome death. Besides, mediatised medicine and medicalised
media in unison do not fight against the ageing and death, but against their traces,
reflections and impressions. Their attraction comes not from this, but from their
liquidity that causes forgetfulness. In this sense, Alain de Botton sees an analogy
between hospital and news. To him, “the news hub has the institutional amnesia of a
hospital’s accident and emergency department: nightly the bloodstains are wiped away
Medicalisation of Media; Mediatisation of Medicine: Towards an Illness Society
78
and the memories of the dead erased” (2014, p. 252). In this environment in which
there is no room for permanent perfection, each text or image produced via media are
reproduced by and over the passionate, concerned and obsessed audience-like
individuals. In here, they wait for taking even the most radical decisions about their
flexibly-constructed bodies. The complex and never-ending cure that is controlled by
science and medicine is however looked for in markets, pharmacies, herbalists and
cosmeticians under colour of killing death. For those who look for the cure without
ceasing, there is not an inner or spiritual way to feel freedom and to sense serenity.
They are always conditioned to material solutions and authenticated tools. Thus,
individuals are objectified in and by the logic-based and costly health regime, which
involves some fictional activities such as diets and exercises. Nevertheless, all
expenses made for the sake of being healthy and looking well are somehow exempted
from total expenditure amount. That is perhaps why any online or broadcasted health
programme does not give place to politics and economics of health care (Christenson
and Ivancin 2006, p. 13). Instead of this, media generally put new fantastic cures,
fashionable diseases and bodily deficiencies on the market. The health system with its
experts is substantially in the possession of a media that works like a clinic. As for the
viewers who encourage using medicine as if fulfilling a divine duty, they turn slowly
into paranoid beings about their body and health (Wallack, 1990, p. 46), so these
flurried and disoriented media-characters get inside an unbounded addiction.
The health versus illness issue is no longer confined to the hospital environment
and the medical centres nor is it confined to the traditional doctor-patient
relationship. This issue has spread to other social and commercial arenas. The
promotion of health has been brought to contemporary households by TV
campaigns. ‘Health’ is showcased in supermarkets and shopping malls; catches
our eye in cosmetics advertising, is displayed in leisure sports arenas, and flows
freely within cybernetic space (Gomes, 2010, p. 90).
Media, particularly television, does not merely influence, but also determines the
public’s knowledge, attitudes and behavior because they reach the masses in an
interactive sense and transfer data within storytelling (Murphy and Hether, 2008, p. 1).
Those who come digitally together through media meet around common space in spite
of physical distance; in so much that even the tools are switched off. This
reconstructive effect continues a while more. The distant bodies in search of perfection
and immortality have a strong commitment and ‘we are feeling’. Devoted members of
the circle have also dramatic stories and anxieties regarding their appearances that
represent their future. They narrate the risks of disease as well as delight of body
transformation and stimulate hope of the phrase ‘Yes, I can’. By this means, medical
knowledge gets quickly into circulation and affects collective behaviour. The body in
the shade of media and science is the focal point of the interpersonal and intra-
personal communication network.
Media programs highlight the results of the latest medical studies that are being
conducted to explore a way of heathier life; besides this advice may totally be different
from the previous one (Hackett, 2007, p. 110). In this process, all the people on TV
are coded as ‘health profesional’ and expertness is reduced mostly to mercantile
affairs. To put this differently, health is turned into an object of reality-show, and
experts and their diagnosis and solution recommendations are offered as consumable
items. Medical knowledge and interest designed and marketed by mass media are
easily spread and publicised through video sharing sites and social network. Here, the
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
79
unquestionable authority allies with the power of media and they eventually break the
resistance of the audience.
THE MEDIA-ORIENTED DOCTOR ACTING MODERN GOD
As long as health is centred on everyday life via media messages and the body
becomes raison d’être, being a doctor goes beyond a profession. Medicalisation not
only of media but also of daily life makes doctors one of sanctified secular symbols of
modern society; so much so that the relationship between doctor and patients
resembles the relationship between God and humanity. The phrase “Trust me I am a
doctor”, which is used in some television programmes and song lyrics, reflects the
sense of God-like perfection and incontestability. This implies at the same time that
humanity is sickly and life is pathologically full of virus. In the sight of doctors, even
the most sterilised things are seen like contaminated factors that must be disinfected
without delay. Moreover, even death, which is not seen as part of nature by doctors, is
defined as personal neglect, untoward accident or contagious disease (Fulton and
Bendiksen, 1976, p. 4). Related to this, in modern culture, the phrase “natural death”
is preferred to the decree of “death is natural”.
In his bestselling book “How We Die: Reflections on Life’s Final Chapter”, Sherwin
Nuland explains the paradoxical view on death. According to him, “neither among the
top fifteen causes of death nor anywhere else in that soulless summary is there to be
found a listing for those among us who just fade away” (1995, p. 43). This is indeed
the criticism of modern society as well as moral and legal medical understanding.
Baudrillard reformulates this irony: “Just as morality commanded: ‘you shall not kill’,
today it commands: ‘You shall not die’, not in any old way, anyhow, and only if the law
and medicine permit” (2007, p. 174). In this respect, doctors who play the role of
counter-God implicitly determine how long people live and when they die. But
struggling against death is as demanding as living. As Bauman underlines, “death is a
momentary event, but defense of health and vigilance against its enemies is a life-long
labour... To postpone death, one needs to surrender life to fighting it” (Bauman, 1992,
p. 142). For this purpose, just like a spiritual ritual or a religious duty, doctors preach
continuously on the importance of exercising, healthy diet, herbal tea and weight loss.
Since death is disrupter, body, place, time and relations are filled with health,
energy, happiness and pleasure. That is also why doctors of the present-day society
are positioned as approved supplier of undying new beginnings. Believing in doctors
and medicine is thus nourished from anxiety concerning uncertain futures and abrupt
death. However, the more people are motivated to obey the rules of medicine, the
more they feel themselves more resistless and more desperate because proposing
medical solutions underlines the power of disease and because there is indeed no
permanent sustainability of fighting against inevitable ageing and dying. One way or
another, death finds the weakest link of organs in spite of all scientifically-proven
inventions and practices. The body of a patient takes a scientific and objective form in
the hands of doctors who relieve pains, so much so that the body is sacrificed in
regard to sanctified medical justification. It, just like a votive offered to God, is freely
able to be cut, fragmentised, diminished and even donated. In this system in which
medicine plays the role of religion, inspection resembles confession of sins to priests
who are represented by doctors in this sense. From this point of view, via media,
patients are accepted and shown as a sinful character who must be mundified
Medicalisation of Media; Mediatisation of Medicine: Towards an Illness Society
80
faithfully. Here, skin obtains a spiritual qualification, whereas spirit is concretised. This
dilemma is one of the most complex deadlocks of modernity that glorifies the
principles of freedom, beauty and health in compliance with mediatised medicine and
medicalised media. In this fiction, it is assumed that everyting will be worse day by day
as long as media and medicine do not intervene in the situation. In other words, media
within medicine and vice versa create and spread the fear of how the world is
unreliable and how individuals have fragile being. According to Ulrich Beck (1992, p.
29), social motives that force individuals to act are not based on real risk factors but
on risk discourse developed mainly in consumer societies and mostly by scientific
disciplines. “In dealing with civilization’s risks, the sciences have always abandoned
their foundation of experimental logic and made a polygamous marriage with business,
politics and ethics—or more precisely, they live with the latter in a sort of ‘permanent
marriage without a license’”.
Health programmes on TV give a disturbing and alarming impression to audience
by designing the conditions from decor to content and from guests to experts. Each
probable symptom implied on media produces a different disease ideationally. This is
the essence of popularity of media organisations. Bauman is also right: “The market
feeds on the unhappiness it generates: the fears, anxieties and the sufferings of
personal inadequacy it induces release the consumer behaviour indispensable to its
continuation” (1989, p. 189). Seeing a danger and risk factor is truly the source of
consumerism. If this adapted to media and medicine, it can be asserted that they feed
on crisis, trouble and disease in opposition to their optimistic promises.
Perhaps, the only norm of modernity is anomie. Everything and everybody have a
rapidly-changeable notion in a non-directional liquidity. Fashion, in this sense, refers
not only to global industries also to socio-personal characteristics. In the liquidity,
there is no permanent place even to the best ones. As for the body, it is home of the
ambivalence that is chronically manipulated by and through mediatised medicine and
medicalised media. The body is no longer real entity; rather, it is a phantasmagorical
fiction and a subjective interpretation. As Nietzsche indicates (1974, p. 120 cited in
Turner, 1984, p. 212), “even the determination of what is healthy for your body
depends on your goal, your horizon, your energies, your impulses, your errors, and
above all on the ideals and phantasms of your soul”. In relation with this finding,
medicine and media in cooperation reproduce health and disease by generating
interpretations on the body. All health-oriented flexible and functional classifications
among beneficial, sick, criminal, deviant and harmful ones (White, 2009, p. 9) are
determined and applied by body-related professionals such as doctors, practitioner,
dieticians, gym teachers, etcetera). Briefly, mediatisation of medicine and
medicalisation of media are, as hypothesised through the paper, both cause and result
of the illness society.
MEDIA AS IGNORANCE; MEDICINE AS DISEASE
Media is the sociological ground in which people easily talk and make
interpretations. But, most of time, this privilege about the right to freedom of speech
may evolve to meaningless or misinformed monologue. Reviews, comments and
research results shared about health through Internet forums, television channels,
radio programmes and social media turn the audience into desirous but uncontrolled
body-watchers who seek for happiness. Besides, a significant part of these electronic
debates is full of contradictory data that reaches from homes to cafes, from
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
81
universities to companies. Accuracy of information gets lost in the speed and delight of
communication technologies.
Ours is an illness society that talks always about health, or is a death society that
desires to live forever. In this sense, philosophically, the rejected truth is truth itself.
As for the health and body experts, they present artificial ways of regulating all
opposite experiences without contradicting. In this respect, they infect and disorient
people with contagious formulas that offer exact solution. As Baudrillard states (1993,
p. 40), “today, the masses act not by deflection but by infection”. In this process,
media represent the infected notion of modern culture that is metaphorised with
disease (Sontag, 1978). Media enhance medicine’s efficiency by carrying it from
hospitals and clinics to every-day life. To put this more precisely, life is medicalised by
media. As for the viewers, they take an active role in internalisation and distribution of
health-based media message and try to display perpetual performance to
accommodate themselves to the rapidly-changing medical discourse and perfect-body
fashion.
This may be one of the reasons of chronic state of depression and blasé attitude
raised in modern culture. As claimed throughout the paper, the illness society in which
we live is based more on psycho-neurological disorders than on biological destruction.
Byung-Chul Han, in his book titled “The Burnout Society”, indicates “From a
pathological standpoint, the incipient twenty-first century is determined neither by
bacteria nor by viruses, but by neurons. Neurological illnesses such as depression,
attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, borderline personality disorder, and burnout
syndrome mark the landscape of pathology at the beginning of the twenty-first
century” (2015, p. 1). Hence, the individuals concentrate on their own bodies so that
they overcome the inner chaos. In other words, they try to repair their worn-out spirit
by reforming the surface and presentation. However, the body that is not a reference
to a stable entity is endlessly formulated by media that create new remarkable defects
and by medicine that reveal new illnesses. In this system, even the most minimal
trouble or sign is assumed as collective attack carried out by uncanny factors in risky
everyday life. Directions gave via media and medications prescribed by doctors
surround and affect not only the past and the present but also the future.
CONCLUSION
Disease is a symbolic parameter engaged in consumerism in modern societies.
Related to this, Theodor Adorno reverses and revises the Kierkagaardian concept “The
Sickness unto Death” as “The Health unto Death” (2005, p. 58). If death is really
gruesome, this idea derives from hyperbolic joie de vivre, because death is not
dialectics of life but desire to live forever (Demir, 2016, p. 291). Disease is, just like
death, dependent upon culture, meaning and virtue. Nettleton also states that disease
entities are not simply real but are products of social reasoning and social practices
(2006, p. 17). In any case, the perfect healthy body corresponds to the desire of
immortality, while fighting against illness stands for the horror of dying; therefore
health is a reference to an existential issue and media refer to an epistemological
power.
Modern individuals are always under the control of the health regime that
surrounds them both in home and in street. This regime captures not only their bodies
but also their minds and transforms them to role models for others who remain out of
Medicalisation of Media; Mediatisation of Medicine: Towards an Illness Society
82
the circle. Consequently, almost all kind of fashion is maintained through the
individuals who embrace scientific data that classifies facts as useful and harmful. But,
this determination is renewed at every turn not by people but by experts. In the global
fiction of mediatised medicine and medicalised media, life is postulated as dirty,
stigmatised and turbulent. Medicine and media have a claim that they have
appropriate formulas to clean them up and to make troubles right. According to the
formula, people should buy recommended products in order to get rid of stigmas as
pursuant to the agreement offered by the health regime.
These people under the emphasis of stigma collapse into an insuperable obsession
that makes each precaution non-functional. More crucially, any obsession does not
wait for illness-related signs to bring itself into being. Instead, it occupies the spirit
waywardly. Although disease and cure are not antithesis to each other, patients
constitute an artificial but faithful community by gathering around shared cures that
promise to destroy diseases. Namely, just as audience meet on a common ground on
media, patients experience the sense of togetherness in clinics. In fact they are all
lonesome with their problems. But hope of recovery has to defeat despair one way or
the other. Science, in this respect, gives confidence to them in attaching to the hope
despite the fact that it is fictional and forced.
Mediatised medicine and medicalised media, or digitalised-healing and health-giving
networks, turn into public knowledge what is accepted and consumed without
interrogating. In future, it can be expected that medicalisation and mediatisation,
separately and together, will gain more momentum in terms of digitalisation and
prevalence. Correspondingly, health and body experts will be more popular but less
accessible in real sense. As an academic discipline, this issue will get involved more in
social sciences such as philosophy and sociology than medical sciences, because health
is ultimately a reference to the Being in which the sense of living and dying appears.
“Nietzsche already observed that after the death of God, health rose to divine status.
If a horizon of meaning extended beyond bare life, the cult of health would not be able
to achieve this degree of absoluteness” (Chul-Han, 2015, p. 18). This inference, which
is dealth with the relationship between media and medicine in this paper, adds new
and more ambivalent to life and existence question and induces an alienation
regarding contemporary body. In this manipulative process, for the modern individuals
who turn into media and medicine users, it seems that there is no other option than
awareness and rejection.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
83
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117206 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
THE NEW NATURE OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY IN THE
AGE OF ONLINE COMMUNICATION
HASAN SALIU
ABSTRACT
Countries undertake different actions to improve international image in order to benefit
politically, economically, culturally, etc. This is made through actions of public diplomacy, where
cultural diplomacy is an important dimension. It doesn’t use media as mediating channel, but
communication with foreign public is carried through different exchanges, visits, tourism,
diaspora, etc. This makes communication more reliable than information and influencing foreign
public through media. However, lately, online communication through different platforms, where
people from different cultures and countries exchange messages, has also changed the nature
of traditional cultural diplomacy. This enables creating an image for their country or receiving an
image for another country, whereas on the other hand and simultaneously this makes
communication with the foreign public more complex and unmanageable.
Keywords: Culture, cultural diplomacy, intercultural communication, image, online
communication.
INTRODUCTION
21st century world has never seemed more united within us regarding
communication and globalisation, but at the same time it remains rather divided. On
one side we have terrorist attacks, uncertainty, military interventions, strong
movements crashing authoritarian systems, and refugees in some parts of the world.
At the same time, on the other side, fast distribution of the means of massive
communication technology, multilateral economic and market institutions, and also
global nature of the war supported on terror, are only several actualities which
underline that socio-politic actualities on one side of the globe have large
consequences for those living on the other side of the globe (Fouts, 2006, p. 7). This
shows that for multiple dividing developments, and simultaneously, the other part of
the world is increasingly connecting and communicating while being informed also
about the troubled part of the world. Different conflicts, terrorist attacks, uncertainties,
etc. have pushed citizens and political actors to asking question: “Why do they hate
us” (Arndt, 2006, p.xviii), which hate disrupts communication and increases the risk,
weakens prosperity, strains wellbeing. Many countries have increased their
PhD, AAB College, Pristina, Kosovo. hasan.saliu@aab-edu.net
The New Nature of Cultural Diplomacy in The Age of Online Communication
88
communicating activities by organizing advertising campaigns, programs that go
towards cultural, touristic commercials, etc., and up to developing projects of
assistance. Through these activities is intended to contact a wider audience for
creating better impressions to the external audience. The purpose of this
communication is political and economic, but also cultural and of merits as well.
Through these external communications, state and non-state stakeholders, aim for
political alliances to achieve external politics, as well for trading, touristic benefits,
increase of investments, cultural benefits and distribution of their values. As would
Hoggart say: the idea of the value should be protected; otherwise democracy is open
to abuse (Owen, 2008. p.2).
However, in modern society the flow of information has become redundant, but
one cannot live without information, exchanges and interactions (Wolton, 2009, p.31)
because human nature seeks to coexist. There is a wider growing consensus that
communication with the public abroad has particular importance for every country’s
internal interest. But there is no consensus on what would be the best way to achieve
these goals (Fouts, 2006, p.7). What is widely accepted is that communication without
media mediation, i.e. direct communication, leads more towards creating of long-term
relations.
CULTURAL DIPLOMACY AS PART OF PUBLIC DIPLOMACY
Public diplomacy is the discipline that aims to achieve these goals, which includes
communication of state and non-state actors with the audience abroad in order to
inform, influence and achieve overall interest a state has. Researchers of public
diplomacy are primarily focused in three dimensions, accepted as action measures of
public diplomacy (Leonard, 2002; Nye, 2004; Waller, 2007, Melissen, 2005; Snow,
2009, Tuch, 1990, Jonsson&Hall, 2005; Saliu, 2017):
- Managing news and daily dissemination of information to foreign audiences
through media;
- Strategic communication events, provided through the media;
- Cultural diplomacy or establishing and promoting long-term relations.
Unlike managing information and strategic communication developed through
media, the third dimension, cultural diplomacy, uses more direct communication
without media as mediating channel, and requires higher level of trust between the
parties; the impact of this dimension is more protracted, but stronger and more
sustainable than that of the other two dimensions. Communication taking place in this
dimension, is primarily intercultural, and involves communication between individuals
of different cultures, communities, ethnicities; interreligious communication, and
communication of different genders, languages, identity groups; communication
through their values, prejudices, personalities, behaviours, styles, identities, etc.
(Martin&Nakayama, 2010). Hall (1959), meanwhile considers non-verbal
communication between individuals from different ethnic communities as a form of
intercultural communication, inter-alia describing distances that people of different
cultures and genders keep during the conversation.
But, over time and different periods, the notion of culture itself has changed, taking
on new distinct features. These in turn are a reflection of major historic, democratic,
and industrial changes with an impact on political, economic and social characteristics
(Williams, 1960, p. xv). Whilst in the past art meant literature, music, painting,
sculpture and theatre, afterwards understanding of culture became more idiosyncratic:
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
89
an overall state of mind related with the idea and the concept of perfection; or
material, intellectual and spiritual way of living. “It came also, as we know, to be a
word which often provoked either hostility or embarrassment” (p. xiv).
Cultural studies indicate that our minds and our lives were shaped out of our own
experiences. As argued by Williams, culture also includes exchange of aesthetic
experience, religious ideas, rituals, personal values and feelings (Carey, 2009). In
other words, culture in its broader meaning, implies studying another country’s
language, traditions, and lifestyle. But, culture goes even beyond to include literature,
arts, fashion styles and traditions, human behaviour, history, music, folklore, non-
verbal communication between people of cultures, gestures, social relations, and so
on.
Analysing society as a form of communication, it appears as a process where reality
is created, preserved, but also modified and divided. When we think about society, we
are almost always constrained by our traditions which bear powerful influence on us.
Even, as has also been said by Said (1977), it may often occur that scientific
approaches on different societies or cultures have a perverted objectivity due to this
prior and influenced concoction on our minds. And, cultural diplomacy tends to level
out these “prior concoctions” through communication. It happens when diplomats, e.g.
governments, in the interest of all, try to shape the flow of cultural relations between
two or more countries. In this sense, there are universities today that offer courses on
international politics and relations, which are using popular films as primary texts to
facilitate active reading about foreign politics (Totman, 2009). But there are film
industries as well, which in more occasions adhered to the political course of their
country towards another country. Hollywood often followed this course, whilst in the
last decade it portrayed several Arabic countries based on the State Department’s
assessment (p. 153).
Music is another important component of cultural diplomacy, a type of
communication with the culture and tradition of foreign countries. This cultural
dimension of music includes broadcasts through audio-visual media and through direct
communication - by organizing concerts in foreign countries. A Russian listener
describes listening to American music as a denied element of freedom and jazz as
playing the role of a cultural ambassador. “Every night we would shut the doors and
windows, turn on Willis Connover, and have two hours of freedom” (Shneider, 2004,
p.8). The same is reiterated all over Albania when speaking about listening to Italian
music during the dictatorship. To treat the music as a force of social life, one of the
main exponents of this treatment, Adorno, says that music “trains subconscious to
condition reflexes” (DeNora, 2000, p.1).
DIMENSIONS OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY
Recorded since the bronze-age, cultural diplomacy became a norm to humanity
within civilizations (Arnd, 2006, p.1). Later it enabled cooperation between wider
groups of people, as in various rituals and ceremonies, songs, dances and language,
etc. Whilst evil forces still could destroy civilisations, diplomacy tried to protect it by
connecting culture with another culture. Afterwards, it developed between elites of two
countries (between the crown and the ambassador), and continued with elites – with
more people (between broadcasters and cinema), whereas now it has entered in its
man-to-man phase, through tourism, migration and internet (Holden, 2010, p. 7).
The New Nature of Cultural Diplomacy in The Age of Online Communication
90
Today, public diplomacy does is not addressed to elites, but targets a larger number of
public in the foreign countries.
Cultural diplomacy means distribution of a country’s culture in supporting goals of
its foreign politics or diplomacy, as a practice of public diplomacy, in order to positively
influence on the foreign audiences (Mark, 2009). Educational, cultural exchange, etc.
means ‘long journeys’ that can melt prejudices through communication, keeping into
consideration the fact that “communication and culture are so intertwined they cannot
be separated” (Zaharna, 2012, p.8). Nowadays cultural diplomacy is the most
important component of public diplomacy and a constantly increasing area of
diplomatic engagement of a country (Appel et al., 2008, p.4).
Among the most comprehensive definitions is that of Cummings (2003, p.1), who
sees cultural diplomacy as an “exchange of ideas, information, arts and other aspects
of culture between countries and their people in a way that promotes mutual
understanding”. In a way, cultural activities of diplomacy are closer to the new trends
of the new diplomacy, rather than the previous activities, which offered a one-way
message. “In cultural relations, as much as in the new public diplomacy, the accent is
increasingly on engaging with foreign audiences rather than selling messages...”
(Melissen, 2005, p.21). Cultural diplomacy puts emphasis on long-lasting relations,
unlike the previous politically motivated propaganda, or the current commercially
motivated promotion of national brand. Cultural expansion should be very broad, not
only with arts, but as well with folk culture, politics, science and academic cathedra
(Leonard, 2002, p.107). Public diplomacy researchers consider cultural diplomacy as
the most important dimension, through which long-lasting friendships with foreign
public are established to enhance the image of the country as a means of
accomplishing foreign policy goals and state interest. Cultural diplomacy should be an
important element of an inclusive program and adapted with its foreign policy in
search of a boost in reputation (Rosendorf, 2009, p.173).
So far, we have noticed that international communication techniques are imbued
with a purpose for political and economic benefits. This shows another dimension
worth specifying, which is the aim of cultural influence that also affects the increase of
political and economic-commercial dimension’s benefit. Importance of culture was
always known under diplomatic profile and it was used by different countries as a
foreign policy instrument. With music and film people in the world love American
culture more than anything else. (US Department of State, 2005, p.4, 9).
Even though born as a governmental activity, cultural activity is also implemented
by non-state actors with the purpose of designing a favourable state image in the eyes
of the public in foreign countries. Skills for speaking, writing and reading in a foreign
language are among the main prerequisites for effective communication (Report,
2003).
But, cultural diplomacy of non-state actors can often be more effective than that of
state actors. In presenting national image outside the country cultural diplomacy can
overcome audiences’ suspicion from official messages and serves to offer better
substance of national reputation (Mark, 2009, p.1). Its main purpose is to provide a
country with alliances and influences through culture by promoting its cultural life.
Cultural diplomacy is increasingly being transformed into an instrument of dialogue
and strengthening of relations through culture as the main medium.
The function and purpose of cultural diplomacy is to establish and strengthen
bilateral relations beyond borders, including economy, trade, politics, culture and the
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
91
diplomatic element; to get in touch with groups across borders, like diaspora, and
assist in maintaining relations amid tensions (p. 9). In achieving the dimension of
cultural diplomacy, a large number of stakeholders are involved, including state
authorities that mediate and assist communications and exchanges, as well as non-
state actors, such as different non-governmental organizations. According to the
historian of diplomacy from Harvard, Akira Iriye, “international relations are as
intercultural communications” (Rosendorf, 2009, p.173).
All these interactions or exchanges between people are included in cultural
diplomacy. It is not simply about teaching them from distance, but personal
acquaintances established through exchange of students, visitors, researchers,
different excursions, etc. Moreover, another dimension is built up through
communication with foreign publics via cultural products like literature, music, and so
on; the latter is very important in today’s world of global communication.
THE DIFFERENCE FROM RELATED CONCEPTS
Cultural diplomacy and international cultural relations are often used
interchangeably, but aren’t the same, although the line if frequently undetermined
(Mark, 2009. p.17). Not all international cultural relations include the government of a
country, just as public diplomacy isn’t carried out just by state stakeholders. Every day,
somewhere in the world, such cultural relations, like school choir tours abroad and
international commercial art exhibitions are taking place without any involvement of
the government (p. 17); however, these are not intended to address a massive
international audience, but to benefit interests of artistic groups. For Mitchell (1986,
p.4) the difference is quite complex because, with cultural diplomacy, a diplomat seeks
to achieve political and economic objectives, whilst Highman (2001, p.136) assessed
that the difference is at the objective. International cultural relations established by
countries are encouraged by governments with final the purpose of developing culture
with artists or cultural professionals. In other words, international cultural relations,
often carried out by cultural attaches within embassies, aim at improving and making
the field of culture more professional, whereas public diplomacy often exchanges not
only individuals of cultural elites but folk culture as well, always aiming at the wider
audience.
Researchers often do not make a distinction between cultural diplomacy and
cultural exchanges. But, researcher of public diplomacy, Cull, draws a dividing line
between them by pointing out that cultural diplomacy includes the work of
organizations like British Council, Italian National Institute or even more, Alliance
Française, which is focused in international activities for propagation of French culture
and language, to understand its prestige and to influence and extend the existence of
Francophonie (Cull, 2008, p.33). He sees cultural exchanges as an attempt to manage
international environment by sending citizens to other countries and by hosting citizens
from other countries for a period of studying and colourisation (p. 33). According to
him, foreign students coming into a country see and get familiar with it, just like they
can talk about the country they’ve visited when they return to their country. Culture
plays an important role in these cases of exchange. It is the foundation of
information’s ownership, a grammar for organizing reality, for proclaiming and
understanding the world (Cohen, 2002, p.12).
The New Nature of Cultural Diplomacy in The Age of Online Communication
92
However, strengthening of these relations in cultural contexts, or establishing long-
term relations between different cultures and civilisations cannot be fully identified
with a single state entity. This means that many aspects of cultural diplomacy cannot
be ascribed exclusively to one country or culture. Western culture, for example, should
communicate with that of Arab countries but not as divided by nations, but rather as
intercultural communications between civilizations, including values and cultural
heritage they are imbued with. Reason of public cooperative diplomacy, according to
Fisher, is that diversity extends the influencing effect on foreign public (Fisher, 2013,
p.7). Public cooperative diplomacy has a large cultural and social capital, penetrates
cultural barriers because a community with better foreign relations has more
credibility.
DIASPORA, ARTISTS AND SPORTS DIPLOMACY
As researchers of public (massive) diplomacy highlight (Nye, 2004; Gilboa, 2008;
Anholt, 2007; Melissen, 2005), a positive image of a given country, can indirectly
influence government policies by making them more amicable on one hand, and can
be beneficial also for tourism and foreign investments, on the other. One of the most
important dimensions for increasing the image of a country in the world are also
culture, education, exchange of students, academics, and so on. Through these
exchanges, a country aims to establish long-term friendships with foreign publics. One
of the most convenient modalities for these exchanges is undoubtedly exchange of
students, since students can disseminate a friendly attitude towards the host country
upon their return home and can play the role of local leaders of the public opinion, or
even assume important positions in their society.
Many countries ascribed significant importance to external communications by
propagating their culture, which also made an impact in the politics of different
countries. Immediately after the French-Prussian war, French government in 1883
established the French Alliance through which to enhance its prestige in the world and
propagate in prevalence of French language and literature (Nye, 2004, 100), whilst
later, similarly British established British Council, Germans the Goethe Institute
(Schneider, 2004, 157), Italians Dante Alighieri etc. Nye states that around 86
thousand foreign students stayed in American educational institutions in 2002, whilst
millions of people that studied in USA over the years comprise a benevolent reservoir
for the country (Nye, 2004, p.45).
Individuals spending time beyond national borders carry with them messages in the
places they live, regardless if foreign actors welcome it or not. Besides communication
with publics of the hosting country, it’s understandable that members of diaspora
preserve relations and memories with the place of origin. Wherever they go, members
of communities are seeking to preserve their cultural identity and praise the respect
about the country they came from (Smith, 1999, 212). “Two major groups which have
been used historically for interpersonal work in public diplomacy are refugees and
Diasporas” (Cull, 2009, p.51). During the Second World War, British Council worked
with Polish and Czech refugees to teach them English before returning to their
countries. United States have used Italian diaspora during the important elections of
1948 asking them to write to their families in Italy and tell them how good they live in
capitalism (p. 52). The purpose of these letters, which were sent to Italy free of
charge, was to influence their families to vote for Italian Christian-Democrats instead
of the Communist Party. “The role of immigrants and migrant workers as a mechanism
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
93
of international cultural transmission should be considered in the creation of policy
towards them”. What can be done in this regard is related to bank costs and ease of
international transfers. Other services to be offered are those of web pages. Hospitality
would serve to build a positive impression by the immigrants about the host country
and they would in turn express this to their relatives in the country of origin.
Individual opportunities that different countries offer, without prejudices to
foreigners, also create a good feeling for foreigners, which afterwards send this
message to their country. Thus, in 1998, one fourth of engineers of high technology in
Silicon Valley were Chinese or Indians. Foreigners were made to feel as Americans and
they transmitted correct and positive information about the USA (Nye, 2004, 58).
Although this feeling cannot be created for foreigners in Kosovo because they come
from more developed countries, nevertheless, it is important for foreigners not to face
unnecessary bureaucratic obstacles.
Due to an increase of migration internationally in the second half of the 20th
century, direct relations were strengthened through friendships, business partnerships
and strengthening of intercultural relations by learning languages of resident countries
where persons migrated (Leonard, 2009). Moreover, such relations offer cultural
knowledge, political knowledge and human intelligence needed for increasing the
success in the foreign politics. In this regard, we consider as successful host countries
of Indian diaspora in Britain or America, whereas Turkish diaspora in Germany is also
an important factor, Italian one in USA. Furthermore, early Greek immigration to USA,
that of Israelis, etc. extended influence in powerful American public personalities.
Government should not pay attention only to improving the image of their country, but
also to the image of their communities residing in diaspora.
Besides diaspora, soldiers play an important role in establishing a soft power, image
of their country through exchange, training in other countries, assisting programs with
other countries in times of peace (Nye, 2004, 116). But, soldiers, as well, can play a
role in the image of the country they stayed after returning home, by speaking about
the country they served at. Humanitarian military interventions like in Somalia, Bosnia,
Kosovo practice bilateral diplomacy, like soldiers when returning to their countries play
the role of the opinion leader (Katz&Lazarfeld, 2009); likewise, hosting country has a
great expectancy for peacekeepers.
Artists who are successful in the international arena and are in position to address
the foreign public also play a role in soft power of their country or of country of origin,
but only if they do not conceal the identity of their origin. The influence grows more
when these artists have media coverage, but they don’t hide the country of origin or
even emphasise it.
Sports diplomacy is also important dimension admired by the sports fans.
Successful athletes, talents, and champions are main topics of the sports and general
media. When such talents become successful, media further spreads their success
among the audience - whilst the athlete is identified as a representative of a country.
Cultural, natural, winter tourism, religious tourism, are other very important
dimensions and part of cultural diplomacy.
CHALLENGES OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY
On the other side, rapid development of technology and internet that has resulted
in an expansion of the social media, brought a new channel of communication with
The New Nature of Cultural Diplomacy in The Age of Online Communication
94
foreign publics, known as cyber-diplomacy. This mass communication is in the global
level and advancement of new technologies of information and communication has
brought substantial challenges to the traditional way of international relations by
dispersing authority to more focal points and fields. According to Potter, such activities
link the influence of novelties in communications and information technology with
foreign policy and diplomacy. Furthermore, Melissen (2005, p.30) sees the
development of this diplomacy mainly as a result of progress of technology of
information and communication, which is seen as an opportunity to redefine public
diplomacy in terms of a more active role for the public, rather than a passive objective
of governmental foreign policy strategies. This has increased activities of global civil
society and leads towards expansion of global finances and markets (Potter, 2002,
p.3).
The world now lives deeply immersed in the technology of electronic digital
telecommunication, which Deibert (2002) calls hypermedia. But, explosion of
information raises the need for increasing reliability of information (Potter, 2002, p.23).
This also brought democratisation of the foreign policy, because communication with
foreign public has increased the transparency of the foreign politics as well and, at the
same time it facilitated opportunities of attempts for manipulation. Wolton (2009, 53)
says that internet holds an ocean of information, but every day a question is raised on
how to easily, freely, and originally establish relations with someone, because in this
versatile channel of communications everybody communicates with everything,
whereas reliability leaves much to be desired. “Internet is a vast space of freedom, but
also of a larger financial, criminal, mafia, propagandistic perversity, biggest storage of
noise and manipulations since essential information aren’t confirmed” (p. 53). Daily
communication isn’t any more privilege of elites (politics, military, economic etc.) of a
country and of governmental structures, for which usually was thought to have more
information, but a broader public is being formed with wider distribution of the
transnational medial word and visuals (Hyavard, 2001).
Hence, exchanges or individual’s physical presence in another country is not
anymore determinant for direct communication with foreign public, since individuals
communicate with other cultures through internet. This made physical distances or
necessity of physical appearance in another country disappear. In today’s age of
internet, communications with foreign public are developed also through social media,
such are twitter-diplomacy, Facebook-diplomacy, but through YouTube-diplomacy as
well. In recent years people more often talk about “YouTube effect” as a phenomenon
where video-clips, often made by individuals, are distributed worldwide and they often
trigger socio-political response. This can be considered as the dark side of cultural
diplomacy; that of distribution of negative messages against other cultures and
civilisations. In recent years there has been a vast amount of these kinds of audio-
visual massages that spur intolerance against other cultures. At the time when millions
of people are communicating simultaneously through internet as a mediating channel
without the need of physical presence, in a world when everybody sees all and knows
everything and where numerous linguistic, political, cultural, religious, and other
differences make communication and tolerance even more complex. “Information
became superfluous, communication infrequent” (Wolton, 2009) and this superfluous
information doesn’t produce diversity because people are locked in their
communicating ghettos. Nonetheless, in modern society we cannot live without
information, exchange and interactions, because human nature wants to coexist.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
95
According to Wolton, this coexistence is to communicate. To attract means to share
values with others, not only telling others that there are values. Human rights,
affirmation of identities are the needs of a coexisting world, whilst culture and music,
as universal language, are main vectors of tolerance, solidarity and integration people
offer. Recognition, culture, cultural coexistence, lingual pluralism, information-
journalists, are also important dimensions in organizing cultural coexistence, because
“global village will be that of diversity” (p. 101, 117, 136).
CONCLUSIONS
Public diplomacy started by targeting foreign publics initially emerging as a
euphemism of propaganda. Even though it changed name, public diplomacy never
managed to detach itself from the propaganda of manipulation, while governments
continued to remain the key agents of communication. They compiled messages
addressed to the foreign audiences through media as mediating channels, with the
only purpose to spread their information and influence. The situation changed when
other stakeholders of communication were introduced in the game. Introduction of
non-state actors in the process of communication with foreign audiences and loss of
government monopoly to massively communicate abroad made for the public
diplomacy to disengage from simply transmitting influencing messages. This brought
about another dimension in steering of the message: from informing, carried by state
stakeholders as a unidirectional activity of transmitting of message towards foreign
publics, to bilateral exchanges of messages, that is cultural diplomacy. Mass
communication of non-state stakeholders with the outside world induced a dialogue of
individuals from different nations. Initially, individuals were exchanged in an organized
way, through visits, study scholarships or cultural exchanges. Researchers of
diplomacy afterwards noticed the importance of movement of people to other
countries, but also their return to the home-country with the purpose of building a
positive image with other countries. People that stayed in a country, subsequently,
upon return home, became local leaders of the opinion. As a result of having resided in
a foreign country and having been able to communicate first-hand with and in daily
communication in individuals from those countries, they were able to diminish and
overcome possible previously existing prejudices. Through better information about
the others, individuals manage to communicate and convey to each-other different
values and to exchange shared values. After the technological advents in the recent
decades, physical movement of individuals is not a pre-condition for direct
communication any longer. Internet has substantially facilitated communication with
the world. Nevertheless, the role of state has not diminished with the progress of
communication. On the contrary, its role has increased, but this time on the grounds
of exchange of mutual values and preferences. Intercultural communication gives a
new dimension to these exchanges not only as a result of recognising mutual values,
but as a shared exchange of different values, an interface between the different.
However, though these communications are massive, they should be seen as limited
communications based on preferences. In the age of internet, the individual has the
opportunity to select information received or to opt only for communication he/she is
interested to accomplish; this is in contrast with the traditional mass media when the
individual was bombarded by messages without the option of refusal or an opportunity
to select information. This creates “communication pockets” or ghettoized
The New Nature of Cultural Diplomacy in The Age of Online Communication
96
communicating groups, which not only refuse to share information with other ghettos
or to communicate with them, but often do not consider an issue as relevant for the
social life to discuss or respond and limit themselves to mere virtual reactions. The
latter presents the challenge of our time regarding the passive and virtual nature of
individual responses on issues of interest to the community or to the global living
milieu.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
97
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117207 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
THE IMPACT OF COURTROOM CAMERAS ON THE
JUDICIAL PROCESS
SCOTT A. CAMPBELL
*
THOMAS M. GREEN**
BRYAN S. HANCE***
JAMES G. LARSON****
ABSTRACT
The sensational trial of Richard Bruno Hauptmann for the kidnapping and murder of Charles
Lindberg’s young son in 1935 marked the starting point of the debate regarding the propriety of
allowing cameras in courtrooms during judicial proceedings. This debate intensified during and
following the 1994-1997 trial of O.J. Simpson. At issue is how a court must weigh the Sixth
Amendment right of the accused to a public trial and the First Amendment right to a free press,
as well as its own interest in preserving the dignity and decorum of the courtroom. This paper
examines the history, Federal rules, seminal court cases, and California rules concerning cameras
in the courtroom in the context of these important Constitutional issues. This research provides
qualitative data from 208 California judges that help explain some of the thinking by those who
are empowered to accept or reject requests to record court proceedings.
Keywords: Courtroom cameras, First Amendment, Sixth Amendment, judicial process, impact,
bias, criminal trials, witness testimony, right to a fair trial.
INTRODUCTION
Though many people today attribute the 1994-1997 O.J. Simpson criminal and civil
trials with bringing cameras into the courtroom, it was not the first time they were
permitted in a public criminal trial. The Richard Bruno Hauptmann trial in 1935 (State
v. Hauptmann, 115 N.J.L. 412, 180 A. 809 (1935), cert. denied, 296 U.S. 649 (1935))
arguably was the first time that restrictions on the use of cameras in the courtroom
became an issue (Barber 1987). Hauptmann was accused of kidnapping and murdering
Charles Lindbergh, Jr., son of the famous American aviator who made the first solo
nonstop transatlantic flight. The trial judge, Thomas Trenchard, allowed still
photographers and newsreel cameramen to record the proceedings; there was no
*
Department of Journalism, Film and Entertainment Arts, National University, USA. scampbell@nu.edu
** Professor, Department of Sociology, National University, USA. tgreen@nu.edu
*** Associate Professor, Director of the Paralegal Studies Program, National University, USA. bhance@nu.edu
**** Professor, National University, USA. jlarson@nu.edu
The Impact of Courtroom Cameras on the Judicial Process
102
objection by defense counsel. Media coverage of this case was so overwhelming,
including a photo of Hauptmann’s face when the verdict was read in violation of the
judge’s order, that it led to the American Bar Association House of Delegates to adopt
Canon 35 in the Canons of Judicial Ethics in 1937 (Fulton 1981). Canon 35 read:
Proceedings in court should be conducted with fitting dignity and decorum. The
taking of photographs in the courtroom, during sessions of the court or recesses between
sessions, and the broadcasting of court proceedings are calculated to detract from the
essential dignity of the proceedings, degrade the court and create misconceptions with
respect thereto in the mind of the public and should not be permitted. 62 A.B.A. REP.
1134-35 (1937) (Fulton 1981: 1394).
With the rise of television, Canon 35 was amended in 1952 to prohibit recording by
motion picture. In 1972, Canons were replaced by the Code of Judicial Conduct in 1972
(Fulton 1981; Patterson 1982). Canon 3 A(7) of the new Code updated the language in
Canon 35 to “…prohibit broadcasting, televising, recording or photographing in
courtrooms” except “…under rules prescribed by a supervising appellate court or other
appropriate authority…” (American Bar Association n.d.: 515).
Federal Rules, Judicial Council, and Pilot Projects
In 1946, the U.S. Supreme Court adopted Rule 53 of the Federal Rules of Criminal
Procedure which states that “…[e]except as otherwise provided by a statute or these
rules, the court must not permit the taking of photographs in the courtroom during
judicial proceedings or the broadcasting of judicial proceedings from the courtroom”
(Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure 2016: 64).
At its September 1990 session, the Judicial Conference of the United States
authorized a three-year experiment in courts of appeal and district courts that allowed
for photographing, recording, and broadcasting of civil proceedings, in accordance with
guidelines, also approved by the Conference, which participating courts would have to
adopt and which give presiding judicial officers the discretion, at any time, to refuse,
limit, or terminate media coverage for any reason “considered necessary or appropriate
by the presiding judicial officer” (The Judicial Conference of the United States 1990:
104).
The Conference also adopted the following policy on cameras that gave federal
judges limited bases on which to authorize the use of courtroom cameras:
A judge may authorize broadcasting, televising, recording, or taking photographs in
the courtroom and in adjacent areas during investitive, naturalization, or other
ceremonial proceedings. A judge may authorize such activities in the courtroom or
adjacent areas during other proceedings, or recesses between such other proceedings,
only:
a) for the presentation of evidence;
b) for the perpetuation of the record of the proceedings;
c) for security purposes;
d) for other purposes of judicial administration; or
e) in accordance with pilot programs approved by the Judicial Conference of
the United States (United States Courts n.d.: 5).
At the conclusion of the three-year study conducted by the Federal Judicial Center,
the Court Administration and Case Management Committee of the 1994 Judicial
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
103
Conference reported on the results of the pilot study. Based on the results, “a majority
of the Conference concluded that the intimidating effect of cameras on some witnesses
and jurors was cause for concern, and the Conference declined to approve the
Committee's recommendation to expand camera coverage in civil proceedings” (The
Judicial Conference of the United States 1994: 47). The study was allowed to sunset on
December 31, 1994.
The Judicial Conference again authorized a three-year pilot project at its September
2010 session (The Judicial Conference of the United States 2010). The purpose of the
pilot project was “to evaluate the effect of cameras in district court courtrooms, video
recordings of proceedings therein, and publication of such video recordings” (11). The
project was to include up to 150 judges and was limited to civil cases only. The
proceedings could be recorded only with the approval of the presiding judge, and all
parties were required to consent to the recording. Recording of jury members was not
permitted.
There was one important difference in this pilot program than the previous program:
there was no media involvement (Singer 2015). Court employees or a private contractor
hired by the court controlled the cameras and video recordings. Video recordings and a
detailed summary of the case were linked to the case’s Public Access to Court Electronic
Records (PACER) docket where they could be viewed. This process had several
advantages over live broadcasting, including protecting the integrity of the proceedings
and providing context for the proceedings (Singer 2015).
Moreover, this pilot program suggested several benefits to reviewing video recordings
similar to the cognitive benefits of directly viewing court proceedings (Singer 2015).
Lawyers, litigants, pro se litigants, law professors and students, and interested observers
can all attain an educational benefit from viewing proceedings with different types of
trials and judges. Access to video recordings also can mitigate the “thin slice” problem
that results from media outlets presenting distorted, out-of-context segments of a
proceeding, a reason cited by several Supreme Court Justices for barring cameras from
the courtroom altogether (Singer 2015).
The Committee on Court Administration and Case Management reported on the
results of the second pilot study at the Judicial Conference’s March 2016 meeting (The
Judicial Conference of the United States 2016). The Committee concluded “that the
findings of the report did not justify any change to the Judicial Conference’s current
broadcasting policy” (12). At this same meeting, the Ninth Circuit Judicial Council
authorized a continuation of the pilot project in the three districts that participated in
the national study (Northern California, Western Washington, and Guam). The Ninth
Circuit pilot project was designed to follow the same processes as the national project
in an effort to provide additional data to the Judicial Conference.
Constitutional Implications of Courtroom Cameras
In deciding whether to allow a camera in a judicial proceeding, a court must balance
certain rights under the United States Constitution that are guaranteed to the various
stakeholders. It must weigh the Sixth Amendment right of the accused to a public trial
and the First Amendment right to a free press, against the defendant’s Sixth Amendment
right to a fair trial. A court also must consider its own interest in preserving the dignity
and decorum of the courtroom, along with its duty to maintain control over the judicial
proceedings to ensure the fair and impartial administration of justice (Annotated Law
The Impact of Courtroom Cameras on the Judicial Process
104
Review, 2017). Both federal and state courts across the country that have examined
these issues generally have held that the specific circumstances in which a camera is to
be used in the courtroom largely determines whether it should be allowed, prohibited,
restricted, or terminated. Those circumstances also include criteria including the location
of the camera inside the courtroom, how much of a distraction the camera may cause
to the parties, witnesses, jurors, attorneys, the court, and others, and whether the
camera may affect the defendant's ability to present his or her case (See generally, Estes
v. Texas, 381 U.S. 532 (1965), reh. den. 382 U.S. 875 (1965)).
Courts have routinely acknowledged the public’s right to be informed of trial
proceedings. As the U.S. Supreme Court held in Richmond Newspapers v. Virginia, 448
U.S. 555 (1980), a criminal trial must be open to the public under both the First and
Fourteenth Amendments absent an overriding interest specified in findings that support
closure. The Court reasoned that the trial courtroom is a public place in which the
presence of members of the community, including the media, and serves to preserve
the integrity and openness of the proceedings.
Courts have further held that a defendant’s due process rights are not inherently
denied by the presence of a courtroom camera. In Chandler v. Florida (1981) 449 U.S.
560, two Miami Beach police officers were charged with burglarizing a popular local
restaurant. The officers argued that televising portions of their case would make a fair
trial impossible. The trial court allowed local television stations to televise a small portion
of the trial and the two officers were later convicted. The issue in the case was whether
allowing radio, television, and still photographic coverage of a criminal trial for public
broadcast violated the accused's right to a fair trial guaranteed by the Sixth and
Fourteenth Amendments. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the trial court's decision,
holding that the cameras did not deny the defendants a fair trial. The Court reasoned
that the use of technology in the courtroom is consistent with the Constitution so long
as it does not infringe on fundamental guarantees of the accused.
It is this potential infringement, though, that tempers the openness of the courts.
Rights to a public trial and free press do not mean unfettered media access to the
courtroom. The Sixth Amendment right to a public trial, applicable to the states through
the Fourteenth Amendment, is guaranteed only to the accused, not the media, or anyone
else for that matter. (See Gannett v. DePasquale, 443 U.S. 368 (1979)). The Gannett
court concluded that, “There is not even the slightest suggestion … that there is any
correlative right in members of the public to insist upon a public trial” (Gannett v.
DePasquale, 443 U.S. 368 (1979), p. 381).
Above all else, the Fourteenth Amendment right to due process dictates that the trial
must be fair to the defendant. In Estes v. Texas (381 U.S. 532 14, reh. den. 382 U.S.
875 15 (1965)), the U.S. Supreme Court held that the defendant’s highly publicized and
sensationalized trial deprived him of this right. The Court reasoned that, “A defendant
on trial for a specific crime is entitled to his day in court, not in a stadium, or a city or
nationwide arena” (Estes v. Texas, 381 U.S. 532 14, reh. den. 382 U.S. 875 15 (1965),
p. 549). Moreover, a member of the media has no greater claim to be in the courtroom
than the general public; both have the same rights.
Given that there is no automatic and unfettered media access to the courts, the
federal judiciary and many states, like California, have imposed various restrictions on
the use of cameras in the courtroom.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
105
California Rules
The rules regarding cameras in California courts closely parallel those at the Federal
level. The Judicial Council of California adopted Rule 980 in 1965 (Administrative Office
of the Courts, 2007). The rule allowed for media coverage during ceremonial
proceedings but prohibited any form of photography, audio recording, and broadcasting
during sessions or recesses. The next year the Council adopted Rule 981, which allowed
a limited number of experiments in courtroom photography (Administrative Office of the
Courts, 2007, 2012). Following a study period, the Council revised Rule 980 in 1984 to
permit media coverage of civil and criminal proceedings.
In 1995, the Task Force on Photographing, Recording, and Broadcasting in the
Courtroom was charged with evaluating Rule 980 by then-Chief Justice Malcolm Lucas.
Based on input from the judiciary, bar, public, and media, the Task Force recommended
that the Judicial Council amend Rule 980 so that it:
• leaves to judges’ discretion the use of cameras in all areas, including all pretrial
hearings in criminal cases;
• prohibits camera coverage of jury selection, jurors, and spectators in the
courtroom;
• lists 18 factors a judge must consider in ruling on a request for camera coverage,
including the importance of maintaining public access to the courtroom,
preserving the privacy rights of the participants in the proceedings, and the
effect of camera coverage on counsel’s ability to select an unbiased jury;
• continues to ban cameras at proceedings held in chambers or closed to the
public; conferences between an attorney and a client, witness, or aide or
between attorneys; and conferences between counsel and the judge at the
bench; and
• since January 1, 2006, includes new digital technologies, such as camera cell
phones, in the restrictions on the use of photographing, recording, and
broadcasting in state courtrooms and makes these technologies subject to a
judicial order permitting their use (Administrative Office of the Courts, 2012, p.
2-3).
Rule 980 was amended in 1996, and as of January 1, 2007, it was again amended
and renumbered as Rule 1.150 as part of the reorganization of the California Rules of
Court (Judicial Council of California, 2017). The current rule continues to leave the use
of cameras to the discretion of judges in both civil and criminal proceedings
…in accordance with established legal procedures in the calmness and solemnity of
the courtroom. Photographing, recording, and broadcasting of courtroom proceedings
may be permitted as circumscribed in this rule if executed in a manner that ensures that
the fairness and dignity of the proceedings are not adversely affected (para.1,
Introduction).
The media can submit a request to the court using form MC-510 at least five days
before the start of the proceedings they wish to record, and the assigned judge must
rule on the request based on a list of 18 factors (see Appendix 1). The judge can permit,
refuse, limit, or terminate recordings (including audio and/or video) at his or her
discretion.
The Impact of Courtroom Cameras on the Judicial Process
106
DISCUSSION
As described, Rule 1.150 of the California Rules of Court (Judicial Council of California
2017) leaves the use of cameras to the discretion of judges in both civil and criminal
proceedings based on 18 different factors. Representatives of the media can submit a
request to the court at least five days prior to the start of the proceedings using form
MC-510 (see Appendix 1). But how likely is it that judges will permit audio or video
recordings?
To answer this question, the authors surveyed 1073 superior court judges in twelve
California counties; of that number, 208 responded (a response rate of 19%). Because
of the low response rate and lack of demographic data to evaluate the
representativeness of the sample, the survey lacks external validity. However, the
qualitative data are instructive and help explain the current state of thinking by California
judges regarding cameras in their courtrooms.
Among those surveyed, 39% indicated that they had received 11 or more requests
to allow a camera in the courtroom, 13% received 6-10 requests, 16% received 3-5
requests, 16% received 1-2 requests, and only 15% had received none. A total of 29%
of judges approved 11 or more requests, 10% approved 6-10, 13% approved 3-5, 16%
1-2, and 17% approved 0 requests (15% did not respond). The rate of accepting media
requests was highest among those judges who received the most requests: over 73%
of those who received 11 or more requests indicated they approved 11 or more requests.
For those who received fewer requests, the approval rate was 50-55%. Only 23% of the
judges indicated that they had never allowed cameras in their courtroom.
For judges who have allowed cameras, 28% provided unrestricted access to the
courtroom, 17% for witness testimony, 12% for communications from the bench, 19%
for the presentation of evidence, and 17% for reading the verdict. Several judges
commented that they allow filming except for the faces of the witnesses, in particular
police officers, victims, or jurors. About having himself filmed, one judge commented:
“After having negative reaction from my children & neighbors who saw me on TV
(and thought I looked distracted b/c I was taking notes during a murder prelim rather
than staring into the camera) I have since restricted access to footage of me other than
rulings. If they have nothing to show from counsel/witnesses then I don't want to be
shown taking notes and having that mistaken for inattention!!”
A majority of judges (53%) stated that the main advantage to having cameras in the
courtroom was to address the public’s right to know about the case; almost as many
(47%) cited a benefit in educating the public on the court processes. Since video
recordings and a detailed summary of the case are linked to the case’s Public Access to
Court Electronic Records (PACER) docket, some judges (31%) believed that allowing
cameras provided access to those who could not attend the proceedings. However, 35%
of judges saw no advantage to having cameras in the courtroom. Some judges seem to
be cynical about the issue:
“The real advantage is that TV stations make money by having cameras in
the courtroom.”
“The reality is not about [the reasons listed]. The reality IS about
ratings/business.”
“For publicity seeking judges, it increases probability that the reporter's
article will be published.”
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
107
Other comments reflected the majority opinion:
“Reduce abuses by attorneys/parties/judges in the courtroom.”
“Educates the public that judges typically don't act like the TV judges (such
as Judge Judy etc.) who are actually used as examples for new judges of
how not to act.”
A majority of judges who responded to the survey cited six specific disadvantages in
allowing cameras in their courtroom:
a) The possibility of impacting jury selection, deliberations, or the jury's verdict
(64%);
b) Witnesses’ reluctance to testify (61%);
c) Different media interpretations (bias) that can influence public opinion
(59%);
d) Witnesses changing their demeanor to be perceived as more or less
sympathetic (57%);
e) Undermining the dignity of our judicial institutions by transforming a trial into
entertainment (57%); and
f) Violation of privacy rights of participants in the proceeding, including
witnesses, jurors, and victims (57%).
Many of the judges went on to explain their responses; the most common theme
related to the integrity of the court processes and decorum:
“Attorneys, parties and witnesses playing to the camera rather than testifying
to the jury; use by the public and media of snippets of the trial rather than
all the testimony heard by the jury which can undermine public confidence
in jury decisions.”
“Lawyers tend to grandstand when they know the camera is on.”
“Pieces of the trial are shown to the public out of context suggesting a
different interpretation of the evidence.”
When a member of the media submits a request to record a court proceeding, the
form (MC-510; see Appendix 1) includes 18 specific factors a judge must consider before
ruling on the request. There is also a 19th factor: Any other factor the judge deems
relevant. The most frequently cited “other” factors include:
“I consider the nature of the charges and the rights of the victims and
witnesses in regard to the charges. I also consider the age of the witnesses
and victims in determining the scope of coverage allowed. In at least one
case, the media did not honor my order to ‘tile’ the face of a witness, so I
take that into consideration as well.”
“Jurors should never be shown. Child witnesses should not be shown.”
“The right of the accused to a fair trial is sometimes implicated. Also, on rare
occasions I consider the safety risk to the accused (e.g., at an arraignment-
-an early stage of the case--I might order the face of an accused sex offender
who is being held in custody ‘tiled out’ to lessen the risk of jailhouse attacks).”
“I usually discuss a media's request with the parties and allow them to make
a decision as to whether they have any objections to the cameras in the
The Impact of Courtroom Cameras on the Judicial Process
108
courtroom and normally decide to grant or deny the media's request based
upon counsel's opinions.”
“Cost to the court and space taken up by media people.”
“I certainly am open to what the parties/attorneys want. I've found they
don't always want coverage. I find it more taxing on me to have the cameras
there as I do think certain witnesses, defendants, attorneys SHOW BOAT and
play to the camera. Also, the videographers/story editors are truly ignorant
about basic civics and many news stories do not provide the necessary
context to explain what occurred. It is all about the SENSATIONALISM. That
does not educate anyone nor does it improve the system of justice or citizens'
faith in their government institutions. As it is, jurors focus on what people
were wearing or hair styles. How much more stupid and subjective can we
make the court proceedings?? Total loss of dignity.”
“My main concern is the legitimacy of claim of newsworthiness. If celebrity
status is the primary motive for camera coverage request, I would almost
certainly deny request.”
“Whether the media has complied with the Rules of Court in making the
request.”
CONCLUSIONS
Since the trial of Richard Bruno Hauptmann in 1935, courts have struggled to balance
the Sixth Amendment right of the accused to a public trial and the defendant’s right to
a fair trial, and the First Amendment right to a free press. Courts have also tried to
consider their own interests in preserving the dignity and decorum of the courtroom.
After years of debate and two pilot studies, the Federal judiciary, through The Judicial
Conference of the United States, adopted a policy to allow judges the discretion to allow
audio and/or video recordings and live transmissions of court proceedings within specific
guidelines. The rules regarding cameras in California courts closely parallel those at the
Federal level, also leaving the decision to the discretion of the judge.
This research contributes to the discussion on allowing recordings and live
transmissions in court in two important areas. First, the authors have succinctly
summarized the history, Federal rules, seminal court cases, and California rules
concerning cameras in the courtroom in the context of the important Constitutional
issues. Second, this research provides qualitative data from California judges that help
explain some of the thinking by those who are empowered to accept or reject requests
to record court proceedings. Based on the reactions of California judges, it is clear that
the criteria described in California Rule 1.150 are being thoughtfully considered,
especially those related to the integrity of the proceedings, the privacy rights of all
participants, and the public’s right to know. At the same time, this research revealed
genuine skepticism about the stated advantages to allowing cameras in court, including
a tendency for some participants to behave differently when cameras are present and
creating inaccurate impressions about the judicial system among the public as a result
of not providing sufficient context for what is reported.
Recommendations
The issue of whether or not to allow recordings of court proceedings is far from
settled. Even as technology has provided less obtrusive means by which recordings can
be made, there is reluctance on the part of many judges to provide access. There are
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
109
at least three areas for future research that will shine more light on this issue. First, the
authors were unable to obtain data from the State judiciary on how many requests were
made to record court proceedings and the disposition of those requests. According to
the judiciary, the request forms are not centralized but rather are a part of each
individual case docket. These data would be useful in evaluating the process by which
such requests are made and how discretion is exercised by judges. Second, the survey
used in this research should be replicated to obtain a higher response rate and evidence
of representativeness. Third, it would be interesting to conduct a similar type of survey
among journalists who cover the courts. It is very likely that journalists will have a
different perspective on both the Constitutional and practical implications of allowing
greater access to court proceedings.
The Impact of Courtroom Cameras on the Judicial Process
110
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American Bar Association (n.d.). Appendix A: Moral code of judicial conduct
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2017).
Annotated Law Review 4th 121 (2017). Validity, propriety, and effect of allowing or
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Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure (2016) 114th Congress, 2nd Session.
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Fulton JD (1981). Fourteenth Amendment: Cameras in the courtroom: Supreme
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Appendix 1
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117208 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
MEN ARE STRONGER; WOMEN ENDURE: A CRITICAL
ANALYSIS OF THE THRONE OF GLASS AND THE
MORTAL INSTRUMENTS YA FANTASY SERIES
KATHERINE CRUGER
ABSTRACT
This study analyzes two popular YA fantasy series: Cassandra Clare’s The Mortal Instruments
and Sarah J. Maas’ Throne of Glass. We evaluate both series for explore tropes and themes
common to YA fantasty. Research shows that popular series have importat effect on identity
formation of readers, for good or ill. We conclude that, despite often being written by women
and about girls, the narratives found in YA often perpetuate internalized sexism, play into racist
tropes, reduce heroines to love interests, romanticize unhealthy relationships, use rape as a plot
device, and abuse characters’ reproductive abilities.
Keywords: Young Adult, literature, symbolic annihilation, media criticism, The Mortal
Instruments, Throne of Glass.
INTRODUCTION
In the 21st century, Young Adult (or YA) fantasy novels are taking up more space
on bookshelves and in the hearts, minds, and wallet share of adolescents. Books
written primarily for teenaged readers were relatively scarce until around the year
2000, when the genre became newly focused on fantasy, a shift largely attributed to
the success of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, and which gave us the Twilight and
Hunger Games popular culture crazes in 2005 and 2008 respectively (see Withers &
Ross, 2011). While there were just over 3000 YA titles published in 1997, by some
estimations there are 30,000+ published each year since 2002. (Bowker, 2014).
Bushman and McNerny (2014) argue that YA literature (often overlooked as a
legitimate field of study) helps readers understand who they are and what is moral and
immoral behavior. We argue that YA franchises do cultural work, meaning that they
are both constitutive of and constituted by our larger cultural and social ideas about
gender, romance, sexuality, heroism, and ideology. One study found, for example, that
readers and viewers of the Twilight franchise had more submissive self-concepts than
those who were not (see Melchiori & Mallett, 2012).
Assistant Professor, Chatham University, USA. kcruger@chatham.edu
Men Are Stronger; Women Endure: A Critical Analysis of The Throne of Glass and The Mortal
Instruments YA Fantasy Series
116
In this study, we analyze two recent and popular, if not blockbuster, YA fantasy
series. The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare made its debut in 2007 and has
sold 18 million copies, inspired a movie adaption, as well as a forthcoming television
series. The Urban Fantasy series follows Clary Fray, an ordinary girl who learns that
she’s a part of a magical World of angels, demons, and fae. The High Fantasy Series
Throne of Glass debuting in 2012, follows Celaena Sardothien, a teenaged assassin
fighting for her freedom in the kingdom of Adarlan. Although worlds and authors
apart, these two-book series have a lot in common. They both have an international
fanbase, have inspired television adaptations, and have been praised for their
diversity. Both series were written by women who began writing fan fiction before
securing publishing deals, and both authors actively engage with fans in person and
online through Tumblr and social media. Many have argued that problematic
representations of marginalized groups would largely be eliminated if those behind the
scenes (writers, film makers, cinematographers, producers) were a more diverse
group. However, this does not prove immediately true in the YA fantasy genre,
dominated by women writers like Clare and Maas. Through our textual analysis,
however, we find that these entries in the YA canon perpetuate many damaging
stereotypes. “Diverse” characters are tokens that are often abused. The books are
celebrated by fans and publishers for having strong female characters, but this
strength often comes at the expense of any other woman and girl in proximity. While
YA heroines can be stronger (and better) than all other women and girls, they can
never out shine their boyfriends. Heroines are often reduced to love interests in wildly
unhealthy relationships. Both series are guilty of using rape narratives and abusing
characters’ reproductive capabilities to move their stories along.
SYMBOLIC ANNIHILATION: Representations of Women and People of
Color in Mediated Messages
Symbolic Annihilation is a term coined by sociologists George Gerbner and Larry
Gross (1976) to describe the phenomena whereby marginalized groups (women,
people of color, LQBTQIA) are absent or under-represented in television content, both
in scripted shows and news coverage. They argue that symbolic annihilation is a
mechanism through which those with power maintain their power. Indeed, while 37%
of the US population are people of color, only 11 % of children’s books published over
the past 23 years features “multicultural content.” Young Adult books, are perhaps
even less diverse. The Cooperative Children’s Book Center found in their 2013 study
that only 5.3% of YA books feautured characters of color, while 95% featured White
characters (see Horning, 2013; CCBC, 2017).
As of 2015, according to their Diversity Baseline Survey the publishing industry is
79% white, 92 % able-bodied, 88 % heterosexual, and 78 % cisgendered-women.
The genre is dominated by female writers (CCBC, 2017). However, African-American,
Latinx, and Native American authors combined wrote less than 6 % of children’s books
published in 2016 (CCBC, 2017).
Gaye Tuchmann (1978) further classified symbolic annihilation into three types:
omission, when characters from a particular identity group are simply absent;
trivialization, when characters from a particular identity group have silly, minimal, or
foolish storylines or coverage; and condemnation, when characters from a particular
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
117
identity group are depicted disproportionately as either victims of violence (as with
women and girls) or perpetrators of violence (as with black men, for example.)
While studies of symbolic annihilation have largely been applied to television and
film representation, here we explore depictions and representations of characters in
two YA fantasy series. Young Adults are reading more than they were in the 80s, or
90s. The National Endowment for the Arts released a report celebrating that teen
readership increased 21% from 2002 to 2008 (NEA, 2009). In a phenomenon
uncommon before Harry Potter, popular YA series now become franchises of film or
television adaptations, merchandise, video games, conventions, even theme parks. Fan
websites, tumblrs, and forums for fan fiction allow superfans (not always teenaged
themselves) to comment and critique series and author choices, as well as participant
in the world building. Teenaged girls identify heavily with characters in the YA books
that they read. In some cases, teenaged readers sometimes look to these characters
for a model of how to handle real life situations (Kokesh & Sternadori, 2015).
In this study, character relationships, main plot points in the series, and dialogue
were analyzed. Where appropriate, the rhetorical analysis of the primary texts was
supplemented with secondary texts from fan message boards, series critiques, social
media content, and interviews with authors and fans. We sought to determine what
themes and tropes might emerged from the text as commonalities between the series,
and which can be seen are a larger trend in the multi-billion dollar YA genre are
analyzed in the remainder of this piece. More specifically, we wondered whether these
two series (written for, by and ostensibly about young women) would disturb the cycle
of symbolic annihilation of women and people of color.
After tabulating all named characters in both series, we found that of the twenty-six
mentioned characters in Throne of Glass series, twelve are women, only four are
people of color. Of those four women of color, two die. In The Mortal Instruments of
the thirty-nine characters mentioned, seventeen are women, and nine characters are
people of color. Eight out of those nine are alive at the end of the series. Of the series’
nine main characters, only three are women.
NOT THAT KIND OF GIRL: Internalized Sexism
In YA fiction, it seems that the best thing a heroine can be is nothing like other girls
(Buttsworth, 2002). To prove their strength and individuality, heroines often reject
conventional expressions of femininity, but more than that, fantasy heroines reject
other women and girls as vapid, conniving, or slutty. It seems that in a world with
werewolves and demons, the most outlandish thing is a friendship between two
women.
The message is painfully clear: there is only room in the story for one amazing girl,
there is only one way to be a girl or woman, and perhaps most troublingly, it’s
impossible for girls to have meaningful friendships with one another. These characters
often display internalized sexism, the involuntarily believe of the worst existing
stereotypes about one’s own gender identity group.
When readers meet Clary Fray, the heroine of The Mortal Instruments series, she is
with her best and only friend Simon Lewis. She wears jeans, tee shirts, Converse
sneakers, and doesn’t wear makeup. At the age of sixteen, Clary hasn’t managed to
connect with anyone else over her passion for popular culture or her love of art.
Whenever Clary is confronted with another girl, she instinctively feels threatened by
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them. Most of the conflicts between Clary and the only other young woman main
character in the series, Isabelle, revolve around slut-shaming and body snarking.
Young women are taught from a young age that the most significant and
fulfilling relationships they will have in their lives will be with men. They are also
taught that the thing that will most interfere with those relationships are other women
(hooks, 1986). In The Mortal Instruments series this idea is reinforced when conflicts
between Clary and other girls are only resolved when they no longer see each other as
a threat to their relationships with the boys in their lives.
Celaena Sardothien the young blonde heroine of Throne of Glass Celaena doesn’t
entirely reject traditional expressions of femininity as Clary has. Unlike Clary, who
thinks of herself as unattractive, “a Raggedy Ann to her mother’s Barbie doll” (Clare,
2007, p. 41). Celaena considers herself beautiful and uses her beauty “like she used
her whip” (Maas, 2012, p. 515). However, Celaena does not like or trust other women:
She never had many friends, and the ones she had often disappointed her ... she’d
sworn never to trust girls again, especially girls with agendas and power of their own.
Girls who would do anything to get what they wanted (Maas, 2012, p. 166).
Celaena has as much to fear from men as women. The king is responsible for the
slaughter of her family. Her father figure exploited her abilities for years and groomed
her to be a killer before she was even an adolescent. During her time as a slave, she
witnessed undertakers sexually assault young women. So, after a lifetime of trauma
and betrayal, why isn’t Celaena as weary of the men in this world as the women?
Because women are inherently untrustworthy, YA novels assert.
Even when there are brief examples of female friendship present in these series, it
seems that female relationships are still tied up in men. Bonds are preserved or
initiated not based on shared interests or experiences, but around men. Isabelle and
Clary’s friendship is solidified when Isabelle learns that Clary saved her brother’s life,
not by living and working together, or by battling evil forces together time and time
again.
The boys in the heroines lives also go out of their way to tell them they’re
“different.” Not from any other person they’ve ever met, but specifically from any
other woman or girl they’ve ever met. In additional to strong female characters
rejecting other women, they must also be defined and controlled by their relationships
with men.
TO LOVE IS TO DESTROY: Romanticized Toxic Masculinity
Jace Herondale, the male lead in The Mortal Instruments series, recalls an episode
of childhood emotional abuse to heroine (and his love interest) Clary, concluding: “The
boy never cried again and he never forgot what he learned: to love is to destroy, to be
loved is to be the one destroyed” (Clare, 2007, p.329).
Jace’s abusive father isn’t the best person to ask for relationship advice, but in the
world of fantasy YA this is an apt observation. In a fantasy story of a YA heroine these
things will be true: she will be beautiful, she will save the world, and she will find true
love with her soul mate. But all too often in YA, “I love you,” is used as a justification
for female characters being subjected to physical and emotional violence. In YA, the
romantic relationships are often endgame, meaning permanent, but very rarely are
healthy (Taylor, 2012).
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A defining characteristic of the young adult fiction genre are the all-consuming
relationships. It’s normal and expected that female characters will find their soul mates
before the age of 18. In fantasy in particular the relationships are written as being
“fated” (Taylor, 2012). As Kristina Deffenbacher (2014) noted, the prominence of soul
bonds in these books complicates narratives surrounding dating. Because these
characters are written as being destined to be together instances of abuse are easily
brushed off; a relationship with a soulmate cannot be toxic, as it was written in the
stars.
The negative types of relationships one will often find in YA will typically into the
following categories: co-dependent, toxic, or outright abusive. The three romantic
relationships that Clary Fray, Maia Roberts, and Celaena Sardothien are in provide an
example of each. Clary Fray and Jace Herondale in The Mortal Instruments are an
example of codependency being portrayed as love. Their story starts with Jace saving
Clary. The narrative then segways into belligerent sexual tension. Then once the
obstacle of their assumed siblinghood is out of the way their relationship shifts to
troubling co-dependency.
“And its potential for danger is literally unlimited,” said Alec. “If Jace knew I let
Clary go to the Seelie Queen, he’d—”
“I don’t care,” Clary said. “He’d do it for me. Tell me he wouldn’t. If I were
missing—”
“He’d burn the whole world down till he could dig you out of the ashes. I know,”
Alec said, sounding exhausted” (Clare, 2012, p.49).
That exchange takes place between Clary and Jace’s best friend Alec Lightwood
and describes the dynamic between Clary Fray and Jace Herondale pretty accurately.
The love that they share comes before safety, sanity, questions of mortality, and even
Clary’s own character development. Clary often ends up comforting Jace after he
physically harms her. Jace declares unapologetically that he cannot live with Clary.
Clary and Jace’s relationship goes to troubling extremes. However, it’s not the only
troubling relationship in the series. Maia’ Roberts’ first real boyfriend, Jordan Kyle,
physically and emotionally abuses her. The abuse leaves scars physically and
emotionally, culminating in Maia being attacked and turned into a werewolf by her
boyfriend after she attempts to end their relationship.
“Twenty-four stitches later, she was back in her pink bedroom, her mother
hovering anxiously. The emergency room doctor had said the bite looked like a large
dog's, but Maia knew better. Before the wolf had turned to race away, she'd heard a
hot, familiar whispered voice in her ear, "You're mine now. You'll always be mine”
(Clare, 2008, p.66).
Readers meet the werewolf Jordan two books later and his version of events are
somewhat different than Maia’s. In Jordan’s side of the story, it sounds like he only hit
Maia once, whereas in Maia’s recollection whenever Jordan became angry with her he
would slap her and got physical with her when she tried ending their relationship.
Jordan makes a point of telling a friend of Maia’s that the night he attacked her she
kissed another boy in front of him, implying the attack was justifiable and provoked.
From the moment, the audience meets Jordan he is set up to be a sympathetic
character and not an abuser and the audience is encouraged to forgive him. According
to the narrative and supernatural mythology surrounding the story Jordan didn’t hurt
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Maia because he’s an abuser, it was all because he is a werewolf. The bite excuses
everything.
Initially, upon seeing him again Maia is understandably furious. But ultimately, she
accepts his apology and forgives him. They once again become romantically involved
and Jordan is accepted into her friend group. Werewolves are not real and Maia
Roberts is a fictional character, but allowing a sixteen-year-old girl to take back her
abusive ex-boyfriend is not without consequence. Because Maia and Jordan’s story is
heavily focused not on the pain that Jordan caused Maia, but on the pain Jordan feels
for hurting Maia, the message is being sent that in some cases domestic violence is
acceptable and forgivable.
On series author Cassandra Clare’s Tumblr fans of the books expressed concern
that Maia and Jordan rekindling their relationships despite their violent history might
send a bad message (Clare, 2014b). Clare responds by saying that “portrayal is not
endorsement” and “I might think that the message of Maia and Jordan’s relationship
was “girls will forgive their abusers” if Maia actually did forgive Jordan and accept him
back into her life, but she doesn’t. She tries temporarily — she really does believe that
Jordan was behaving out of character due to the werewolf transformation he was
undergoing, and indeed that magical aspect of things absolutely muddies the water.
Even though she may be right to some degree that the fault on Jordan’s side is
complicated, she realizes she can’t forgive him, realizes she doesn’t want to be with
someone who did what he did to her, and decides to dump him” (Clare, 2014b, para.
1).
Generally speaking yes, portrayal is not endorsement, provided that there isn’t
endorsement within the portrayal. Jordan is accepted amongst Maia’s friends. In the
fifth book they’re dating and sleeping together. When Jordan dies, he spends his final
moments being held by Maia. He’s a romanticized and sympathetic character
remembered fondly after his death. That’s a form of endorsement.
Unfortunately, the Throne of Glass series published five years after The Mortal
Instruments has similar troubling portrayals of relationships. In Sarah J. Maas’ world,
toxic masculine behavior is not only condoned but rewarded. This can be seen most
prominently through Celaena Sardothien relationship with Rowan Whitethorn. The pair
meet in the third book when Celaena is in a deep depression due to the brutal murder
of her best friend. Celaena is ordered to train with Rowan, and Rowan walks her back
to the room where she’ll be staying afterward. Neither Celaena nor Rowan is happy
about this arrangement. Rowan thinks that Celaena is a spoiled child and Celaena
believes him to be an arrogant brute. When Rowan expresses his displeasure for the
task of training together, Celaena angrily insults him. Rowan is infuriated and chooses
to respond with violence.
“Faster than she could sense, faster than anything had a right to be, he punched
her.
She shifted enough to keep her nose from shattering but took the blow on her
mouth. She hit the wall, whacked her head, and tasted blood. Good” (Maas, 2014,
p.109).
Rowan punched her the face, so hard that she bled and her lip was swollen. Not in
a duel, not in training, not in defense, but simply because Celaena insulted him. This
behavior is excused almost immediately. As Celaena is lying in bed later that night she
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would think to herself that she “deserved it.” The following morning, she would also
find a tin of salve outside her door from Rowan, attached to a note that said she
deserved it (Maas, 2014, p.114). Upon considering the physical power of the immortal
Fae and Rowan’s age and experience, Celaena observes that if Rowan really wanted to
him could have shattered her jaw. So, by only leaving her slightly bloodied and
bruised, the audience is supposed to believe he practiced restraint. This is only the
beginning of the violent foundation of heroine Celaena’s relationship with Rowan.
Rowan’s approach to “training” Celaena mostly consists of beating her senseless. This
is romanticized. “Gods, he was brilliant. Cunning and wicked and brilliant. Even when
he beat the hell out of her. Every. Damn. Day” (Maas, 2014, p. 669). Rowan is mostly
seen through Celaena’s eyes, and in this context female gaze is not empowering for
her or for the reader. Focusing on his attractive qualities while Rowan “beat the hell
out of her,” takes away from the seriousness of his behavior.
Rowan’s violent behavior is excused repeatedly. The audience is told that because
Celaena is capable of violence, is not a stranger to being treated violently, and has
been hurt worse by others, Rowan’s violence towards her is inconsequential. The
audience is told that because Rowan is a Fae male his aggression cannot be helped.
“It’s in our blood,” another Fae Luca says. “It is our duty, honor, and life’s mission to
make sure our families are cared for. Especially our mates” (Maas, 2014, p.228).
This portrayal of violent, overprotective Fae male behavior as well-meaning and
noble echos the unfortunate reality that abuse victims are sometimes told that their
abuser’s behavior is for their own good. It also echos one of the most damaging myths
about dating and domestic violence: men simply cannot help themselves and therefore
cannot be held responsible for the damage they do (Deffenbacher, 2014).
Although in their own way they are noticeably toned down from Stephanie Meyer’s
Edward Cullen, Jace, Jordan, and Rowan in different ways embody the compensated
psychopath Debra Merskin (2016) describes. “A psychopathic personality is one
characterized by manipulativeness, low frustration tolerance, lack of remorse or
empathy, shallow emotions, egocentricity, episodic relationships, glibness, a parasitic
lifestyle, persistent violation of social norms, and hyper need for stimulation” (Merskin,
2014, p.159). In Rowan, we see the constant assertion of dominance and lack of
remorse. In Jace we the see the constant need for stimulation and unattainability
serves as draw within the text (Merskin, 2014). In Jordan we are shown a
manipulative young man who gains sympathy from peers for his own predatory
behavior.
They easily win over characters that dislike them or have reservations about their
relationships with their partners. By the end of The Mortal Instruments, Jace has won
over Clary’s mother and closest friend. Jordan easily gains Maia’s friends’ approval.
Rowan wins over Celaena’s cousin. Within the narrative they are not just sympathetic
but pitied. Jace because of his abusive childhood. Rowan because of the murder of his
first wife and unborn child. Jordan due to his guilt over injuring Maia, Maia not loving
him back, and his murder. Even when they cause their significant others pain, the pain
of the male characters is more important (Taylor, 2012).
As Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie observed, “We teach girls to shrink themselves, to
make themselves smaller. We say to girls: You can have ambition, but not too much.
You should aim to be successful but not too successful, otherwise you will threaten the
man.” (Adichie, 2012, p. 1). This is true of many of the relationships within Throne of
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Glass and The Mortal Instruments. These heroines can be superior to other characters
of all gender identities, but they are written to be smaller in comparison to the boys
they fall in love with (Peterson, 2012). Although Clary and Celeana are the
protagonists of their stories, neither of them are ever quite as strong as their love
interests. In The Mortal Instruments what makes both Jace and Clary special is that
the angel blood given to them in utero endowed them with abilities no others of their
magical kind (called Shadowhunters) possess. For Clary, this means the ability to make
runes, magical tattoos that give the shadowhunter that wears them supernatural
abilities (no one has ever had this power before). For Jace this means he is stronger
and faster than any other Shadowhunter alive. In theory this is Clary’s story, and yet
the title of best shadowhunter in the world goes to Jace. The same is true in Throne of
Glass with Celaena and Rowan. Rowan is the first and only person in the series who is
able to best Celaena in battle. Rowan’s ability to command the air can smother
Celaena’s fire magic. Heroines can be strong, stronger than other girls, stronger than
the villains, but not stronger than their boyfriends. That would be too much of a threat
to traditional gender roles that require women to be submissive in relationships. This
sends the message that even if you are the hero of your own story you have to be Lois
Lane, just a little, or else that would be too threatening to any man.
In these characters readers see themselves, their friends, and who they would
someday like to be (Kokesh & Sternardori, 2015). So if it’s ok for Maia, Clary, Celaena,
and a never-ending list of examples of characters in unhealthy relationships to stay
because it’s true love, then readers subconsciously might be lead to believe that in life
as is the case in these books: it’s not real love unless you’re bleeding.
WHEN MAGICAL GIRLS ARE MAMMIFIED: Race, Colonization, and
Sacrificial Characters of Color
When writers of fiction and television are praised for their diversity, what people
usually mean is that they have a character of color that exists. They have done the
bare minimum. But the problem is that in doing this, many well-meaning authors do
characters of color and their readers a great disservice. In works of fiction all too often
characters of color exist only in relation to the white protagonist. They exist to provide
comic relief. They exist to convey information. They exist to die or be tortured to
further a protagonist's character development and teach a lesson. However, they are
not often whole characters in their own right.
In the Throne of Glass series, Nehemia Ytger is a rebel princess fiercely devoted to
her people. She’s kind, empathetic, cunning, and capable of being very calculating.She
saves Celaena’s life more than once throughout the first book. Nehemia’s bravery and
devotion has made her beloved by her people. And it’s that devotion and her profound
hope for a better world that is what costs her life.
Our heroine, Celaena Sardothien is the “chosen one.” She’s the lost heir of a long-
conquered land and is endowed with incredible power by her bloodline. She’s the only
one who can save the continent from the tyrannical king. As the ghost of the departed
queen tells her in the first book, “You could rattle the stars,” she whispered. “You
could do anything, if you only dared” (Maas, 2012, p.633).
Celaena understands that the king is evil. He is to blame for the slaughter of her
family and conquering of many kingdoms. despite not being loyal to him, Celaena
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doesn’t want to act because she feels there’s no hope. But according to Nehemia,
according to Elena, according to everyone who comes into contact with our reluctant
hero, Celaena could change the world for the better, she just needs a push. After
Celaena refuses to help Nehemia challenge the king and help to free her country, this
conversation between Princess Nehemia and the ghost of the queen takes place.
“One of them has to break,” the queen said to the princess. “Only then can it
begin.”
“I know,” the princess said softly. “But the prince isn’t ready. It has to be her.”
“Then do you understand what I am asking of you?”
The princess looked up... When she looked back at the ancient queen, her eyes
were bright. “Yes.”
“Then do what needs to be done” (Maas, 2013, p.340).
Nehemia orchestrates her own brutal murder to spur her friend into action.
Nehemia Ytger’s terrible storyline is a hybrid of two equally offensive tropes: 1) the
magical negro and 2) the mammy. The mammy archetype goes back to at least the
1800s, but unfortunately unlike corsets and muskets, the trope has had much more
staying power. The archetype is simple: a black woman who is resigned to a lifetime or
enslavement or general servitude. These figures are often docile, obese, and sexless
(Collins, 2000). Not all the cliches usually found in the mammy trope are found with
Nehemia, but ultimately, she exists to serve. As sociologist Patricia Hill Collins would
describe a mammy figure, “the faithful, obedient domestic servant...loving, nurturing
and caring for her white children…[she] knows her ‘place as an obedient servant. She
has accepted her subordination.” (Collins, 2000, p.71) Before we meet her, we learn
that Nehemia has resigned herself to self-sacrificing subordination. She exists to bleed
for everyone around her and is more than willing to do it.
The magical negro trope is a supernatural version of the mammy archetype, the
trope is wrapped up in black and brown characters serving white protagonists who
cannot take care of themselves (Harriot, 2016). In addition to providing comic relief
and motivation should they meet an untimely death, characters who are considered
“magical negroes” provide magical support for the protagonists (Harriot, 2016). As
critics have pointed out, one of many implications of these kinds of tropes is that
characters who exist to clean up emotional or magical messes can never truly be
equals.
It’s deeply troubling that one of the few prominent women of color in this series
who wanted so desperately to change the world decided upon calculation and a dead
queen’s urging that only way to make the world better was for her to no longer be in
it.
Sorcha, who wasn’t important enough to be given a surname, suffers a similar fate.
She is introduced in the fourth book and is one of the castle’s healers. In the continent
where the events of Throne of Glass are taking place it appears that Ellwye, Nehemia’s
country, is heavily populated with black and brown people. When Sorcha’s physical
description is given, other characters deduce that one of her family members must
come from Ellwye. And while talking about her physical appearance the prince
describes her as not beautiful, but only “pretty” in comparison to Celaena the thin,
blonde haired, blue eyed epitome of white womanhood and western beauty.
Ultimately, Sorcha is a consolation prize for the prince, who could not win Celaena’s
heart.
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Sorscha feels for the prince and they enter into a secret relationship. Ultimately,
she is beheaded before the Prince’s eyes, and it is the pain of her death that causes
him break with his father and develop his magical powers. Again: the woman of color’s
awful death is mere catalyst or motivation for another character’s development.
Bad representation is as damaging as no representation. Regardless of author
intent, creating characters like Sorcha and Nehemia who exist to be tortured and killed
for white characters to learn a lesson or have an epiphany perpetuates white
supremacy; it perpetuates the idea that black and brown people only exist to serve.
Characters of color in this scenario exist to hold other characters’ confidences, they
exist to sacrifice themselves, they exist to be tortured, but they do not exist to be the
heroes of their own stories. While studies have shown that reading fiction increases
empathy, stories that perpetuate negative stereotypes can reinforce real life
prejudices. Being included in the narrative only to have negative stereotypes about you
reinforced leads to individuals internalizing those stereotypes. A story with more dead
people of color than alive is a poor excuse for diversity. Real representation and
diversity is when characters that are part of marginalized populations are fleshed out,
three-dimensional characters, who are not simply plot devices. This is especially true
for the world of fantasy, because in a world where anything is possible audiences are
given the opportunity to imagine worlds where there isn’t inequality.
To be a hero or heroine means that you model what heroism is for an audience.
Having a character that is a woman of color choose to die for the “greater good” and
because they ultimately were not the chosen one sends the message that the only acts
of heroism women of color are capable of is martyrdom and that communities fictional
or otherwise are better served without their existence.
TRIGGER WARNING: Use of Sexual Violence as Plot Device
A trigger warning is an advisory to individuals who have suffered traumas ranging
from war to sexual violence that the content that they may see or hear may bring up
painful memories and or cause physical and emotional responses (Phillips, 2016). The
Mortal Instruments and Throne of Glass series probably should have come with several
trigger warnings for sexual violence.
Clary Fray of The Mortal Instruments and Kailtain Rompier from Throne of Glass
although worlds, years, and authors away are both victims of sexual violence. Kaltain
is an antagonist whose rape is meant to purify and redeem her. She is catty,
manipulative, social climbing, and obsessed with marrying a prince, so much that so
she participates in a plot that nearly costs heroine Celaena her life. For her crimes
Kaltain is thrown in the dungeons, raped repeatedly by her once co-conspirator the
duke, and eventually blackmailed into marrying him.
To have a villainess, an antagonist, a “bad girl” like Kaltain raped and violated
repeatedly has some unfortunate implications. In literature and television, sexual
violence has been a tried and true way to make unlikable female characters likable
(Dutta, 1999). When the audience meets Kaltain they have every reason to dislike
her, to have no problem with such a vapid and conniving girl rotting away in the
dungeons. The duke’s sexual assault appears to be a tool to get the audience and
Celaena who suffered the most because of her actions, to forgive her behavior.
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When rape is meant to be a purifying and redemptive experience in storytelling
these narratives communicate conflicting notions about sexual violence (Dutta, 1999).
On the one hand, it’s made clear that rape is a crime and being raped causes victims a
great deal of trauma. On the other hand, writing rapes as the beginning of characters
redemption, perpetuates some of the most persistent and damaging of myths about
sexual violence in regard to women: their actions in some way bring on their attacks,
only “bad girls” are raped, and men cannot help themselves.
Focusing on when rape is meant to redeem and or “tame” the victim there is a
consistent formula. Introduce a young woman, show her behaving badly, in this
context bad behavior is characterised as being sexually aggressive, manipulative,
dishonest, and then have her to be the victim of rape or a sexual assault (Dutta,
1999). On the one hand, it’s made clear that rape is a crime, being raped causes a
great deal of trauma, and so long as the rapist isn’t meant to be redeemed things
usually don’t end well for them (Dutta, 1999). And yet the message is clear: if the
victim had behaved better this wouldn’t have happened (Dutta 1999).
Sometimes writers write sexual assault into their stories to shock people.
Sometimes it’s a lazy way to make a point or convey information, as with the sexual
assault of Clary Fray by her brother Sebastian.
“Open to me, my sister, my love.’” His blood dripped onto her face. She held
herself still, her body humming with the effort, as his hand slipped from her throat,
along her side, to her waist. His fingers slid inside the waistband of her jeans. His skin
was hot, burning; she could feel that he wanted her.... She silently thanked the battle
euphoria for doing what it had to do and keeping her focused while Sebastian sickened
her with his touch” (Clare, 2012a, p.716).
When writers want to remind characters and audiences of a male hero's
vulnerability they kill someone he loves; when writers want to remind a heroine, they
have her raped or threaten her with rape (Brown, 2014). Clary is defined by her good
intentioned reckless behavior, and has been reprimanded more than once for her
impulsivity. The kinds of gendered attacks that Kaltain and Clary are subjected to
typically happen after the girls have challenged societal norms or authority in some
way. And it goes without saying that their male counterparts (Harry Potter, Percy
Jackson) rarely experience similar treatment. Upon frequent questioning from readers
in online forums, author Cassandra Clare defends the decision to have Sebastian
attempt to rape his sister Clary by stating via her Tumblr account that the audience
needed to know that Sebastian was irredeemable (Clare, 2012b). However, Sebastian’s
past behavior communicates that information just fine.
Cassandra Clare also justified her choice by arguing that books must reflect reality
and, “To say rape shouldn’t be written about, that sexual assault shouldn’t be written
about, it is to say that people who are survivors of sexual assault and rape shouldn’t
see representations of people like them in books. It is also to say that books should
represent a world in which those things don’t happen. This is extremely dangerous
thinking” (Clare, 2012b, para. 1). Clare is correct that rape narratives are not
inherently problematic. A distinguishing characteristic of the YA genre is hope.
Narratives about individuals who are survivors of sexual violence do have the potential
to provide hope for readers that they can recover too. (Deffenbacher, 2014) There is a
place in literature for stories about individuals who have experienced sexual violence
and managed to heal. There is even a void of such stories (Phillips, 2016). However,
where Clare fell short in storytelling is that in its aftermath, Clary Fray’s sexual assault
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was not the story of a young woman’s recovery, but evidence of a young man’s
depravity.
Mediated messages are constitutive of and constituted by our larger culture. This is
crucial, as generations of activists have learned the experiences that real life victims
will have in their personal lives and in the justice system depends upon society as a
whole understanding the seriousness of rape and sexual assault and who is at fault
(Cuklanz, 2000). In a fantasy context, there is the opportunity to imagine a better
world, a safer world for women and girls. As Kristina Deffenbacher observed, done
properly a story about a heroine who has been raped in a fantasy setting could portray
a world where women defeat rape culture (Deffenbacher, 2014). Unfortunately, The
Mortal Instruments fails to do that. Clary Fray could have been a positive
representation of sexual assault survivors. Clary is sixteen. RAINN, the Rape and
Incest National Network, estimates that 54 % of victims of sexual violence are under
the age of eighteen, as are most of this genre’s audience. She also doesn’t tell anyone
about her attack as many victims don’t (RAINN, 2016).
Many writers are under the impression that for a heroine to become a heroine she
must at some point in her journey be raped or sexually assaulted (Phillips, 2016). One
of troubling things about this trend is that for these characters, being raped or sexually
assaulted isn’t something that was done to them, but something that defines them.
More than that: transforms them into superheroines (Deffenbacher, 2014). Before City
of Lost Souls, Clary was still fumbling through her training, by the final book she is a
competent fighter. This attack can be considered the final nail in the coffin for Clary
Fray an innocent aspiring artist from Brooklyn and the birth of Clary Fairchild a
Shadowhunter, a warrior.
To give writers an idea of how to respectfully and realistically write about sexual
violence RAINN suggests that writers focus on the the impacted character’s journey to
recovery to show audiences what happens in real life (Phillips, 2016). Clare fails to do
this. The way Sebastian's assault of Clary impacts her is largely absent from the
narrative. In Throne of Glass and The Mortal Instruments, masculinity is portrayed as
the solution to sexual violence as opposed to the cause. With the Duke and Sebastian,
the audience is presented with psychotic, marginal, outlier demonic portrayals of
rapists. In Throne of Glass, it is revealed that the Duke is being possessed by a demon
from another dimension. In The Mortal Instruments, Sebastian’s inhumanity is often
attributed to the demon blood in his system. Sebastian and Duke Perrington are not
meant to be considered “real men.” They are portrayed to be violent not because of
misogyny, but because of supernatural forces; they cannot help themselves. The
danger here is that such narratives reaffirm the myth that rapists are outside of the
general population and that no one anyone might ever believe to be “normal” or
“respectable” could ever commit such crimes. Statistically this is untrue. Reinforcing
the myth that rapists exist only in dark alleys and not on swimming teams, makes it
more difficult for people to see “respectable” individuals as guilty of these sort of
crimes (Cuklanz, 2000).
Done improperly, as I feel it was in these stories, the use of sexual violence in
storytelling can take even more of the characters’ agency away from them. Because
their attacks are used to make a point, to convey information, or to facilitate a reaction
from other characters. The victims, the ones who will suffer the most are quickly put
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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on the back burners in these narratives. Characters like Clary and Kaltain are often
robbed of their right to say no by their attackers and then robbed of their reactions by
the authors. Stories about survivors of sexual violence are important as they reflect
and form our societal understanding of rape culture. Which is why writers should craft
them with great care.
When written properly, researchers have found that narratives surrounding victims
of sexual violence can have a positive impact (Hust et al., 2015). A study found that
viewing television shows with storylines about sexual violence can lead to a better
understanding of consent, lessen victim-blaming, and increase bystander intervention.
Unfortunately when poorly written and portrayed they can reaffirm destructive myths
about sexual violence. (Hust et al., 2015). However, rape narratives are not the only
way women can have their agency taken from them in stories like these.
INCUBATORS WITH LEGS: Mystical Pregnancies and Disposable Mothers
As a general rule, pregnant protagonists are few and far between in fantasy stories;
babies usually come after evil’s been vanquished. So as a reader it is safe to assume if
there’s a pregnancy before the epilogue it’s probably not going to go well for the
pregnant person. In fantasy, pregnancy is another way that many a female character
have their bodies violated to move the story along. In a similar fashion, the way that
pregnancy is treated excludes the experience of those most impacted by a pregnancy
and pregnancy becomes a plot device that’s about everyone except the mother.
An example of this in The Mortal Instruments is Jace Herondale’s mother Celine.
The audience knows very little about her except these four things: she was twenty
when she died, she loved her husband who did not love her back, her family was
abusive, and she always looked vulnerable. Celine is, in short, a walking incubator;
she’s a way to explain Jace’s existence and importantly why he and Clary are not
related after all and it’s okay for them to date.
When asked by readers why Jace is utterly uninterested in learning about his
birthmother’s family, Cassandra Clare said that it’s because Jace already has a family
that he loves. And yet, Jace tried to understand himself better by learning about her
birth father’s side of the family. The same is never true for Celine. She is absent from
the narrative surrounding her pregnancy and the death that it ended with. Oddly
enough, even though Celine was the pregnant person and she is biologically Jace’s
parent too she is not truly Jace’s mother, she is just an incubator whose life and
experiences were ultimately irrelevant beyond her ability to carry a child.
The abuse and subsequent disposal of pregnant bodies doesn’t end with Celine
within the series. Warlocks are immortal beings with the ability to wield magic. They
have demon fathers and human mothers, but the warlock race stems from rape.
Demons seduce these women by pretending to be their significant others. When the
readers are introduced to Magnus Bane, a powerful warlock, in the first book one of
the first things learned about Magnus is that his mother committed suicide.
“You want to know what it’s like when your parents are good churchgoing folk and
you happen to be born with the devil’s mark?” He pointed at his eyes, fingers splayed.
“When your father flinches at the sight of you and your mother hangs herself in the
barn, driven mad by what she’s done?” (Clare, 2007, p.368).
Although the emotions that surely go along with being the product of rape are valid
and worth exploring we never truly understand what these women went through.
Men Are Stronger; Women Endure: A Critical Analysis of The Throne of Glass and The Mortal
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When the mothers are horrified, it’s always because their children are not human and
not because of the revelation they have been raped. Never once is it mentioned how
deeply violating it must have been to realize their spouse or significant other is not
their child’s father, except that it is awful to realize the father is a demon. Worse, to
learn about their own rape in the form of their child. They simply provide backstories
to other characters. As is the case often for female characters who are victims of
violating crimes, their pain is never truly allowed to be their own.
Throne of Glass handles pregnancy in a similarly dehumanizing way. It’s heavily
implied that the witches of Throne of Glass come from non-consensual circumstances.
“The Valg kidnapped and stole whatever Fae they could, and because your eyes are
getting that glazed look, I’m just going to jump to the end and say the offspring
became us. Witches” (Maas, 2015, p.360). To strengthen the king’s army the duke
wants to use a group of witches to bear half-demon, half-witch children. For the
women selected the process is rather brutal. The pregnancy cycle is accelerated and
women are required to give birth to one “child” after another with no real time for
recovery. For the women involved the process is traumatic.
“They are not witchlings. They are not babies,” Elide spat, covering her face with
her hands as if to rip out her eyes. “They are creatures. They are demons. Their skin is
like black diamond, and they—they have these snouts, with teeth. Fangs. Already, they
have fangs. And not like yours” (Maas, 2015, p.687).
The readers never learn the names of the women forced to bear the demons’
offspring, or see what the experience was like from their perspectives, or hear from
them again because at the end of the story they along with their demonic progencies
are incinerated. The witches who were forced to bear the demon spawns, were not
characters but plot devices. What was done to them, was done to make a point. It was
done to reinforce the ruthlessness of the Duke and the King. It was done to create
conflict among the witches. However again, as is a trend with this sort of plot device,
the characters hurt the most and impacted the most by having their reproductive
abilities used and abused are excluded from the narrative.
Unless things seriously go wrong medically, pregnancy doesn’t leave a person
ruined. In these YA fantasy stories it does. That was the story of Magnus’ mother and
the witches. They couldn’t bear to live after their traumatic experiences with
pregnancy and didn’t even have the option of healing. More often than not when a
character becomes pregnant her agency goes out the window as often does her
usefulness after giving birth. These women are so dehumanized they’re not given
names or space to have reactions to the often deeply traumatic experiences inflicted
upon them. They’re not only subjected to horrifying births or conception
circumstances, but they’re reduced to their functioning uteruses until they can carry
the story no further. And all without ever having their stories told.
CONCLUSIONS
Throne of Glass, The Mortal Insturments, and the countless other YA fantasy
stories that follow their generic form pass off disempowering narratives as feminist
epics. Many of the narratives conflict, (re)producing a contradictory double bind of
ideal womanhood. Heroines embody western beauty ideals, but see themselves as
ordinary until they become extraordinary under the gaze of their soulmate. A heroine
is physically and emotionally strong, but embodies patriarchal, militaristic concepts of
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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strength, just not as much strength as their boyfriend has. Lead characters are
destined to be together, and love is used as justification for heroines being subjected
to physical and emotional violence at the hands of their older, more experienced
partners. This all-consuming violent love is presented as pleasurable for protagonists,
but the audience also consumes violence as pleasure. Heroines distrust and trivialize
other women, while their boyfriends reassure them that they’re “different” from any
other woman or girl they’ve ever known. Heroines are often white saviors, and servile
women of color are commonly killed as a plot device in the protagonist’s character
development. Magical races, often coded as people of color, are often depicted as
savage, uncivilized, and violent in nature, peoples for the heroine to conquer. Heroines
are frequently disciplined or developed through sexual violence; sexual assault isn’t
something that happens to heroines, but something that defines them and transforms
them into superheroines.
In sum, YA authors often wind up using the supernatural rules to reinforce real
world inequalities. We argue that authors should give their audiences credit and trust
them to deal with difficult emotions as it’s likely they’ve had to deal with them in their
own lives already. At the same time, I believe that authors should always consider the
vulnerability and likely lack of media literacy of their audience. These stories are
fictional, but their impact on the people who read them is profound.
Masculinities and femininities are lived and performed in daily life, but constructed
in the imagination. As hooks (1986) argues, sometimes representations of black
womanhood is so awful it’s almost better to be excluded. In essence: omission might
be preferable to annihilation (Tuchmann, 1978).
Men Are Stronger; Women Endure: A Critical Analysis of The Throne of Glass and The Mortal
Instruments YA Fantasy Series
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117209 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
PHONOGRAPHIC INDUSTRY: SUMMIT AND DECLINE
IN THE 20TH CENTURY
VALTERLEI BORGES DE ARAÚJO
*
LEANDRO DE PAULA SANTOS**
ABSTRACT
By highlighting the Brazilian context as the analytical approach, this article gathers data on the
impacts on music consumption brought by the development of the phonographic industry. Since
the emergence of the phonograph in the late 19th century until the revolution brought by the
digitization and sharing of files in the first decade of the 21st century, this research presents,
chronologically, the main devices for sound reproduction or physical music supports that have
appeared within this time period, thus creating a record of the technological evolution in the
phonographic industry in the 20th century. This article targets the present-day reconfiguration of
the means of production and distribution of music, as well as its means of consumption and some
of its effects on the industry, the artists and users.
Keywords: Phonographic industry, music, new models of music production and consumption.
INTRODUCTION
The digitization of communication processes and the transformation in the
running of cultural assets, which occurred mainly after the year 2000, made us wish
to review the past of the phonographic industry, analyzing some of its main periods
and their respective characteristics. In that sense, this article seeks to draw upon
some dates in history we believe are crucial points when observing the
transformations held primarily throughout the 20th century: a watershed century to
the music industry.
Talking about the music market without looking at the transformations occurred
in the 20th century is neglecting its period of extensive, key changes, with the summit
and decline of the so called “majors” (big record companies) - that would end up
determining, for better or worse, much of its history, as we shall see in this article.
That’s why we opted to create a record on the evolution of the phonographic industry,
from the late 20th century to the early 21st century.
This technological evolution is strongly related to the very development of the
music market and the music industry, since the process of recording for the purpose
*
PhD in Literature Studies, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brazil. val.borges@gmail.com
** PhD in Media Studies, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. psleandro@gmail.com
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
134
of reproduction and hearing is born having an industrial, technological device as its
base. We’ll approach the evolution process in the recording of music, with reference
to the emergence of new technologies that have fostered new ways of circulating
and enjoying the musical production, paving the way for our argument over the
impact brought by the digital/virtual platforms for such market.
In a way, when observed through the historical perspective of the phonographic
industry, the history of music is similar to that of cinema, a kind of art in which the
process of production is inseparable from the technological apparatus. Furthermore,
the seventh art emerges within an industrial and properly commercial structure: we
just have to remember that the first public screening of a movie, in 1895 in Paris,
had its tickets sold. It was within these historical circumstances that music also began
to be registered in physical supports, with expectations of an industrial model
structure, aiming commercialization. We are then talking about the real historical
transformation of music into a product, of its commercial tangibility, because as we
shall see next, until then, enjoying music was restricted to auditions of live
performances.
This article is structured as to cover the key in force models in each analyzed
period, contextualizing the Brazilian reality whenever possible. In order to do so,
these periods were chronologically subdivided according to names of the main
devices or other musical reproduction supports: in the first part of the article - entitled
Yesterday - we’ll talk about the phonograph (which covers the years between 1877
and 1887), the gramophone (which dates back to 1888 and lasts until the late 1910s)
the 78 rpm record (which emerges in 1925 and lasts until the late 1940s), the vinyl
records (which emerge in 1948 and begin to decline at the end of the 1980s) and
the cassette tapes (a technology that emerges in the late 1970s and declines in the
late 1980s). In the second part of the text - entitled Today -, dedicated to the
digital/virtual era of the phonographic industry, we’ll find the CD (which emerges in
the beginning of the 1980s and remains until today) and finally, the download (which
emerges in 1990s and becomes popular after the 2000s). As our focus is the 20th
century, we opted for leaving the current streaming services aside, as these services
arise in Brazil only after the second decade of the 21st century.
It’s important to state that the time span for each period as exposed here is not
precise; it is an attempt to better organize the timeline of the 21st century according
to the history of the phonographic industry in that time frame, taking into
consideration that, even nowadays, these multiple models of music supports keep
coexisting, especially amongst private collectors and music lovers. Given that, we’ll
start analyzing the key time frames in the phonographic industry that begin in the
end of the 19th century, peaking and declining (when considering industrial means
of production) in the next century. That way we can assert that it is in the 20th
century that major industrial and massive transformations connected to the music
market take place.
YESTERDAY
The phonograph
Until the end of the 19th century, in order to listen to or consume music it was
necessary to go to a concert or to listen to a live performance: until then, music
wasn’t reproduced or commercialized through any audio recording formats. In Brazil,
during the transition period between the 19th and the 20th century, according to
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
135
researcher José Ramos Tinhorão (1998: 226), the music “market” at that time was
limited to the informal sales of sheet music for piano.
Developed in the year 1877 by the American Thomas Edison (1847-1931), the
phonograph was the first attempt of recording and reproducing music. Harry Crowl
says that “the American inventor created, after numerous experiments, a device with
two needles, one for recording and the other for reproducing music, which was able
to register sounds in cylinders. Such sounds were emitted through a mouthpiece
similar to one of a musical instrument, perhaps a tuba or a sousaphone” (Crowl 2009:
144).
The phonograph was a device that originally recorded sounds in wax cylinders. It
was, therefore, one of the first mechanical devices which had the purpose of
reproducing sounds (not necessarily music) and which had the potential to open the
gate to a market that could sell and commercialize goods that so far didn’t know their
own reproducibility was possible - even though that wasn’t Thomas Edison’s original
intention. In our brief genealogy of the phonographic models, the phonograph
represents the first form of music reproduction, and also connects the experience of
listening to music to the physical existence of a device that is responsible for diffusing
sound waves.
The gramophone
Developed in 1888 by Émile Berliner (1851-1929), a German man who immigrated
to the USA, the gramophone was an update compared to the phonograph, according
to Simone Pereira de Sá (2009: 57), the gramophone was able to “reproduce and
copy sounds through shellac discs made from a copper mold, allowing sound to be
recorded in one of the sides”. There was also the possibility of making new discs in
wax. In other words: Berliner’s invention freed music from being trapped in a
reproduction device and placed it in a physical support that was easier to handle and
was also more portable. Unlike the previous moment, there was now an interest in
the sale and commercialization of music. The chosen format for Berliner’s invention
was that of record discs: it was then installed, from that moment on, the model that
would rule the whole phonographic industry during the 20th century.
In effect, it is only after the gramophone that we can identify the prototype of
what would be one of the main products in the phonographic industry in the 20th
century: the record disc. Kept and fixed in a support that allowed its transportation
and marketing, music would become an industrial product marketed in large scale -
although it could hold symbolic value and inherent expressions in a given culture.
In fact, after the invention of the gramophone, during the slavery period in Brazil
in the 1880s, the possibility of marketing record discs could be foreseen, especially
after the emergence of the vaudeville, which was similar to Brazil’s “teatro de revista”,
a theatrical genre of political and social satire that would also stage musical acts
during its shows, and were highly popular in Rio de Janeiro in the late 19th century.
Every artist who wished to have a successful career would have to take part in
the variety (vaudevillian) theatre. And that arose the greed and interest from certain
groups wishing to seize the opportunity of their success in the theatre to sell records
with music from their performances. José Ramos Tinhorão sees this moment as the
beginning of a period in which music would become a product: first, as previously
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
136
pointed out, with the sales of piano sheets and after through the sales of gramophone
records and player piano rolls (Tinhorão 1998: 226).
Yet, the first recordings made by Brazilian artists date back to the 1900s. If we
think that the gramophone had been invented a little more than ten years earlier, in
the same year that slavery was abolished in Brazil, and that the proclamation of the
republic had taken place in 1889, we can say in this sense that we were not so far
behind. One of the people directly responsible for this breakthrough was Fred Figner
(1866-1947), a Czech immigrant of Jewish origin who settled in Rio de Janeiro and
founded, in the late 1890s, the famous Casa Edison, a phonograph and gramophone
import company. Shortly after, more precisely after 1902, Casa Edison began to
venture in music and became a record company, winning the title of the first
commercial label in Brazil. However, all the material was sent abroad, where it was
produced, and then returned to Rio de Janeiro as finished record discs, ready to be
marketed.
A few years later, after becoming associated with foreign corporations, the same
Fred Figner, founds the first record factory in Brazil, called Odeon, which worked as
an agent to the international headquarters. While Casa Edison was in operation, it
launched more than 28 thousand titles in the Brazilian market, being considered one
of the main responsible for the professionalization of the phonographic industry in
the country. It was at Casa Edison that the samba singer Bahiano recorded dozens
of songs, such as "Pelo Telefone", the first samba registered on a record disc, in
1917, which came to be a milestone in the history of Brazilian music. Brazil was also
the first country in the world to record music on both sides of an album, this first
album recorded both sides was also sung by Bahiano.
It is a period that will last until the late 1920s but that shows definite signs of the
commercial system that would rule the entire 20th century. Although in general,
historiography does not recognise, in this particular period, what could be called mass
consumption of music as we understand it today, we cannot fail to see at that
moment the embryo of the phonographic industry, either by the way music was
recorded (in discs), or by the very principles and means of reproduction that very
little changed in the following periods - also visually and structurally speaking. In
fact, we can say that the technological evolution brought by the gramophone
improved the reproduction and quality of sound, but there weren’t many changes
regarding the principles that were already there in that phase, which, according to
our chronology, is the second phase in the evolution of the phonographic industry.
The 78 rpm records
It is possible to say that the 1920s are another milestone in the history of the
phonographic industry: firstly because it is in this decade that we first see the 78 rpm
(revolutions per minute), which would then become the standard for the industry,
more precisely, after 1925; secondly because it is in the same decade that we identify
what we can call modern-day phonography, as defined by Simone Pereira de Sá
(2009: 58): "the culture of mechanical reproduction of music as of the link between
the record as its physical support and the length of the popular song".
Although many researchers have commented on the curious story of how the
popular song adopted its format, we shouldn’t stop talking about such topic, as it is
closely linked to the 78-rpm record: as it has a recording space of approximately four
minutes on each side, the physical support eventually determined the format and the
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
137
average length of popular songs. More than 90 years have gone since the 78-rpm
record emerged and popular songs continue to have the same dominant market-time
pattern, an exemplary fact of the influence of technology on artistic creation, which
contrasts with the standards for musical composition that ruled until the 19th century.
Until today, when an artist dares to break this model, especially when it comes to a
“musica de trabalho” (a song chosen amongst others in the album to be performed
exhaustively in all media), two versions are usually made: one that we may call
original or full-length, which will be part of the album, and another one to run on
radios and/or television, which we may call as edited version.
Approximately four years after getting into the market, somewhere near 1929,
shellac discs began to triumph over the phonograph cylinders developed by Thomas
Edison, and multinationals already installed in Brazil, such as RCA Victor, for example,
began producing those discs for commercial use in radios, since they were more
resistant and produced less surface noise.
To get an idea of the revolution caused by the 78 rpm records in the phonographic
market and especially in the Brazilian market, we just need to remember that the 78-
rpm record that contained the song "Chega de Saudade", released by the novice João
Gilberto in 1958, sold 15 thousand copies. Anísio Silva and Orlando Dias, two very
popular singers in the 1950s, sold up to 100,000 copies of every 78-rpm released.
We can say that in the 1950s, the world of music already displayed complete
structure and a growing market, although most of these devices were concentrated
in largest cities like Rio de Janeiro, capital of Brazil at that time, and São Paulo.
However, the great evolution was yet to come: the emergence of the LP format, as
we’ll see next.
The vinyl record
1948 is the year marked by the emergence of the Long-Play or LP format, as it
became popularly known. It was made from a new plastic material originating from
petroleum, the vinyl, which, although delicate, was more resistant and allowed better
sound quality when played. Because of the type of plastic material used in
manufacturing, LP records have also become known as vinyl records. In reference to
this particular moment, Sá states that: "The continuity of this story has other
important milestones in the development of two modalities of a new support, the
vinyl record, which was released in the post-war period by rival labels almost at the
same time: in the Long-Play version of 12 inches and 33 1/3 rpm by Columbia in
1948; and the seven-inch version with a large hole in the middle, and played at 45
rpm, released by competitor RCA Victor in 1949” (Sá 2009: 58).
One of the differences between the 33 rpm LP record as it became known, and
the 45-rpm record is that "the LP record gains legitimacy, initially, from its association
with 'good', 'pure' music, seen as ‘high class'- like classical music and other adult
genres, for example. The 45-rpm record gains its importance by being the chosen
option for disclosing commercial pop-rock hits, thus becoming an important format
for the distribution of singles to radio and television" (Magoun 2002; Keughtley 2004;
Shuker 1999 apud Sá 2009: 58).
We should also highlight the playing time of each: the 33-rpm record played up
to 23 minutes of music on each side while the 45 rpm record could play up to eight
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
138
minutes on each side (around four tracks if we consider the length of commercial
songs). It is also important to observe that in this transition period all formats were
still being manufactured and marketed: the 78-rpm record, the 33 rpm LP record and
the 45 rpm record. Naturally, the new technologies and the direction given by the
industries surpassed all the other formats and the extinction of the first supports was
inescapable, to the point of vanishing completely and becoming rare items as they
are today (at that time they were perhaps more eccentric than rare objects).
All this evolution, until the end of the 1940s after the emergence of LP records,
had generated some technological advance in the process of recording and
reproducing music. In the 1920s, the electric recording replaced the mechanic
recording almost completely, even for analog recordings.
Since the emergence of the first phonograph in the late 19th century until the
modern Long-Play record, the phonographic industry had already disseminated the
marketing of the records and the multinational companies were already structured in
the fordist model of vertical integration of industrial production, that is, the record
companies themselves were part of and had total control of all stages of the
production of a record, from the choice of the material to the confection and
distribution of the finished LP record, in addition to deciding which artist would or
would not play on the radios and television and, consequently, reach success.
It is then, since the 1940s and early 1950s, that the multinationals settled as big
corporations that led all stages and spheres of the phonographic market around the
world. It was during this period that we identified the transformation of music into
an industrial business capable of building fortunes and large corporate
conglomerates.
When analyzing Brazilian popular music from this period, an analysis that could
be extended to other genres and to the phonographic industry that had sprang up at
that moment as a whole, Tinhorão states that "after the emergence of recordings -
first in cylinders, and then also in records -, the production of popular music would
have amplified both its artistic and industrial base: the first, through the
professionalization of singers (soloists or choir singers), the wider participation of
instrumentalists (orchestras, bands and groups in general) and the emergence of
new positions (the conductor-arranger and the artistic director); the second, through
the appearance of factories that demanded capital, technology and raw material"
(Tinhorão 1998: 247).
It is a turning point in the evolution of the phonographic industry, since it is in
this period that the professionalization of music begins, proof of that lies in the fact
that great names in Brazilian music, such as Pixinguinha and Tom Jobim, have
worked as arrangers and conductors in two of these corporations. Pixinguinha, in
1920, was hired by Victor Talking Machine Company of Brazil as an instrumentalist,
chief and rehearser of the Orquestra Victor Brasileira. Tom Jobim was hired as an
arranger by Continental in 1952, at a time we can already call industrial, because in
addition to the appearance of features that were characteristic of the major labels,
there was also a boom in the communication networks in the country, after the
popularization of radios and especially the emergence of television, vehicles that
started making use of an important space within the chain of production and
promotion of popular music.
It is also in the late 1950s, more precisely after 1958, that the first LP records
with stereo sound were sold, in other words, LP records with a system that used two
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139
audio channels, right and left, synchronized in time, but that gave the listener the
impression of a single channel of sound. That way, the LP record became a support
for even better-quality music. Gradually, the previously adopted model called
monaural, which is a single audio channel system, was being replaced until its total
disappearance (and stereo sound still remains to this day).
Tinhorão is enlightening at this point. Although somewhat lengthy, the quotation
is enriching and, once again, can be extended to other musical genres: "The result
of this expansion of industrial-commercial basis of the product 'popular music' to a
much greater extent than on its artistic-creative part was that in a few years, the
criteria of production in such a field went from the artistic quality of the product to
its commercial possibilities. This meant that while artistic creation was to be governed
by aesthetic standards, popular music started, in its production, to be governed by
the laws of the market. This subordination of the artistic to the commercial would
explain, after all, not only the growing transformation of popular music into formulas
which were manufactured for the market (after its massification was achieved,
producing only 'what people like' was enough), but also the progressive domination
of the Brazilian music market by foreign music imported from major European and
North American centers, also home to international record labels and the modern
industry of electronics and high-tech instruments. Transformed, therefore, into an
industrial-commercial product due to the need for a material basis for its reproduction
- record, tape, film or videotape films -, Brazilian popular music has, after the 20th
century, settled within the market on the same level as other domestic products"
(Tinhorão 1998: 248).
Although Tinhorão advocates as if there had always been a conspiracy movement
against certain Brazilian popular music, we cannot fail to notice many illuminating
aspects on the subject in his analysis, especially regarding Brazil in the 1950s.
However, it would be naive to imagine, as Tinhorão's text indirectly leads us to think,
that there were only product-songs. It is true that this type of production
strengthened widely because of the growth of the phonographic industry, but non-
commercial music, if we may call it that way, continued to be produced and sold,
albeit on a smaller scale and much less conveyed by the large systems of media.
We also have to remember that it is in this same period that television appears in
Brazil. And TV has a major role in the massively produced music set up in the country.
It is also after the 1950s that TV, which becomes a strong ally of radio (soon to
become the main communication vehicle in the country), goes on to dictate the rules
of what will or will not succeed in the country. Perhaps the greatest exponent of the
relationship between TV, radio and the phonographic industry in Brazil is the singer
Roberto Carlos, who in the 1960s, alongside Erasmo Carlos and Wanderléa, hosted
a program directed at young people on Sunday afternoons (on a channel called TV
Record) and that had the same name of the movement headed by him: the “Jovem
Guarda” movement, a Brazilian cultural movement that mixed music, attitude and
fashion. It is also worth mentioning that, as the name of the movement itself reveals,
it targeted young people, who after the post-war period became as or even more
important as a consumer for the industry than the adult, economically active people,
who had been the usual consumers so far. From that moment, young people,
responsible for a considerable part of the sales, became the target of the
phonographic industry.
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
140
Apart from the technological evolution and media interests directly linked to the
phonographic industry, perhaps the greatest cultural change brought by the
emergence of LP records, and also driven by financial interest, is the creation of the
album format. As previously mentioned, the 78 rpm and 45 rpm records each had
playing times of approximately 8 and 16 minutes, which in practice meant a record
with 2 and 4 tracks according to the length of commercial songs. As the new LP
records allowed approximately 45 minutes of playing time, a new structured product
was created, in which the songs were somehow interconnected within the whole that
composed the artwork. Simply put, we could say that the records formed a narrative
and an aesthetic piece of work, and had beginning, middle and end. In that way,
record companies (and artists) paid less and less attention to the formats of 78 and
45 rpm, which normally, after the appearance of the LP record, were used to promote
singles. At that moment, these types of records began to decline, although it was
common in Brazil that record companies would still work with this format, like in João
Gilberto’s debut album released in 1958 by Odeon.
What actually happened is that the 78 and 45 rpm records ended up serving as
tests: if a single reached good sales numbers, the label would give the artist the
chance to release an LP record. That’s exactly what happened to João Gilberto who
released his LP record "Chega de saudade" in 1959, one year after releasing the
single. In Brazil, the compact records, support in which many hits were released,
were marketed until approximately the late 1980's.
The fact is that the LP record, besides bringing technological innovations,
reshapes the whole culture of music consumption. Sá states the following: "To this
end, the contribution is not coming from the development of studio recording
techniques, but mainly from the consolidation of a 'long-lasting' product, which brings
together a piece of work in close connection with the notion of an author/composer,
and which fans could also collect. So, although the compact records represented an
important share of music consumption in those years, it is the album format -
understood as one product lasting about 40 minutes, where songs were all
interconnected, which had a title, a side A, and a side B, was presented inside a cover
also enclosing inserts, texts presenting the artist, a technical sheet and which were
released by a certain group or performer - that guarantees to LP records the
hegemony within the popular-massively produced music culture [...]" (Sá 2009: 59).
As Keightley (2004) points out, the fact that the LP record consolidated its place
as the flagship of the phonographic industry between the 1950s and the 1980s was
due to the market perception that these records did not only sell when released:
when composing the catalogues of main record companies, they would also present
a constant and long-term commercial return.
In an interview for Bravo magazine in April 2008, the musician Charles Gavin
seems to agree with the previously quoted passage: "[...] In the past, the arrival of
a new record was an opportunity to see your friends and ‘taste’ the records with
them. ‘I remember people going to school with their favorite LP records under their
arms’, says Charles Gavin, researcher, drummer for the Brazilian rock band Titãs and
host of “O som do vinil”, a show on Canal Brasil. ‘It was a way of saying 'I like this
song', but not only that: it represented political and behavioral options. You were
stating 'this is who I am' [...]. At the same time, the LP record implies an intimate
ritual. ‘Side A and side B propose something quite different to the listener’, explains
Gavin. ‘Which way to start?’ As he decides, a whisper comes to his ear: ‘Let go of
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
141
what you're doing, pick up the record cover, get the record insert, sit down and have
a nice trip! […]”
Gavin’s words touch an important topic: the symbolic and cultural power
concentrated in a LP record. Vinyl discs then become part and also compose the
identity of the individual who consumes it - in a way that is not very different from
what happens with the visual identity of a particular group or "tribe". Music, combined
with the LP record product, has the power to express tastes and attitudes, such as
belonging to one niche or denying another. And so it continued until the end of the
1990s, when the music CDs became popular and, more importantly, financially
accessible to the Brazilian population.
To conclude this section of the article in which we talk about records, whether
made of shellac or vinyl, it is interesting to point out the basic differences in all of
them. The following table points out the differences between 33, 45 and 78 rpm
records.
RECORD TYPE
RELEASE
MATERIAL
COMMERCIAL NAME
PLAYING TIME
33 rpm
1948
Vinyl
LP record
Up to 46 minutes
45 rpm
1949
Vinyl
Compact or Single
Up to 16 minutes
78 rpm
1920s
Shellac
78 rpm record or just 78
Up to 8 minutes
Table 1: Difference between 33, 45 and 78 rpm records.
The magnetic tapes
Another support that is also of great importance for the development and
understanding of the phonographic industry, but is frequently overlooked, is the
magnetic tape. Developed initially by the Germans in the 1930s, as of the
magnetophone, they would only become popular (in commercial terms) after the 1970s.
Prior to its massification, according to Crowl, "the magnetic tape was only used for
professional purposes on radios, TVs, film production companies and labels to create the
matrix of the records." Thus, the old recording methodologies, "with wire recorders
recording on a piano string" (Crowl 2009: 143), have disappeared. So, we can say that
the magnetic tape was of great importance for the technological race, because it
increased the quality of the phonographic production while facilitating the corrections
during the recording processes. In the United States and Brazil magnetic tapes would
reach greater professional visibility only after the 1950s.
However, the popularity of magnetic tapes and the great changes brought by them
would come only after the 1960s and especially in the 1970s: that is when the cassette
tapes emerged. From this period on, consumers had two options: vinyl records and
cassette tapes - which were less durable than records. There were three advantages to
the cassette tapes compared to vinyl records: the price, the portability and the possibility
of homemade recording. The second and third advantages require deeper analysis on
our part, as they represent a new relationship with the musical product: the consumer
was free to listen to music on portable radios, as well as in automobiles. At that moment,
we can see the beginning of the process that would individualize the consumption of
music: if before, as Charles Gavin reported, the act of listening to an LP record was
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
142
motive for a hangout with friends, now, for the first time, individuality would gain more
space and the relationship between music and listener would change forever.
It is also after the cassette tape that the consumer becomes free to copy, from a
matrix, their own tapes, just as it becomes possible to copy the contents of the vinyl
records to a tape (in this case, Including the freedom of a change of support and editing
content), and the possibility of recording directly from commercial radios. Anyone who
had a cassette tape could start making music and sound recordings, such as the
recording of a child singing or some tribal or indigenous ritual for example. This has
made the German government, at that time, to impose a copyright charge on the
production of cassette tape players, in order to avoid possible copies. It is the beginning
of the homemade reproducibility of music. "With all these attributes, even if we consider
its lower quality compared to records, cassette tapes have also become a perfect solution
for so-called 'demos' - samples of professional music or recordings from any other
origins. The circulation of independent recordings, as well as piracy of commercial
recordings, became noticeable after the cassette tapes" (Crowl 2009: 147).
Crowl reminds us of other crucial points: the beginning of "demo" tapes allowed
novice or even successful artists to record their music or their new compositions in a
simpler way - and they also worked as an effective way of registering ideas and
compositions that were still in progress. Another fact that arises after the emergence of
cassette tapes is piracy: as it was so easy and cheap to copy a tape, compared to the
original records and original tapes, homemade reproduction on a commercial scale and
for profit had become a reality, especially in smaller cities.
Also for the first time in the history of the phonographic industry, the cassette tape
had allowed people to create and select songs according to their particular tastes and
interests. Once home recording was feasible, creating a personal set-list became a
reality, or in other words, it was now possible for anyone to create their personal album,
selecting, recording and creating a cassette tape with their favorite songs or interests
for any particular purpose.
As cassette tapes were practical and portable, easy to copy and allowed the act of
listening to music to be individual, nothing would be more natural than creating a
portable and individual device to listen to music. In 1979 Sony launched a new product
in the market: the Walkman, a compact device capable of playing cassette tapes and
tuning into commercial radios. The Walkman is, therefore, the pinnacle of listening to
music individually. "With their Walkman, people could go anywhere or do anything with
music. The first models of the device had two headphone jacks, so that it was possible
to listen to songs with other people. This demonstrates that the adaptation to the idea
of individualized use and consumption of music happened gradually, as this detail on the
device was discarded by Sony shortly afterwards" (Milles 2005 apud Carvalho e Rios
2009: 83).
Currently, cassette tapes can still be found; however, they are no longer used for
music or piracy, but for other types of sound recordings, such as interviews. The
commercial tapes manufactured by the phonographic industry to sell their artists can no
longer be found. Nowadays, we can only find blank cassette tapes.
Herein, we close the analogical part of the development of the phonographic industry.
Although some recording resources, during the same period, already had digital
technology, such resources were restricted to industrial processes and not directly
related to the user, as would happen later, as described below.
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143
TODAY
The CD
Proceeding with the history of the phonographic industry, in this second part of the
article we will approach the emergence and popularization of digital technology through
two crucial points: the CD and, later, the download and the sharing.
The compact discs, or CDs, represent a revolution and a new era in the history of the
phonographic industry around the world, because although the recording processes
were already well advanced in industrial terms, it is only after the CD that the
technological resources of the digital world became a reality for consumers. Sound
quality had become considerably higher compared to LP records and cassette tapes:
noises and hisses disappeared and the recording time practically doubled in comparison
to the vinyl record. Another advantage of the CD was its size: although it was only 12
centimeters in diameter, it could initially contain up to approximately 70 minutes of
music. Some researchers say that the storage time of a CD was intentional: Akio Morita,
the Sony executive who commercially launched the novelty on the market, was
passionate about Austrian conductor Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic
Orchestra's interpretation of Beethoven's 9th Symphony, a version that lasts around 70
minutes. Others say that the CD has this storage time due to the demand for recording
another Beethoven symphony, the 5th.
The novelty came to the market through Sony in 1982, but in Brazil it is only after
the 1990s that this type of media becomes popular. Having such high sound quality, the
CD was initially intended only for classical music lovers, since they were the ones who
wanted to get rid of the characteristic hisses of LP records and cassette tapes: "[...] To
the consumers of classical music, since they naturally had much more demanding ears
[...]" (Crowl 2009: 149).
One of the great evolutions brought by the CDs was precisely the enabling of a
revolution similar to the one cassette tapes had originated a few years earlier: creating
the possibility of home recording. The CD allowed, sometime later, with the help of a
computer and some specific software, that anyone could copy or create their albums
according to their taste - only now with much better quality than that provided by the
pioneering cassette tapes. It was such an easy process that the CDs quickly became
pirated and distributed for profit. However, at that time there was no room for people
who would offer the latest musical innovations at a more affordable price in smaller
cities: CD piracy arrived at the same time almost everywhere. From that moment on,
the phonographic industry started feeling that its hegemonic structure (sustained
throughout most of the 20th century) was trembling. There wasn't much to be done and
there were no ways to control it, since consumers had access to the means of
production, whether on a private scale or on an industrial scale aiming profit (as in the
case of piracy). This is a watershed event for both the phonographic industry and the
consumers, and such revolution can be summarized in one word: freedom.
Throughout the industrial development that has taken place since the first records
appeared (along with the gramophone in the late 19th century), the consumer was led
to accept whatever the industry provided. Changes began to happen after the arrival of
cassette tapes and became more considerable after CDs appeared: making copies had
become so easy that the habit of borrowing albums gradually disappeared - it became
easier to copy a CD and give it to friends than to lend your original (if you owned the
original). Younger people today are unfamiliar to what we refer to when we say ‘loan
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
144
culture’ of any kind of music physical media: they share their musical taste in other ways,
as we will see later.
Similarly, to what happened after the cassette tapes and consequently after the
emergence of the Walkman, the CDs followed the same path: in 1984, once again by
Sony, the Discman was launched, a device that played CDs instead of playing outdated
tapes. Once again, we notice the encouragement to individualize the act of listening to
music - a fact that would be consolidated once and for all with the virtualization and also
the vanishing of the physical supports in the following decades. The Discman
symbolically represented the cutting-edge music market of that time. Thereby, the CD
meant a new revolution, made possible by the technological and electro-electronic
development, by the cheapening of production costs and by the mass consumption of
this new format of sound reproduction.
Much is said nowadays about the vertiginous drop in the sales of original CDs after
internet arrived. Although this is an unquestionable fact, this drop did not cause the CD
to disappear completely from the music business: a different type of appeal to the
consumer was then created. The following table shows the number of CD units sold in
Brazil in the first decade of the 21st century, according to the ABPD – Associação
Brasileira de Produtores de Discos (Brazilian Association of Record Producers):
YEAR
GROSS SALES CD + DVD (R$)
UNITS SOLD (CD + DVD)
2002
726 million
75 million
2003
601 million
56 million
2004
706 million
66 million
2005
615,2 million
52,9 million
2006
454,2 million
37,7 million
2007
312,5 million
31,3 million
Table 2: values reported to the ABPD by the largest labels operating in Brazil.
As we can see, over the period under analysis, sales numbers fell sharply, causing
the Brazilian phonographic industry to register a 50% drop in financial activity in less
than 10 years. It is thus clear that the experience of buying music has been altered
significantly in the last two decades, topic that we shall address in the next section of
this article.
Sharing
Differently from the previous topics, which were initially listed according to the names
of the sound reproduction devices of each period and later by the names of the main
music physical support types, we chose to call this part of the text "sharing", instead of
proceeding to discuss each contemporary virtual music delivery format. Firstly, because
it would likely be a long and repetitive task, since new hardware and software capable
of reproducing and sharing music constantly appear, even though they all work
practically under the same principle. The specificity of each media format that arose
from this virtualization process will not be our focus, since they do not have a major,
exclusive role within the industry: they do work as a model that has reshaped the music
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
145
market within a digital context, guided mainly by the development and popularization of
the internet. Our objective is, therefore, to highlight the emergence of a new logic of
production and consumption, favored once again by technological development and also
capable of significantly altering the ways of making and enjoying music.
The amount of time that each virtual format - such as software, websites, and sharing
tools - have endured as being a novelty in the last two decades is too short to have each
one discussed separately, as we had previously adopted as standard approach in this
article. It is worth, however, to highlight the emergence of Napster as the starting point
of the discussion, since this tool was able to make the entire phonographic industry
rethink its business model.
When it arrived on the Internet in 1999, Napster became the first mass software to
share music in MP3 format. Its operation was peer-to-peer (P2P): each user downloaded
the songs directly from another user's computer, while making music stored on the
computer's hard drive available to anyone else who was also online - in other words,
users exchanged files with each other, without any kind of middleman and with no costs,
simply by being connected to the internet and having the software installed on their
respective computers.
That way, we witnessed the arising of a great global network with thousands of songs
available that could be exchanged at zero cost. It is estimated that 8 million users
worldwide exchanged a volume of 20 million songs per day. In 2001, however, Napster,
which had become a company in the previous year, ended up closing because it did not
withstand the lawsuits of the phonographic corporations and also of musicians who did
not allow the exchange of audio files that were protected by law, both alleging the
promotion of piracy.
The fact is that Napster has made its way into history as the pioneering program of
digital/virtual file sharing and has forever changed the structure and performance of
music companies. Shawn Fanning, a young programmer who was 19 years old in 1999,
was responsible for shaking the way big music corporations operated by creating
Napster, which would be the epicenter of the changes that would shake the major labels
around the world.
After that, other software began to appear, such as eMule and Bittorrent, both very
popular, each one with its peculiarities and perks, but all of them working under the
same principle of ideas spread by Shawn Fanning. As we know, the popularization of
these tools occurred in the midst of the installation of cyberculture at the beginning of
the last decade, which promoted the idea of information sharing and presented a
counterpoint to the classic dynamics of the Cultural Industry. The boom in social
networks in this period - which in Brazil was carried out by the Orkut network - opened
space for the posting of songs and images, in a logic of free content exchange between
connected users that would be the keynote of later technological developments.
In this context, the social network MySpace, which emerged in 2003, ended up
attracting the attention of musicians precisely because of its applications which enabled
hosting MP3 files - the audio file compression format that has become the most popular
on the internet. And what was initially perceived as an opportunity only by musicians
and bands from the independent scene interested in promoting their work, later gained
a possibly bigger than expected projection and started to include successful national and
international musicians. MySpace subverted the concentrated outreach scheme of the
phonographic industry, and gradually became an important tool used to promote new
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
146
songs and albums even for high-profile artists. Taking part in social networks and other
digital platforms of communication and social interaction gradually became part of what
many companies call digital marketing, in other words, a marketing strategy focused
specifically on the internet and the virtual world.
In 2008, André Midani, one of the leading names in Brazil´s phonographic industry
in the 20th century, titled the book in which he tells his autobiographical memories:
Música, ídolos e poder: do vinil ao download (Music, idols and power: from vinyl to
download). Midani thus defined the download as the finishing line of the History of
music, that could be understood through its relationship with the industry. At the
download stage, the materiality that objectified music in the music industry - from shellac
to magnetic tapes, from wax cylinders to vinyl - would be replaced by P2P networks and
audio file compression programs. It´s worth mentioning that the MP3, a format that
became popular by the exchange of songs online, made this revolution possible by
compressing audio files 12 times smaller than the size of a WAV file, which was the
original format of music recorded on a commercial CD.
We then highlight the virtualization process that impacts the experience of the post-
internet music: we speak of a time when it became possible to carry the complete
discography of an artist in a cell phone, for example. This historical process has led
artists of various styles to release songs or albums first through the internet and later in
the traditional way, that is, in physical media. Every so often, there would be no physical
album at all: as they were made available on the official websites of artists or offered
for sale in virtual stores, albums became a mere compilation of files. The
artistic/aesthetic proposal of each album, previously printed on the inserts, was often
shared through different channels, such as hotsites or special pages that would contain
pictures and information of a certain production.
Music is yet another product among thousands which have been affected by the
development and popularization of the internet. Those changes were not, therefore, an
exclusive historical break for the music business. Other media were equally affected,
suffering major impacts, such as print media and cinema. However, the music business
carries a very peculiar shift, because, in short time, anyone on the internet could have
access to a heap of music on a global scale. We can afford getting to know and searching
for music of all genres without leaving our homes and, especially, without having to pay
for it, using popular tools such as Bittorrent or other music download websites.
In a way, we can say that cheaper access - and not just the abandonment of physical
formats of media - is just as important as the separation of music from its physical
support formats. For there would be no use in such a split if there was no possibility of
mass access by consumers. If before, the phonographic industry dictated the rules of
the market and especially the price of its products, after virtualization we entered a new
era: that of telecommunication companies, without which, access or consumption of
music is severely impaired.
On the other hand, crucial events for this transformation had already appeared before
the split of music and its physical support happened, a topic we shall address in the
conclusions below.
OVERALL CONCLUSIONS
It is interesting to consider that many of the "novelties" that have emerged in the
digital world have been sketched since the 1970s, which was the period when cassette
tapes became popular. Cassette tapes, as mentioned before, allowed music to be more
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
147
portable for the first time in the history of the phonographic industry, and allowed the
consumer to independently record songs according to their interest - enabling a breakout
from the format of a finished album. Therefore, part of the digital technology brought
by the CDs was already available in the 1970s, in other words, the means to the
revolution in the music industry were already present in those years.
Similar processes also happen with new support formats or new types of media: part
of the freedom preached by many researchers already existed years before - but, of
course, on a smaller scale and uncappable of revolutionizing the means of production
and consumption as it has happened in more recent years. Something similar also
happened after songs began to be marketed unitarily - which many say is a way of
negating the album format - that already was a reality at that time, as well as the
homemade or commercial reproduction of any song, from cassette tapes. This is one of
the lines of reasoning advocated by Jenkins (2009), in which the author shows how the
different media can coexist and, contrary to what is often pointed out or questioned,
these different types of media don’t exclude each other, they coexist and in some cases,
complement each other.
Thus, being aware that the means of production, the availability and the means of
consumption of music have undergone great changes, it is worth highlighting that many
of the aims are still the same: music lovers keep on making homemade copies of their
favorite albums or songs, they continue to listen to music individually (but also
collectively), they go on trying to escape the dictatorship of the market (which is still
strong and validating) and finally, continue to be influenced by the market itself through
its multiple performances, internet included. If we have indeed overcome a strictly
industrial model of production and distribution of recordings, it is a mistake to think that
we are completely independent in our experience with music: our patterns of taste and
aesthetic expectations continue to be defined by a market of symbolic goods, that now
tends to act under the logic of niches.
Regarding consumption, the great change is the easy access to an endless catalog
of musical offerings that are available on the internet. As for the means of production
and availability, today's musicians, whether professionals or amateurs, have the
possibility of producing their work at a reasonable price compared to 1980s’ reality, for
example. This reminds us of that old children’s game where the magic spell backfires:
the industry has lost control of its existing mechanisms which were created by the
industry itself.
However, we would be naive to think that the industry is only a victim in this reality,
it is not: it makes good use of these mechanisms and is also learning to deal with and
play this reality, often bringing to its catalog musicians/bands that have emerged
through virtual channels and which, as it were, have a loyal and guaranteed audience.
And it is not common that many musicians/bands decline the old means of production:
they end up surrendering to the music market and being hired by the labels, which today
try to push contracts that grant them participation in the box office of concerts, pleading
the decrease in CDs sales as the reason.
Finally, we believe that, with respect to music, many possibilities were already there
even before the creation of the digital/virtual world. Perhaps the best thing would be to
say that the digital/virtual world has reshaped and improved many of the available types
of media, it certainly created many possibilities and, after its digitization/virtualization
and after the practicality provided by the internet, allowed the means of production and
Phonographic Industry: Summit and Decline in the 20th Century
148
the content sharing mechanisms to become popular. However, so far, there has been
no change in two of the main formats imposed by the cultural industry: the album format
and the length of commercial music, which have been the same since the beginning of
the music industry, and it looks like they will be the same for a long time.
On the other hand, the digital/virtual culture of music is re-shaping practices like the
consumption of songs detached from albums and the creation of personalized albums
instead of finished ones put together by record companies - realities made possible, as
we said before, after the emergence of cassette tapes. The number of independent
artists is also rising. It is relevant to mention the nostalgia brought by the exacerbated
digitization/virtualization of music: the return of the LP record and the reactivation of an
industry that had been surpassed by technology. Faced with these facts, we may wonder
if CDs will ever disappear. Maybe not... And we can conclude by asking: when will the
standards imposed by industry really be thought about or altered in order to reformulate
all the standardization of commercial music? For, until now the means have changed:
the format and standardization seem to remain the same.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
149
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117210 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
REPRESENTATIVE OF LGBTT IN PRINTED LOCAL
PRESS GAZIANTEP SAMPLE (2009-2014)
FATMA YEŞİL
ABSTRACT
The basic aim of the paper is an attempt to find out how Van Dijk's critical discourse analysis
of LGBTT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transvestite, Transsexual) individuals who are represented at
the local press. Sabah, Hâkimiyet, Express, Gaziantep27, Olay and Telgraf newspapers were
selected from Gaziantep Printed Local Press for the study and how these LGBTT people were
represented in these newspapers. The articles reviewed for the study were published between
2009 and 2014 is a key criterion for LGBTT people to be involved directly or indirectly (with links
to various topics under different headings). In the context of Van Dijk's critical discourse analysis
based on the study, and in the light of the determined criteria, the existing news obtained were
carefully scanned from newspapers, examined and analyzed in detail by the method of critical
discourse analysis.
Keywords: Media, Discourse, Representation, Gender, Sexual orientation, LGBTT,
Homosexuality.
INTRODUCTION
It can be said that since the first time, many theoreticians and doctors have been
contemplating sexual preferences or orientations. One of these philosophers is Plato
and there are doctors including Soranus (Baird 2004, 98). In this context, it is pointless
to consider LGBTT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transvestite, Transsexual) people as a
recent phenomenon in our present societies today. In Turkey, it is possible to say that
the debate on sexual preference and sexual identity issues in the public arena has only
started to come to the agenda in the 1950s. But LGBTT individuals, have begun to
take their first steps towards coming together since the 1970s. But in the 70s, it was
seen that they could not get a chance to organize within the framework of their sexual
identity and have rarely come together since the 1980s and have begun to share their
experiences and problems they have experienced. Although LGBTT people have made
some major changes to change the rhetoric, have initiated talks about the existence of
LGBTT individuals and have accepted themselves to the dominant culture in the social
structure; the national media did not pay much attention about the existence of LGBTT
individuals in the local press even after the 1990s. (Oksacan 2012, 313-323).
Lecturer, Gaziantep University, fatmayenmez@hotmail.com
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
152
The media is divided into traditional media and digital media, and Internet
technology, social interaction and social media are realized (Köseoğlu 2012, 58).
McLuhan says, "In order to be a real intellectual, you need to know quite well the
influences of the media." It may be impossible to avoid the effects of the media, but it
is not impossible to identify the means that affect them, and it is possible to gain the
ability to interpret and translate the information conveyed by recognition of these
means (McLuhan 2005, 23). Lasswell explains the powerful influence of the media on
the individual by "hypodermic needle-magic bullet theory". According to his findings,
the important fact in the communication process is the "effect". Lasswell’s model is
formulated as "Who - What It says - Which Channel - From - To whom - With Impact"
(Alemdar and Erdoğan 1990, 65-67). The media fulfills an important function such as
creating public opinion including giving news, training, entertainment, promoting
goods and services, making propaganda, and so on. (Mutlu 2007, 18). The media, on
the one hand, perform its functions while serving the interests of powerful social
groups that inspect and finance it (Herman and Chomsky 2012, 15). The local press,
which has a narrower distribution area but has a broader and more detailed
information transfer function for its locality has a separate precaution all over the
world. Because the local press cites the facts of people living in that society. The
communicators see the local press as a dynamic factor that allows the authority to
move away from the center and to create a structure that respects the human beings
(Gezgin 2007, 177-178).
Discourse produces what we know, know, know and say in all that we can say.
Discursive "knowledge" is not a transparent representation of "truth" in language, but
a product of language about real relationships and situations and is the result of a
discursive practice (Hall 2005, 90). Foucault explains that discourse is a language
practice, "Ideology is processes related to language practices that turn into action
through the exchange of knowledge, dialogue, expression, expression, negotiation,
power and fortune," and state that cultural codes that perpetuate forms of perception
in any culture, (Foucault 1987, 27). Moreover, discourse shows the effect of being able
to act in a direct and compelling manner through text types, such as laws, regulations,
or statutes, through acts of speech that declare the order (Van Dijk 2005, 360).
Discourse is inherited from texts that mainly characterize western philosophical,
theological, and other human researches (Jensen 2005, 27). The different meanings of
the sayings according to the syllables and the person who has spoken can cause the
thought that one may appear in parallel with the ideology, and the idea that an
impartial discourse can be made impossible. Hate speech is manifested at every level
of society as a phenomenon that is exposed by many people in everyday life. It is
different in every societal activity and boundaries. Therefore, the perception,
interpretation, and definition of hate speech in every society is also different. For
example; in Turkey there exists differences in racism, gender, minorities, sexual
preferences, and so on. Gender based on hate speech and hate crime show
themselves in discourses such as "We can gain them by raping lesbians," "They have
gone out from gay bars," and "The races have solved the endangered church."
(Keyman 2013, 9; İnceoğlu ve Çoban 2014, 71). The media makes to the "other" and
"target" by resorting to exaggeration methods such as negative, humiliating, hurtful,
insulting, insulting through the discourse language through the language are seen as
"potentially risky and threatening people" threatening public security (İnceoğlu and
Çoban 2014, 71; Burnukara and Uçanok 2012, 82).
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
153
Representation is the production of meaning through language, but the meaning is
not reflected directly from the mirror. They are produced in language, in relation to
different representation systems or through them (Hall 2002b, 28; transcriber, Özer
2011, 169). More images and patterns are resorted to for the task of representing the
invisible or unrepresentative, unrepresentative or inexpressible (Tutal 2014, 281). The
function/function of the representatives is to move the disturbing information in the
circle from the outside to the near side. (Öner 2002, 32). Representation in the media
is an effective and widespread area in which media representatives are constantly
being produced, structured and transformed, and they do not concentrate on one
subject or represent a group; they construct values, boundaries, hierarchies, positions
to gain/loss positions among groups and individuals in the network of social relations,
(Odabaş 2008, 56-57). This turns many stereotypical stereotypes and associated
occupational definitions into the definition of the framework of their activities to
different "codes" of many life changes (Gerbner 2014, 324). The Representation of
Minorities in the Media is often misled by the media as discrimination and it commits
discrimination by ignoring groups that are seen as minorities in the society, providing
them with no space or providing very limited representation, as well as some groups
(homosexuals, ethnic minorities, etc). Other prejudices and stereotypes continue
through indirect discriminatory ways through prejudices and stereotypes (Çelenk 2010,
222-223). Gender relations which carry historical background are reformulated with
new patterns and mean organized practices in the context of, or linked to, the
masculine/feminine division of people (Connell 1998, 189-190). In addition to being
used for various reasons, gender is also used to regulate the social relations between
the sexes (Scott 2007, 11). Today of the media is considered to be the most
important means of conveying or teaching the roles and responsibilities that the media
society has given to women and men (Ersoy-Cak 2010, 105). Some of those who think
that gender differences are due to social differences and inequalities are natural are
based on very severe prejudices and use insulting, alienating and discriminatory
expressions (Sancar 2013, 187).
METHOD AND ANALYSIS OF WORK
Teun A. Van Dijk Critical Analysis of Discourse: An important condition for the
application of social control through discourse is the control of discourse and the
production of discourse itself. The basic questions in this context are: In which
situations, who, who, what can they say or write? Who has access to different forms of
discourse or to their forms or to the means of production of discourse? The answer to
these questions is of great importance. Since the powerless individuals in society are
less likely to have access to text or speech, groups that are stronger in economic,
political, and status in society, and their members, control or own the roles of various
and diverse discourses (Van Dijk 2005, 319-322). The news sources know that their
words carry the value of the news and they can direct reporters in the direction of
their desires. Thus, it is almost as a news reporter who is bringing news to the
fountain, becomes a source of news, and the media gets a place as a producer of
judges and sayings. Van Dijk considers this as a rhetoric; (Van Dijk 1994, 281; Kula
2002, 191), because the social formation and discursive formations that are
reproduced in the news must be questioned. Van Dijk examines the two sections by
separating them into macro and micro structures, and the macro structure is covered
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
154
under two headings: "Thematic analysis and schematic analysis." The news follows a
hierarchical scheme such as stories or arguments. In this scheme, the header entry is
summarized together and at the same time, it carries out the task of inputting the text
as well as the summary which must express the meaning of the macro structure of the
text. It is examined how discursive differences are reflected and legitimized in the
macro structure, and how the actors involved in the news are positively and negatively
active or passive are presented to the news sources used, the uniform and similar
presentation of the news, the selection of the news headlines. In microstructures,
syntactic analysis, regional harmony, word choice and rhetorical analysis are
performed. The meaning of a culminated by an active or passive structure can be
different. Word choice is very important in terms of ideological structuring. Differences
in word choice can reveal the basic beliefs and ideologies about social actors and/or
social participants. In the retention of the news, persuasive or believable statements
are sought. Photographs also show a convincing and convincing example (Özer 2011,
83-84). Van Dijk's controversies based on his analysis of critical discourse are based on
the principle of "emphasizing positive things about us, emphasizing negative things,
emphasizing negative things, emphasizing positive things about us" (Koç 2012, 205).
Here Van Dijk's method of critical discourse analysis has been tried to be explained in
the context of this work. In the light of the study of critical discourse analysis, we have
explained how LGBTT individuals are represented based on news about LGBTT
individuals in selected newspapers for local representation and how LGBTT individuals
are structured in other news, and some of the statements about LGBTT individuals in
any news.
Teun A. Van Dijk Limitations of Critical Discourse Analysis: The analysis of critical
discourse basically focuses on the pressure that social power has created. It examines
how the balance of power and inequality in society is reproduced on a daily basis on
the written and oral level in the public sphere, and with such an opposing research,
the critical discourse analyzer stands in the middle and aims to take social inequalities
in society. In doing so, however, rather than discursive content analysis, it follows a
method based on language-grammar analysis (Şeker and others 2013, 175-176).
Teun A. Van Dijk the Essential Questions of Critical Discourse Analysis: Individuals,
from the moment when social groups act as members, can move their ideology to their
actions and interaction. For this reason, men can apply different distinctions to women,
to whites to blacks, to youths to old people, to rich to poor and heterosexual to
homosexuals. This distinction may be through written, visual and speech. However,
ideologies can also be achieved with different behavioral patterns (hand arm
movements, facial expressions, body posture and distance) that complement the talk
or make sense alone (Van Dijk 2003, 43-44). Based on this information, it was aimed
to orient and resolve various questions based on Bell's questions, which enrich the
method of analyzing the discourse of Van Dijk with different questions, whether or not
the newspapers news examined in the study placed the language/discourse on
ideological grounds. Steps of the basic questions: How do individuals have ascribing?
What social characteristics do these individuals refer to? What means are used to
alienate, discriminate and oppress against these individuals? From what point of view
are the evidence found in the news sorted? How are social actors evaluated? What
kind of social practices are at stake? (Bell 1991, 126-127; transcriber, Şeker and others
2013, 176). Acting on the questions of Bell, how did we and the other been
fictionalized? Did the adjective used in the sentences the other person edited? If used,
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
155
are adjectives that are affirmative or negative adjectives? Sentence structures are
complex and long, or are short, straight structures? Is the ideological structure of the
examined newspapers clearly reflected in the existing sentence structures, or is the
understanding of impartial/impartial journalism? Are the predicates active or passive?
It has been deemed appropriate to direct such questions. In addition, for the analysis
of the existing news in the study, Van Dijk's macro-structures and micro-structure in
the news analysis (Ozer 2011, 87), the stage is considered to be appropriate for the
analysis of the study, which is within the scope of the two main categories.
Results In the framework of the study, Sabah, Hakimiyet, Telgraf, Gaziantep 27,
Express and Olay newspapers representing the Gaziantep Printed Local Press were
selected between 2009 and 2014, and all news that were found in the narrow sense
under the direct or different news headlines about LGBTT individuals were searched.
We have investigated the way in which the "we" and "the other" fiction is formed and
the way in which the newspapers have the understanding of neutral/ impartial
reporting, and also how the news reports are conveyed by the authorized persons of
the newspapers selected for representation, in parallel to its positioning with the
knowledge of where the publication policies of the newspapers are located, or how
LGBTT individuals are represented? These have been tried to be detected.
Table: 1 Classification of all newspaper reports that directly or indirectly address
sexual identity differences
The total news from the newspapers elected to represent the printed local press
are given numerically in Table 1 and the general distribution of how the news is
constructed is reflected. The parts of the total news from newspapers producing
meaning for the study were analyzed and analyzed according to the stages of analysis.
Headings:
According to Van Dijk, the importance of headlines in news analysis is
great; because it is the first point of attention of the reader. It can carry ideological
and directional items. For this reason, the messages it gives are of great importance; it
is also possible to learn the theme of the news from the headlines. The words in the
headlines, the punctuation marks used, the colorings and the quotations are some of
the important elements in the study of the headlines and headlines that form an
important pillar of the analysis of critical discourse (Özerkan 2009; Transcriber, Aşçı
2013, 44). In this context, news headlines have been resolved in the local print media
journals examined.
Newspapers
Positive
Negative
Neutral
Total
Sabah
3
7
11
21
Hâkimiyet
1
5
3
9
Ekspres
1
5
2
8
Gaziantepp27
1
1
Olay
2
2
4
Telgraf
1
2
2
5
Total
6
22
20
48
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
156
Table: 2 Neutral title classification negating sexual identity differences according to
the news headlines that make sense for the study.
News
Source/Political
Stance
Negative Headings
Positive Headings
Neutral
Sabah: Positive
discrimination to
minority groups
Heading: "There is
adultery and
homosexuality in
Turkey"
Heading: “There are
women, age, LGBT and
disabled quotes in the
new party”
(Main heading:
Murderer nephew "He
attacked me too ...")
Heading: Uncle who is
killed is homosexual.
(Main heading:
The point where mankind
has died…)
Heading: Nobody come
out when homosexual is
killed.
Heading: Homosexual
cut his brother’s throat.
Heading: Transsexual
Sevda B.’s killer is
captured.
Hâkimiyet:
Objective
Heading: “I am under
injustice "(Tutan, LGBT
individuals, said they do
not tolerate different
people)
Ekspres:
Objective
Heading: Transvestite
killed his brother in the
hospital.
Heading: Homosexual
police
Heading:
reaction against
transgender murder
Gaziantep27:
Objective
(Main heading:
Reaction to
transgender murder).
Heading: find
murderer
Olay:
Conservative
Heading: Reaction to
transgender murder
Heading: Lesbian’s lie
didn’t bring discount!
Telgraf:
Social democrat
Heading: Reaction to
transgender murder
Heading: Panorama
of the Week (LGBTT
members participated
for the first time of
this year's
celebration)
In the context of the information obtained from the interviews with the authorized
persons of the newspapers selected for representation of the local press, the news
headings where the authorized persons position the publication policy of the journal
and the news headings included in the selected newspapers are shown in table 2
(two). As you can see in the news headlines, Transsexuals, Gay, Homosexual,
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
157
Transvestites, Homosexuals, Lesbian and so on. Concepts seem to move to the
headlines in a way that negate the sexual preference gap in the majority of the news
headlines in the newspapers. In addition, all of the news outside of LGBTT directly
related to the news is composed of news and news titles including brutality, violence,
murder and negativity. Rarely, in some titles, it appears that expressions that reflect
the difficulties experienced by LGBTT people in an impartial manner appear to be
used, without emphasizing differences in gender preference. In the news headline, the
expression "Panorama of the Week", which carries the news text in which the LGBTT
individuals and related texts contain affirmative expressions such as "focus of interest"
and "different atmosphere", are seen as the only news headlines that constitute the
headline of affirmative news. As a result of overall evaluation, it was determined that
most of the titles were used to point out the writing fonts, punctuation marks,
emphasis, the use of adjectives qualifying names, used visuals and colors, and
showing sexual preference irregularity.
News Entries or Main Event:
The news follows a hierarchical scheme, such as
stories or evidence/evidence. News production is carried out thousands of times every
day under the severe limitations of professional routines, time, trained people and
entry to the press (Özer 2011, 83).
Table: 3 News entries forming meaning for the study and classification of negative
findings and negative findings that negate sexual identity difference in the main event
News source/political
stance
Negative headings
Positive headings
Neutral
Sabah: Positive
discrimination to
minority groups
-…He was killed by his
brother because he was a
transvestite ... His funeral
was not accepted by his
family. ... When you see,
him lying in the ladies’
clothes...”
-…20 percent, LGBTT quota
in this process party politics
5 percent and disability
level 5 percent with a
participant method.…
B.T. whose age 14,… His
brother who is claimed to
have a perverse relationship
with men ... First, he cut his
throat ... He killed ... "By
saying, He lived with men
..."…
-… Marriages which make at
early ages and forced
marriages and
discrimination against
lesbians, gay, bisexual and
transsexuals have also been
criticized...
-… Friends of Trans Sevda
Başar...
-… has been a victim of a
psychorelation... your uncle
has a perverse relationship
with men…
-… “We do not want the
Turkish model. There is
adultery and homosexuality”
Hâkimiyet: Objective
…Ç who is claimed to be a
transvestite was killed by
his brother. When Ç’s
funeral wasn’t accepted by
his family, he is buried in
the graveyard of homeless
-…Tutan, they are
uncomfortable because
LGBT individuals are
organized. They want to see
that everyone is the same.
They do not tolerate
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
158
people…
different people 'he said ...
Members of the LGBT
Gaziantep, condemned.... to
animals ...
Ekspres: Objective
-…The suspect brother who
was taken into custody after
the travesty murder, said,
"When I saw him in the
woman’s dress, I killed
him."
'Daytime police and night
transvestite 'how interesting
these issues are.
-… Killed... Transsexual
murder...
-…Ethem O. Who is married
and two children has a fair
secretly with transsexual
Sevda B….
Gaziantep 27:
Objective
-…killed… Transsexual
murder…
Olay: Conservative
-... who murdered his
brother allegedly as a
transvestite... "I cleaned my
honor" and the police
surrendered.
-… Killing' because it is a
lesbian relationship... The
court of genuinely 'The
natural tendencies that
people can explain with
their own preferences do
not concern me ...'
-…killed… Transsexual
murderer…
Telgraf:
Social democrat
- …Brother of Ramazan Ç.
Who claimed that Ramazan
is travesty mowed down
him…
-… LGBTT
members also
participated in the
celebration for the
first time this year.
With the flags of
rainbow colors,
LGBTT members,
who brought a
different
atmosphere to
their actions with
their slogans...
-…killed… Transsexual
murderer…
Within the scope of the study, news entries or mainstream events, which are
thought to make sense for the study, have been resolved in printed local press articles.
Findings obtained in the news entries or main event examined are shown in table 3
(three) etc. It has been found that the sentences often took part in news entries or
main events and tried to draw attention to these expressions with punctuation marks.
It seems that they are usually found in the news entries of the topic which is being
tried to draw attention in the headlines. In these news entries, the difference in sexual
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
159
identity has been shown as a dominant problem in the events taking place in the
foreground in every occasion and trying to attract attention. In addition, sexual identity
has been shown as the main reason for legitimizing the events or murders that are the
main topics of news texts. "I cleaned my honor", "I could not look in anyone's face",
etc., to reflect the facts or the murders of the subjects as if they were necessary to be
gathered. In the case of newsletters and in the main event punctuation marks have
been used to draw attention and it has been determined that attempts have been
made to normalize all kinds of humiliating, degrading. Some newsletters have access
to news entries and the main event is that gender identity is not a reason for murder
and that individuals have the right to live regardless of their sexual preferences, and
news editors have found that people have the right to life, which is the most basic
right. Some news entries and main events seem to have an unbiased approach to
sexual identity.
Sequence and Context Information:
Subsequent knowledge is thought of as the
social and political aspect of events: Structural and historical. It is different from the
context, because it may include the history of real events and their contexts, but it is
not possible to distinguish between them (Van Dijk 1988, 54; 1991, 115; transcriber,
Işık and Ozer 2000, 74). The newspaper news selected from the local press in writing
was analyzed and news texts forming an example of successive and contextual
information were resolved.
Table: 4 Classification of negative findings, negative and negative findings of
negative sexual identity from news texts that make sense for succession and
contextual information
News source/
political
stance
Negative headings
Positive
headings
Neutral
Sabah:
Positive
discrimination
to minority
groups
-… Killed by his brother for
being a transvestite... When he
saw his brother lying in woman
clothes ... He killed ... Because
of the "neighborhood pressure"
he saw.
-…Women,
young people
and LGBTT
(Gay, Lesbian,
Bisexual, Trans)
individuals... the
most wounded
community ...
Cantek, for this
reason women,
young people
and LGBT
people
expressed the
symbol of
resistance …
-… Gay, bisexual and
transsexuals are under threat ...
At this report, the homosexuality
is not a crime in Turkey but
discrimination and threats
towards lesbian, gay, bisexual
and transsexuals continue... are
recorded.
-…It was a victim of a
perverse…His uncle has the
perverse relationship with the
men and that’s why we could
not look at anyone's face and
said "he attacked me when I
went to talk" …
-…Intellectuals and academics,
environmental and animal rights
activists, laborers, young people,
women, LGBT individuals and
artists are very supportive to the
new party …”
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
160
-…By saying "You lie up with
the men,” he stabbed knife first
to his neck ... "I could not look
at anyone's face. My friends
told me "Your brother is on the
wrong way, do not talk to us"...
-… Dr. Özkan who is pointing out
that violence against
pornography, homosexuals and
lesbians,
-… Ethem O. Who is married
and has two children has affair
secretly with transsexual Sevda
B…
-… LGBT quota is 5 percent in
party politics and 5 percent in
disability quota participant...
Hâkimiyet:
Objective
-… Disadvantaged sections of
the society... There is no place
for them... It has to be on
news. Even if you’re a
homosexual...
-… Trans, Travesty, gay, lesbian
and bisexual individuals (LGBTT)
live on the agenda because of
their sexual identity…
-… members of LGBT
Gaziantep... To animals...
Ekspres:
Objective
-…After the travesty murder...
The brother said, "I killed him
when his brother saw him on
the woman's dress,"…
-… That woman becomes a
prostitute, a consort, every
human being becomes a
homosexual. Judging and
punishing him should not be our
duty...
-… How two homosexual
teachers should be in a state of
insanity. They did such thing…
-…'Daytime police night
transvestite' is like this...
Telgraf:
Social
democrat
-…Claiming that your brother is
a transvestite, saying ... "We
saved from this embarrassment
..."
-… With his transsexual identity,
his family, society, boyfriend...
He had trouble with all the
people…
-…” Those who bear the titles
of' homosexuality, pimps,
assholes, lesbians, gays, idols,
prostitutes and so on, the
society is' patient 'types'; says…
-… LGBT
members also
participated in
the celebration
for the first time
this year. With
the flags of
rainbow colors,
the LGBT
members, who
brought a
different
atmosphere to
their actions
with their
slogans...
Became the
focus of
interest…
Olay:
Conservative
-… The person who killed his
brother claiming to be a
transvestite ... "I cleaned my
honor" saying that the police
surrender... After the travesty
murder... Brother said “when I
saw my brother in woman’s
dress, I killed him” ...
-… He murdered his girlfriend
because he was a 'lesbian
relationship' ... The accused told
the court that 'the natural
tendencies of people to be
explained by their own
preferences do not concern
themselves'…
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
161
Within the scope of the study, successive and contextual information analysis of
news texts thought to have produced meaning for the study was made in the local
press articles. Findings from the texts examined are shown in table 4 (four).
Expressions such as Gay, Transvestite, Lesbian Gay Bisexuals are often used as
adjectives in news texts, and it is seen that punctuation marks are used to draw
attention to the cues that these expressions take. In addition, it has been found that
humorous, depriving concepts such as "perverted" and "sick", which are frequently
seen in the text of news texts, are included. In some news, it is perceived by the
society that there is a humiliating situation similar to the woman already seen by the
society, with the phrase "seeing her lying with her clothes" and that trying to get the
foreground of the expression "print of the neighborhood" in the same news text using
the punctuation marks is a way to gain legitimacy. In some news, the presence of a
perverse relationship with men and saying that they cannot look at someone's face
shows the fact that the situation is contrary to what is considered as social values and
that news is being made to make it legitimate. So much so that in some news texts
the expression "even if it is a homosexual" is sufficiently clear in the point of view that
LGBTT individuals are also the other. In some news, it has been determined that the
persons left in the victim status due to their sexual preference are transferred in a
neutral / neutral way. Even in only a few news texts to be analyzed, the findings of the
affirmative approach to the LGBTT individuals are found in the news texts, which do
not alienate such as the "focus of interest", "different atmosphere" and "first time"
used. But the ending implications of the resolution of all the news show that most
news texts have a different form of sexual identity, that is, a form of fiction that
excludes, degrades, and shifts LGBTT people.
Selection of Sentences and Sentence Analysis: Word choice is one of the most
important parts of critical discourse analysis. Ideological structuring can occur through
words. The words used may reflect the class to which the journalist belongs. It is also
part of regional harmony. The choice of words is therefore directly linked to the
formation of meaning within the micro-structures of news speech (Van Dijk 1991, 116;
1988, 81; transcriber, Işık and Özer 2000, 76). In the syntactic analysis, it is examined
whether the sentences are long-short, simple-complex, active-passive. For example, a
cullet created by a passive structure can justify police action. Or, it may mean that
some cumulative police created by active construction is right and strong (Van Dijk
1988a, 7781; 1991, 116; transcriber, Işık and Özer 2000, 76). The words in the texts
the printed local press news texts selected for the study here were examined and
syntactic analysis was conducted.
Table 5: Classification of affirmative and neutral expressions that negate sexual
identity difference from news texts that make sense for Sentence Analysis and
Sentence Analysis
News
source/political
stance
Negative headings
Positive headings
Neutral
Sabah: Positive
discrimination to
minority groups
-… It is risk to have multiple
partners with homosexual and
unprotected relationship…
-… In order to
end discrimination
and categorization
against
homosexuals…
-… Gay, bisexual and
transsexual... Sex, bisexuality
and transsexuality are
threatened... At report, it
continues to discriminate and
threaten lesbian, gay,
bisexual and transsexual,
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
162
although homosexuality is
not a crime in
Turkey…recorded.
-… There is adultery and
homosexuality '…
-… Emphasizing
that women,
young people and
LGBT (Gay,
Lesbian, Bisexual,
Trans) individuals
in the forefront
lines of the
resistance are the
most wounded by
authoritarian rule,
Cantek voiced
that women,
young people and
LGBT individuals
are the symbol of
resistance. It is a
historical process
in terms of feeling
the power of
community and
solidarity...
for violence against
pornography, homosexuals
and lesbians... Ozkan, various
reasons of violence... Specify
-... Killed by his brother
because he was a transvestite-
... not accepted by the family
of the estate... He lived in the
graveyard of the homeless...
He said he had to kill because
of the neighborhood
pressure...- ... When he saw,
his brother lying in a woman's
outfit... He killed... He was
surrendered. - He said he
regretted the murder because
of the 'neighborhood pressure
-... His relatives did not accept
his funeral.
-…The murderer ... she chose
just because she was a trans
woman... The killers of our
trans friends also said, "How
come she was a transvestite,
I couldn’t stand it, when she
asked for anal sex"…in
acquittal effortings... Media
organizations are showing as
a monster to trans individuals
with titles like "Transvestite
horror, Travesty murder" …
-… Uncle who is killed as a
homosexual!... She was a
victim of a perverse
relationship... Killer nephew...
Saying that they went into
perverse relationship with men
and that they could not look at
anyone's face, she said,
"When I went to talk, she
attacked me."... Even though
he repeatedly warned him that
he did not give up on this
affair... Our relatives could not
look at anyone… Me too... a
-… SYKP and LGBT
organizations participated…
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
163
few days away. For this
reason, my friends
misunderstood me, they all
excluded me... I said (leave
these things now). He
attacked me (by saying, do
you want also) ... I fired...
He cut homosexual brother’s
throat!... It was claimed that
he has the perverse
relationship with the men...
Cutting his throat, then... He
killed him by stabbing... Then
he came to surrender to the
police... "I could not look at
anyone's face. My friends told
me "Your brother is on the bad
road, do not talk to us" ... I
said why are you doing like
that and he said what can I do
it happened once...
“Black generation"... raising"
gay "generations...
The captured organization...
two of them were homosexual
at the same time,...
Detected…
To protest the law that allows
the marriage of the
homosexuals and adoption ...
It was recorded that it called
for the demonstration to be
edited.
-… The killer of the
transsexual was arrested...
According to the assertion he
is married and father of two
children: Ethem O, ... secret
love with transsexual... started
... Ethem O... Killed…
-… The killer of
the transsexual
was arrested ...
According to the
assertion he is
married and
father of two
children: Ethem
O,... secret love
with transsexual...
Started... Ethem
O... Killed…
Hâkimiyet:
Objective
-… Everyone has to be on
news. Even if he's a
homosexual, he said...”
-… Claimed being travesty...
Who was killed... When his
funeral was not accepted by
his family ... was buried to
homeless graveyard... he said
he was regretful ... murder
because of the 'pressure of the
neighborhood'... The family
did not accept his funeral…
-… Tufan expressed that he
was subjected to
discrimination in the
university because of his
sexual identity... He said,
"They do not tolerate
different people. Tufan stated
that he was discriminated
against by the university
administration because he
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
164
was a trans male ...
-...will add another one. That's
lesbianism (love) ...
Members of LGBT Gaziantep,
condemned violence and
rape...
-… The captured
organization... was found to
have two homosexuals at the
same time ...
People like me... Gay, who
says gay, who says
homosexual... I say that don’t
say bad words and watch your
tongue
Ekspres: Objective
-… Travesty killed his brother
in the hospital ... after the
murder of the travesty... he
said, "I saw him on the
woman's dress and killed
him..." I said, "I cleaned my
honor" ... I was given the
statement ... which was
surrendered... By saying that I
clean my honor... who is
surrendered… His testimony
has been taken… Learned
that he said “When I saw him
on the woman's dress, I could
not bear it... I killed him…"
-… Independence
to homosexuality
is warriors... They
are screaming...
They are shouting
slogans.
-… That woman becomes a
prostitute, a consort, every
human being becomes a
homosexual... Penalty should
not be our duty... "
-… There is adultery and
homosexuality..."...
-… What a helplessness?
Attention!... Two men ... a
homosexual relationship...
Such a relationship... Two gay
teachers... can they try to do
something like this? Doing
such bad things...
-… Gay police… "... It fell like a
bomb 'daytime police night
transvestite' like this ... it
attracts our interest…
-… LGBT members... Killed...
To protest the transgender
murder... gathered…
-… Ethem O. Who is married
and father of two children.
Transsexual and secret love...
Killed by shotgun... Escaped
Ethem O... made entry
secretly.
Gaziantep27:
Objective
-… LGBT members ... Killed ...
To Protest the transgender
murder... Gathered…
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165
Among the local press news articles covered in the study, there is a citation table 5
(five) which is thought to be significant for the study. The words used in the reports
conveying events based on direct sexual identity in the newspapers give more specific
clues to determine whether the newspapers have a neutral / neutral approach. In the
news of exclusion, violence and murder that LGBTT individuals in newspapers are
exposed to, the reasons for living events are different from the ones used in news
texts such as "pervert", "halt", "women's outfit" and "helplessness" The use of gay,
transvestite, homosexual, lesbian, and transsexual concepts suggests an alternative
approach that negates, excludes, and alters sexual identity. As some of the news texts
analyzed are transmitted from the source, the words there do not give clear clues that
LGBTT individuals can be fully evaluated as othering, secreting or impartial. But in
these news texts, the emphasis on sexual identity in the qualities that characterize
certain words and titles used in the titles creates a connotation implicitly suggesting
that LGBTT individuals are negating and others. When the active-passive sentence
Olay: Conservative
Who killed his brother by
claiming that he was
travesty... saying "I have
cleared my honor” …?
surrendered…I saw him in his
woman's dress and killed him"
-… Lesbian lie didn’t bring
discount. Who is saying “he
is killed just because of
lesbian relation.... the court
said' the natural tendencies
of the people to be explained
by their own preferences do
not concern me…
-… LGBT members, reacting to
the murder transsexual
murder... Organized…
-… Who is walking with gays…
To not caring…
Telgraf:
Social democrat
LGBT members… killed ... To
react to transgender murder...
Organized…
-… He claimed to be a
transvestite... He mowed
down... He fired a pistol... In
his statement... He claimed to
be a transvestite and said, 'We
can’t go out and look at the
faces of people. We got rid of
this embarrassment...
Panorama of the
week ... First
experienced.
LGBT members
also participated
in the celebration
for the first time
this year. With the
flags of rainbow
colors, LGBT
members, who
brought a
different
atmosphere to
their actions with
their slogan’
-… 'Homosexuality, pimps,
assholes, lesbians, gay
Paternity, prostitution... Who
has kind of titles… they are
patient types…
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
166
structures of the news in newspapers are examined, it is seen that while the
statements of the suspects in the murder news are composed by active sentence
structures, the news of the information about the victim is formed by passive sentence
structures. It is seen that sentences of news reports conveying incidents of violence,
violence, exclusion, and humiliation that LGBTT individuals are exposed to are
generally active. The creation of codes in an active form also suggests that they may
have been edited in order to legitimize existing news. In the newspapers selected from
the local press it is rarely seen that the news they carry on a few pages shows an
approach that affirms the LGBTT individuals and in particular one of them is given
headline with the heading "the panorama of the week", and in the context of the
related subject, without emphasizing sexual identity tragedy, brutality, negativity or
that it is the only news that is not constructed on the basis of negativity. In some
news, it is seen that the "other" in the minority groups using the expression "even if it
is a homosexual" is negated and alienated by the LGBT people. In some news, it
seems that the difficulties that LGBTT individuals experience are neutral/unbiased.
Retribution of News: In the news rhetoric, quotations from the sides and witnesses
of the event are made to convince and convince the news, and emphasize our good
things and their bad things using exaggerations, metaphors, ironies to emphasize
certain ideological views (Van Dijk 1988a, 8-12; 1988b, 16; 1991, 116; transcriber, Işık
and Ozer 200, 77). The findings of the newspaper headlines analyzed within the scope
of the study are explained here with general conclusions; the title of some of the news
was colored and quoted in an attempt to reflect the remarkable. Some titles are
intended to be outlined on a large scale, in dark color and using punctuation marks.
The images used are often reflected in the news headlines and strengthen the
direction of the news. It seems that the images are understandable for the readers to
acquire information and they may wonder about the content. It has been determined
that murders committed based on sexual identity and other related events of LGBTT
individuals are usually transmitted in a form of positioning against LGBTT individuals.
In some news, the credibility of the news has been strengthened by the use of
numerical data, and even though it is rarely or even in some cases that the LGBTT
individuals are neutral to the subject, they are reflected as "the other" even within the
related subject.
CONCLUSION AND EVALUATION
Within the scope of the study, printed local press journals were evaluated
separately in accordance with the criteria set and according to each category of the
solution; Located in Sabah Newspaper; a total of 21 habits have been reached, under
the headings of different news stories and about the events that were directly
experienced by LGBTT individuals. In this respect, it differs from the newspapers
selected for other representation as the newspaper with the most news. When the
headlines of the news that make sense for the purpose of the study were analyzed by
the method of critical discourse analysis, most of the titles were given in the form of
plain meaning titles, but they were generally directed towards orienting the reader by
using coloring and punctuation marks. When we look at the news texts of the
headlines for reader orientation, punctuation marks are used in the text and it is found
that the events are directives that are tried to be legitimized. In some news, it seems
that they have a positive attitude towards the elimination of grievances. Although, in
the context of the topic related to some news texts, an approach towards eliminating
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
167
the victims living in some news headlines is determined, it has been found out that it is
a news editor which negates the sexual identity difference as a result of general
evaluation. Thus, it was determined that Sabah Newspaper, which stated that its
publishing policy was formed in line with a positive discriminative publication line to
minority groups, contradicted its publication policy. A total of 9 reports were given in
the Hakimiyet Newspaper. In general, it is not possible to determine the ideological
publication concept of journalism in the titles, when the news of the newspaper is
interpreted in consideration of every stage of the method of critical discourse analysis.
News entries, main events and various topics under the title of the narrowly related to
the various articles in the frame of the news in the framework of the evaluation of the
result of the sexual identity difference and excludes the difference in a negative
broadcast line has been determined to have a negative effect. As a result of all of
these, it is determined that the ideological publication concept of journalism is
contradictory to the approach of publishing which positions itself at the center and
approaches every distance equally. Express Newspaper has a total of 8 hits. When
news entries and texts are examined, it is seen that emotional expressions try to orient
the reader by using punctuation marks and to legitimize the event, and it is a situation
where constant sexual identity is emphasized. The news conveyed in narrow sense by
being associated with various topics under different headings is that the difference of
sexual identity is mostly differentiated and neglected. Gaziantep27 Newspaper differs
from all other newspapers by giving only one report about LGBTT individuals. The
newspaper, which places itself in the center by expressing that it can move objectively
towards every object that carries the news value and can move it to its page reveals a
situation that contrasts with the objective/unbiased journalism approach to pay
attention to the difference of sexual identity in the top title and news entry. When the
news in the Olay Newspaper is analyzed by critical discourse analysis method, the
headings that give meaning to the aim of the work are given as plain meaning, some
are highlighted by using capitalization, capital punctuation and coloring in the title,
some are punctuated, others are sexual Attempts have been made to draw attention
to the difference in identity. Compared to the number of news articles using 10 visuals
in total 4 news articles published, it is different from other newspapers as the
newspaper that uses the most visuals. This situation can be considered as a magazine-
like approach, as well as giving the visibility of the main text in the news text. When
news entries and texts are examined, it is seen that there are some expressions to
move the reader's feelings in order to draw attention to the tragedy and brutality of
the events that are indicated as the cause of the sexual identity difference, and these
expressions are tried to be conveyed in a way to attract attention to the reader by
using punctuation marks. So perhaps the differentiation of sexual identity in the
dimension of brutality, violence and murder may have been extrapolated. However,
the fact that sexual identity is often emphasized and shown as justification is also
associating with a situation of being excluded. Thus, it is not possible to say that the
Olay Newspaper, which is expressed as a pro-government broadcasting policy, is also
objectively approaching the difference of sexual identity completely. Finally, when the
news of the Telgraf Journal is analyzed by the method of critical discourse analysis, It
is determined that the difference of information and the difference of sexual identity is
wanted to draw attention to, the capital letter and the big picture are reflected in a
remarkable and flat meaningful different way. When we look at the news texts, it is
Representative of LGBTT in Printed Local Press Gaziantep Sample (2009-2014)
168
seen that in some news texts using the visuals that reflect the moment of the event,
there is a need to draw attention to the brutality of the crime committed by showing
the difference in sexual identity, and in the title and in the news text there are
statements to pass on the feelings of the reader. The ways in which the Telgraf
Newspaper and the Newspaper report news of murder are similar; because both
newspapers have the impression that no reason can be attributed to murder. There is
a feature that separates the Telgraf Newspaper from all other newspapers. Although
the Telgraf Newspaper emphasized differences in sexual identity in some of the titles,
it was determined that the printed local press conveyed news articles about LGBTT
individuals in the newspapers selected for representation, with the most
impartial/unbiased and objective journalism conception. In this case, it is seen that the
newspaper, which has positioned itself centrally and has approached equally from
everybody, overlaps with the ideological publication policy. If LGBTT individuals make
a general evaluation of all the newspapers in terms of what kind of news they
represent and how they represent these forms (neutral/objective, objective,
affirmative or negative), they are mostly discriminating and negating their sexual
identity, they represented an alternative humiliating approach. All newspapers,
regardless of how they position the ideological publication concept, contradict the
positioning of publication policies, which often include "violence", "savagery" and
"other" based fictionalized news. As a result, it would be appropriate to say that the
newspapers cannot escape the influences of the judge cult and move them to the
headlines of the news in parallel with the ideologies they position themselves and with
an objective understanding of broadcasting. The newspapers have found that even in
the news that LGBTT people rarely try to convey with a neutral and impartial
approach, they are building news in such a way as not to create anxiety and fear in
the majority of the society. Thus, in almost all newspapers, the news reporters do not
resemble the point of representing LGBTT individuals, and if they are few in number,
they convey news with an unbiased or affirmative approach in some news. In many
news, LGBTT individuals show signs of poor exclusion and others show that they
cannot fully adopt a publication policy. In this context, it is inevitable that the news on
the pages of the press are formed by the "abnormal" which is formed from the
perspective of the heterosexual majority in the society and the "normal" which they
see legitimate through the written language practices. In this case, efforts should be
made to provide a basis for the emergence and widespread practice of democratic
social solidarity for representations of LGBTT individuals in the local press. In creating
such a ground, as in all mass media, there is also an important task in printed local
and national press. The current heterosexual perspective and the structural sources
that feed this perspective must be subject to a criticism that will enable the change to
take place. An understanding that contributes to this kind of solidarity can only benefit
the representatives of right identities in the light and in practice.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
169
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http://www.hakimiyetgazetesi.com/
http://www.gaziantepsabah.com/
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117211 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
SOURCING PATTERNS WITHIN BRITISH AND
AMERICAN NEWSPAPER COVERAGE OF THE 2011
EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION: THE RISE OF NON-ELITE
PRIMARY DEFINERS
PATRICK FITZGERALD
ABSTRACT
Previous studies have noted the dominance of official sources within the news process and
their unique ability to shape media narratives. This research addresses the role and implications
of news sources in contributing to the overwhelmingly positive portrayal of the anti-Mubarak
opposition protesters within British and American newspaper coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution. Furthermore, this paper will assess how the position of global political elites towards
the protests in Egypt possibly opened up the editorial space within the news coverage of the
revolution for the anti-Mubarak opposition movement to emerge as the dominant voice within
the reporting.
Keywords: News sources, Arab Spring, newspapers, journalistic routines, content analysis,
political protest.
INTRODUCTION
Recent scholarship has demonstrated that the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters
were accorded with favorable media coverage within reporting of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution from influential print (Fitzgerald, 2016) and broadcast (Guzman, 2016)
news outlets in the United States and/or the United Kingdom. This paper aims to build
off of such scholarship by examining how news sourcing patterns contributed to the
positive media representation of the anti-Mubarak opposition
1
, paying particular
Independent Scholar. Ph.D. from Cardiff University's School of Journalism, Media, and Cultural Studies.
fitzgeraldpm@outlook.com
1
It is beyond the purview of this research to determine whether the ascendancy of non-elite sourcing
patterns presented herein can be linked to the rise of ‘network journalism’. Such a theoretical approach
would be more appropriate if the focus of the study examined sourcing patterns within online news
coverage. Instead, this paper exclusively focuses on how sourcing patterns played a decisive role in the
positive representation of the anti-Mubarak opposition within print media, hence the focus of the literature
review on primary definers, normative sourcing patterns, and press-state relations. One could take a number
of theoretical approaches to this research topic, but given the scope of the study and research questions
posed, this was indeed to most appropriate and relevant route for the purposes of this study.
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
174
attention to which sources were quoted or cited most frequently, in addition to the
order that they appeared within individual news stories. Furthermore, this study will
also outline whether official (e.g. former or current governmental/political officials)
sources were determined to be supporting the anti-Mubarak opposition or then-
President Mubarak within news coverage of the revolution.
2
When evaluating the factors contributing to the positive media portrayal of protest
groups or social movements, it is important to heed Tuchman’s (1973) advice that
scholars who want to develop a more holistic understanding of media coverage should
focus on the construction of news (p. 62) since journalists themselves are influential
gatekeepers determining who or what aspects of a particular event make it into, or are
emphasized within reporting. (Shoemaker et al., 2009). Evaluating media coverage of
the 2011 Egyptian Revolution offers an opportunity to evaluate to what extent the
anti-Mubarak opposition was given a platform to articulate and voice their grievances
to an international news audience in contrast to official sources from Western or
regional nations, along with Egypt itself. While this study contributes to existing
scholarship evaluating news coverage of the ‘Arab Spring,’ it will also highlight the
implications of this research for press-state relations.
News sources and broadening the concept of ‘primary definers’
Examining sources and sourcing patterns within media coverage is essential since it
not only reveals 1) whose voice is included (and whose is not), but to what extent they
are included, and 2) the order in which certain sources appear, which is important as
the sources who are quoted first can “set the limit for all subsequent discussion by
framing what the problem” or issue is. (Hall et al., 1999, p. 255). What is more,
examining sources and sourcing patterns addresses how news is constructed and how
audiences come to understand the news that they are consuming. An essential piece
of scholarship relevant to understanding this phenomenon is Hall et al.’s discussion of
2
For the purposes of this research, the term Anti-Mubarak Opposition is a catchall designation referring to
street protesters, individual or individual protester, Mohamed ElBaradei, Egyptian politicians, political groups
or organizations, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the online opposition. Street protesters and an individual or
individual protester were simply just that: either a reference to the street protests engulfing Egypt during
the revolution, or an individual or individual protester that were either active participants within, or
sympathized with the larger opposition. Mohamed ElBaradei is a former Egyptian diplomat, Nobel laureate,
and former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency who was either seen as a prominent, or the
leading opposition figure. ElBaradei was a response category on his own given his stature within Egyptian
and international politics. The Egyptian politicians’ response category referred to current or former Egyptian
political figures who were outspoken critics of the Mubarak-led Egyptian government, and of lesser
importance than Mohamed ElBaradei. Figures such as Ayman Nour (dissident politician who was jailed by
Mubarak after challenging him for the presidency in 2005), Amr Moussa (former Egyptian diplomat and
former Secretary General of the Arab League) and Osama al-Ghazali Harb (former member of Mubarak’s
National Democratic Party that went on to co-establish the liberal-leaning Democratic Front Party with Yehia
Al-Gamal in 2007) fell into this category, amongst others. The political groups or organizations response
category referred to the Egyptian Association for Change, the Council of Wise Men, socialists, ‘leftists’, and
other references to formal or loose oppositional coalitions. The Muslim Brotherhood merited its own category
due to their turbulent relations with the Egyptian state, as well as their preeminence within Egyptian social
and political life. Lastly, the online opposition could have referred to an individual describing their use of
Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, or blogs to coordinate the protests, or referred to an organized group using the
same or similar platforms to communicate with other dissidents and mobilize against the Mubarak-era
government (e.g. the April 6th Youth Movement and the “We are all Khaled Said” Facebook page).
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
175
primary definers, a term that encompasses powerful institutions, interest groups, and
people that are part of, or connected to the governing elite of a nation. (ibid.).
Primary definers provide a framework by which all subsequent contributions to a
dialogue are defined as either relevant or irrelevant. (ibid.). For example, Hall et al.
mention that journalists, when reporting on political topics, will seek out commentary
from MPs and accredited sources to provide an authoritative analysis of whatever issue
is being debated. (ibid. p. 254). What this then means is that instead of journalists
acting as a bulwark against the interests or influence of the powerful, they orient their
coverage in a way that is in tune with the definitions of good policy or social reality
that only ‘accredited sources’ can provide. (ibid.).
Influential research from Tuchman (1978) further outlines the importance of who is
quoted in news stories, contending that “quotations of other people’s opinions are
presented to create a web of mutually self-validating facts” (p. 95) in which journalists
professionally validate their work by including comment or opinion from sources.
Tuchman’s ethnographic study of newsroom culture and practices found that in the
relationship between reporters, political sources, and citizen-based social movements,
journalists typically did not seek out commentary from representatives of social
movements. (ibid. p. 81). Instead, Tuchman found that journalists defer to statements
from political figures possessing considerable sociopolitical currency, while neglecting
dissident voices (ibid.). Selecting the politically powerful as a vital source for
information inevitably helps contribute to decisions on which facts are taken into
account when piecing together a news story (ibid.), as political sources often only
disseminate information deemed prudent to the realization of a desired policy
outcome.
Indeed, prevailing journalistic routines often produce news coverage that elevates
the voice of elite sources and diminishes or depoliticizes the voice of non-elite sources
(e.g. ordinary citizens). (Galtung and Ruge, 1965; Sigal, 1973; Tuchman, 1978; Gans,
1979; Clausen, 2004; Lee et al., 2005). However, more recent scholarship has offered
a critical appraisal of Hall’s seminal work. Cottle (2003), in analyzing Hall’s conceptual
understanding of ‘primary definers’, faults Hall for failing to adequately address the
implications of the relationship between news sources and news producers (p.10).
To expand on Cottle’s point, if we were to accept Hall’s stance that ‘primary
definers’ command the discursive field within the media, set the terms of debate, and
cast news producers as unwitting purveyors of dominant ideologies (ibid. p. 11), we
would be adhering to a reductionist understanding of the relationship between state
power and the media as a top-down hierarchy that does not view the media as a site
of struggle between news producers and sources. Indeed, as Timothy Cook (1998) has
previously argued, journalists and the media outlets they report for should not be seen
as uncritical vessels reflexively disseminating official opinion, but as political actors
with considerable agency in their own right. (p. 12-13).
Echoing Cottle, Schlesinger and Tumber (1999) call into question the legitimacy of
deeming a source a primary definer, since such a designation does not take into
account the competition amongst sources to influence a news story. (p. 258).
Additionally, they question who would be deemed the ‘primary definer’ in a dispute
between governmental elites, and if there can be many primary definers, rather than
just one. (ibid.). Second, there is the question of what constitutes the boundaries of
primary definition. Not all members of the political class have equal access to the news
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
176
media in the way that prime ministers and presidents do, who can subsequently
influence news coverage to enhance their reach and legitimacy amongst the viewing
public as a dominant source. (ibid. p. 259). Such inequalities of access are not taken
into account within Hall et al.’s formulation of primary definers. (ibid.). Thirdly,
Schlesinger and Tumber fault Hall for assuming the passivity of the news media and
their reticence to challenge elite opinion. (ibid.).
More important to this research, though, is the collapsing boundary between
‘primary’ and ‘secondary definers’ (e.g. journalists) that has been illustrated in recent
scholarship (McLaughlin, 2008; Greer and McLaughlin, 2011), with research from
Kunelius and Renvall (2010) pointing towards the rise of citizens as ‘primary definers’.
Evidence for this emerging trend has been demonstrated in more recent scholarship
examining sourcing practices within news coverage of the 2011 Arab Spring. Hermida
et al.’s (2014) study found that National Public Radio’s Andy Carvin was inclined to
favor non-elite sources within his influential Twitter stream, where he curated
information emanating from Tunisia and Egypt during the revolutionary protests that
swept through both nations. Carvin’s preference for non-elite sources was particularly
evident in the case of Egypt. (p. 492). Van Leuven et al. (2015) determined that
“ordinary citizens and non-mainstream groups” emerged as important sources within
Belgian TV and newspaper coverage of the Arab Spring while cautioning that, at least
in the Belgian context, journalists still “mainly turn to official political sources to
introduce the news.” (p. 585-586). Hermida et al. and Van Leuven et al.’s research
present especially relevant and compelling case studies going forward, as both studies
point towards the realization of Gans’ (2011) call for “bottom-up news” that focuses on
how ordinary citizens “are affected by the decisions and acts of high government
officials.” (p. 4).
Press-state relations: From a ‘passive’ to ‘active’ understanding
The relationship between the press and the state has been the focus of intense
deliberation over how these different entities influence each other and under what
circumstances. Since this research also assesses whether official political sources could
be found to be supportive of the revolutionary protests or not as was described in the
reporting, it is important to explore several theoretical models by which to evaluate the
topic of press-state relations and how it impacts the construction of news and
journalistic sourcing routines, particularly in relation to foreign news. Bennett (1990)
previously argued news media professionals, from the boardroom down to beat
reporters, indexed the range of viewpoints within news and editorials according to the
contours of debate taking place within government circles about a particular topic. (p.
106). Thus, Bennett’s ‘indexing’ hypothesis is that non-official voices are included
within news stories or editorials when those voices express opinions that are in
alignment with viewpoints emanating out of official policy circles. (ibid.).
Hallin’s ‘Spheres’ analyzed the U.S. media’s performance in covering the Vietnam
War, arguing how American journalists orient their coverage in relation to the policy
positions of “the major established actors of the American political process.” (Hallin,
1986, p. 116). Journalistic discourse within the Sphere of Legitimate Controversy is
largely defined by the “parameters of debate between and within the Democratic and
Republican parties” and the executive branch itself, with the professional norm of
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
177
objectivity establishing the ideological boundaries of news coverage (ibid.). Within the
Sphere of Consensus, journalists are advocates or celebrants of values or policies that
are assumed to be so uncontroversial that opposing views need not be entertained.
(ibid. p. 117). The Sphere of Deviance, however, describes the role of journalists in
“exposing, condemning, or excluding from the public agenda” ideas or groups who
challenge the consensus values or viewpoints, thereby defining and defending “the
limits of acceptable political conflict.” (ibid.).
While Hallin’s ‘Spheres’ is certainly an influential conceptual framework by which to
assess why journalists cover foreign affairs or governmental policy in a particular
manner, subsequent contributions from Wolfsfeld (1997) and Robinson (2001) add
further nuance to this discussion. Gadi Wolfsfeld’s (1997) political contest model
illuminates the complexity at play in the reporting of political conflict, demonstrating
that journalists are professionals with agency that make editorial decisions
independent of official opinion or influence, and actively assess the goals, motivations,
and methods of those seeking to bring out change versus the response of authorities
determined to undercut those aspirations. (p. 155). Piers Robinson builds on Hallin and
Bennett’s earlier work through the policy-media interaction model, which elevates the
role of journalists to actively influencing the formulation of policy through producing
news coverage that is not contained within the boundaries of official opinion, thereby
possibly becoming a part of and shaping elite debate. (Robinson, 2001, p. 540). While
this paper will not be arguing that the reporting conducted by the journalists covering
the 2011 Egyptian Revolution can be entirely mapped onto the conceptual frameworks
detailed within this section, they are nonetheless useful in demonstrating how the
scholarly understanding of the media’s role in reporting on foreign affairs, politics and
policy has shifted from seeing journalists as being largely unwilling to call into question
or deviate from official opinion (Hallin, 1986; Bennett, 1990) to acting independently
of, or actively challenging it. (Wolfsfeld, 1997; Robinson, 2001).
Scope of Research
This paper analyzes the sourcing routines of influential newspapers from the United
Kingdom and United States in their coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. The
paper specifically focuses on which sources were quoted or cited most frequently
within news coverage, in what order they appeared within the reporting, and whether
or not official sources from U.K., U.S. or other nations could be determined to be
supporting then-President Hosni Mubarak or the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters.
Following previous research from Fitzgerald (2016) demonstrating that the anti-
Mubarak opposition protesters were accorded with overwhelmingly positive media
coverage within either country’s influential establishment newspapers, this paper
assesses the impact of news sourcing routines on the positive media portrayal of the
anti-Mubarak opposition protesters. This is an important point to emphasize, as the
choice of news sources can “promote a particular interpretation” (Entman, 2004, p. 5)
of an event or issue. Through an analysis of news sources, it is possible to understand
how and why news stories are presented as they are (Johnson-Cartee, 2005, p. 218),
which is especially timely and relevant given that the positive portrayal of the anti-
Mubarak opposition protesters stands in contrast to previous studies not only
highlighting the negative portrayal of domestic political protests within American and
British media outlets (Turner, 1969; Halloran et al., 1970; Gitlin, 1980; Shoemaker,
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
178
1984; McLeod, 1995; McLeod & Detenber, 1999; Boykoff, 2006; Boyle et al., 2004;
Boyle et al., 2005; Jha, 2007), but also the pervasiveness of reductionist
characterizations of the Middle East present within Western news coverage of the
region after 9/11. (Karim, 2006; Pintak, 2006; Mishra, 2008; Kumar, 2010).
Research Questions
With the scope of the study outlined, this paper is guided by the following two
research questions:
• Research Question 1: Who were the dominant sources that were cited or
quoted most frequently within British and American newspaper coverage of the
2011 Egyptian Revolution?
• Research Question 2: Who were non-Egyptian political or governmental
sources determined to be supporting within British and American newspaper
coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution?
3
Methodology and Research Sample
A quantitative content analysis was conducted in order to answer the above
research questions. Content analysis is an indispensable method for evaluating how
the news media contextualizes social and political events within news coverage.
(Payne & Payne, 2004, p.52). This research examined influential newspapers such as
The New York Times
,
The Washington Post
, and
USA Today
from the United States,
and
The Times
,
The Daily Telegraph
,
The Guardian
, and
The Independent
from the
United Kingdom. Comparative analysis of British and American news media has
revealed meaningful findings in previous studies. (Christensen, 2005; Dardis, 2006).
Following Fitzgerald’s (2016) study, this content analysis examined 611 news stories
published between “the dates of January 24th, 2011 to February 21st, 2011.” (p. 161).
The dates were chosen in order to capture the greatest concentration of relevant
coverage, while news stories were found via Nexis UK using the keywords ‘Egypt’ and
‘protests.’ (ibid.). After coding each individual article, the results were entered into an
SPSS spreadsheet, at which point a descriptive statistical analysis was used to parse
out which news sources appeared most frequently, in what order, and who official
political sources were found to be supporting.
Findings: Dominant sourcing patterns
To begin, the research revealed that the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters were
most frequently cited or quoted as the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth sources
within the British newspaper coverage of the revolution. Within the American
newspapers, the anti-Mubarak opposition was most frequently cited or quoted as the
first source, with U.S. officials (including President Barack Obama and Secretary of
3
The following is a breakdown of coding categories used to determine the stance of political or
governmental officials towards the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. Mubarak/Mubarak-led government:
Voicing support for Mubarak or Mubarak-anointed successor, and/or condemning or delegitimizing the
actions and aspirations of the opposition protesters. Anti-Mubarak Opposition: Calls for Mubarak to
implement political reform, to respect the right of protest and the civil and human rights of protesters,
and/or to step down as the President of Egypt. Neutral: Neither convincingly supportive or critical of the
protest movement, and/or urging nonviolence from both supporters and opponents of Mubarak.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
179
State Hillary Clinton) being most frequently cited or quoted as the second, third,
fourth, and fifth sources within the American press. Interestingly enough, British and
American media outlets rarely looked to commentary emanating from social media
platforms to supplement their reporting, a point which will be discussed further in the
concluding remarks of this paper.
To further unpack the results of who appeared most frequently as the first source,
Table 1 lays out the primacy of the anti-Mubarak opposition and U.S. officials in
quantitative terms as the preeminent sources within both British and American
newspapers. What is striking about these results is how often then Egyptian president
Hosni Mubarak or an official from the Egyptian government appeared as the first
source compared to the opposition protesters, and how the presence of U.S. officials
far outpaced that of governmental/political officials from other nations (most notably
the U.K.), as indicated within Table 1 below:
Table 1: Most frequently mentioned as first source – British (n=314) and American
(n=191) Newspaper Samples
4
UK - Source Percent US – Source Percent
1. Anti-Mubarak
Opposition
25%
1. Anti-Mubarak Opposition
20%
2. U.S. Officials
11%
2. U.S. Officials
19%
3. Foreign Head(s) of
State/Politician(s)
7%
3.Non-Egyptian News
Agency/Journalist
9%
4. Hosni Mubarak (tie)
6%
4. Foreign Head(s) of
State/Politician(s)
9%
4. Business Source
(tie)5
6%
5. Hosni Mubarak
6%
5. U.K. Officials (tie)
6%
Total
61%
Total
63%
What can be determined by comparing who was most frequently quoted or cited as
the first source within British and American newspapers is that the British press gave
considerably more weight to the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters, as the protesters
appeared more than twice as much (25%) than U.S. officials (11%) in this regard.
American publications, on the other hand, seemed to balance the weight of the anti-
Mubarak opposition within their coverage with that of U.S. officials. Taking the British
and American samples together, however, the anti-Mubarak opposition ascended to
the status of ‘primary definers’ within both countries’ print news coverage of the
revolutionary protests, and were thereby able to contextualize the protests according
to the grievances and aspirations they articulated to the journalists reporting on the
events. (Fitzgerald, 2016). In stark contrast to Tuchman’s (1978) influential study in
which it was found that journalists covering the protests rarely sought out commentary
4
This table accounts for articles in which at least one source was included, rather than the total number of
articles coded from either sample. All percentages have been rounded to the nearest whole number.
5
Business Source
: Employee from a commercial entity commenting on the effects of the protests on energy
prices, tourism, etc.
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
180
from representatives of social movements, the journalists covering the protests in
Egypt elevated the voice of the opposition protesters to a position of dominance, which
contributed to the highly favorable media coverage that the anti-Mubarak opposition
protesters received within British and American newspapers. Indeed, the anti-Mubarak
opposition’s status as primary definers stands in contrast to other influential studies
where it was found that journalists privilege elite sources and diminish the presence or
agency of non-elite sources. (Galtung and Ruge, 1965; Sigal, 1973; Tuchman, 1978;
Gans, 1979; Lee et al., 2005).
While the dominance of the anti-Mubarak opposition movement as a news source is
significant in its own right, the question remains as to why the journalists covering the
2011 Egyptian Revolution reported on it in such a favorable manner and privileged the
voice of the anti-Mubarak opposition. As researchers from Loughborough University
(2012) noted in their analysis of the BBC’s reporting on the 2011 Arab Uprisings, the
protests were described as “revolutions” pitting protesters against “brutal dictators”
whose actions could be compared to previous revolutions in European political history
(ibid. p. 33), and perhaps influenced the positive media portrayal of the regional
protest movements. However, it could also be that the absence of a unified position on
the behalf of global political elites opened up the editorial space for non-elite news
sources to influence the coverage of the protests in Egypt.
Prominence, influence, and role of official opinion
Although not dominant, U.S. officials were nonetheless prominent news sources
within British and American newspaper coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. This
section of the paper will reveal how the inclusion of American political officials within
news coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution may have played a role in the positive
media representation of the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters. But first, let us retrace
the findings presented earlier, in which American officials were found to be quoted or
cited second-most within coverage from the British newspapers, while falling just short
of being most frequently cited or quoted as the first source within the American press.
This is where the samples start to diverge, in that while the British press privileged
the voice of the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters, American newspapers followed a
different track, one that saw U.S. officials emerge as an important source within
coverage. Whether this speaks to Clausen’s (2003) understanding of domestication,
where journalists assimilate global events into frames of reference that audiences
within the reporting country are familiar with (p.15), or is merely a reflection of the
fact that events occurring in nations of vital geopolitical significance to the United
States (such as Egypt) are more likely to receive media coverage is open to question.
(Shoemaker et al., 1991).
The discussion of the possible influence of U.S. officials on the media
representation of the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters will begin by analyzing the
extent to which former President Barack Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton, and other American officials were included within coverage, and who they
were determined to be supporting within the reporting on the protests. With that
clarified, then President Obama’s presence and stance within coverage will be analyzed
first.
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
181
A. U.S. Officials: President Barack Obama
Former President Obama was not featured to a significant degree within either
British or American publications, and therefore did not have a decisive impact on the
positive portrayal of the anti-Mubarak opposition. To start, Obama was mentioned
within only 15% of articles published within British newspapers, and 27% of all articles
published within American newspapers. By comparison, Britain’s own Prime Minister,
David Cameron, was only included within 9% of all articles from the British press (and
only 2% of all articles published within the American newspapers). What is interesting
about the inclusion of Barack Obama is that when British newspapers sought the voice
of official opinion to contextualize the protests in Egypt, they were more likely to turn
towards President Obama to do so, rather than their own prime minister.
Table 2 shows which side of the protests President Obama was found to be
supporting within news coverage of the revolution:
Table 2: Who was President Obama coded as supporting within news coverage?
U.K. Newspapers
U.S. Newspapers
Anti-Mubarak Opposition
53%
24%
Neutral
31%
70%
Mubarak/Mubarak-led
government
16%
6%
The most significant point emerging from this discussion is that Barack Obama was
found to be supporting the anti-government opposition over Hosni Mubarak within
either country’s press by a notable margin. Obama was determined to be supporting
the opposition within 53% of the articles that he appeared in from the British press
compared to 24% of articles within American newspapers, and his stance was coded
as neutral within 31% of British newspapers versus 70% within American newspapers.
Given that Obama’s stance toward the anti-Mubarak opposition was, for the most part,
determined to be either supportive or neutral within either sample, it begs the
question of which side then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other U.S. prominent
officials were determined to be supporting.
Overall, it is difficult to ascertain whether Obama’s inclusion within the reporting
and the position he took towards the anti-Mubarak opposition impacted the media
representation of the protesters. However, Obama’s (and that of other U.S. officials,
more importantly) presence perhaps acted as a means by which to project an
‘objective take’ on the events in Egypt, particularly within American newspapers where
although the opposition was most frequently cited as the first source just ahead of
U.S. officials, those two sources switched positions in terms of who was most
frequently cited or quoted as the second source. Whether U.S. officials were included
within media coverage as a ‘balancer’ to the presence of the anti-Mubarak opposition
was further revealed by who Hillary Clinton and the other American officials were
determined to be supporting.
B. U.S. Officials: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Similar to the results for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton did not feature heavily
within coverage from British or American newspapers. Within the British press, Clinton
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
182
was included within 38 (10%) news stories. An overview of Clinton’s position towards
the revolution within British media coverage is displayed within Table 3:
Table 3: Who was Hillary Clinton coded as supporting within British newspapers?
Anti-Mubarak Opposition
20%
Neutral
40%
Mubarak/Mubarak-led government
40%
Shifting to the American press, Clinton was included in 33 (15%) articles, with
Table 4 below laying out her position within reporting from American newspapers:
Table 4: Who was Hillary Clinton coded as supporting within American newspapers?
Anti-Mubarak Opposition
10%
Neutral
55%
Mubarak/Mubarak-led government
34%
An interesting point to note here is the divergence between who Barack Obama
and Hillary Clinton were determined to be supporting most frequently. Though
Obama’s position, on average, could be described as neutral within the American
media and supportive of the revolution within the British media, he was found to be
supporting the anti-Mubarak opposition more than Mubarak or the Egyptian
government when evaluating both the British and American media together. Clinton’s
position, on the other hand, was found to be pro-Mubarak more often than not.
While it is difficult to explain the apparent discord within the Obama administration,
it was an issue that was touched upon within some of the reporting on the protests,
particularly within articles that included Frank G. Wisner, a former U.S. ambassador to
Egypt dispatched by the Obama administration to the country in order to relay the
American position to Hosni Mubarak. In an article with the headline “Obama furious
over Egypt remarks by ‘monster’ Clinton” published within
The Times
on February 14,
2011, the disunity within the Obama administration came into focus, describing the
divergent positions taken by Obama on one side with Clinton and Wisner on the other:
A rift has opened at the heart of the US Government, with Mr. Obama furious that a
delegation led by the Secretary of State had publicly undermined his attempts to
pressure President Mubarak to stand down.
The confusion peaked after Mr. Obama was told that Frank Wisner, a former State
Department official acting as an envoy to Egypt, had told a security conference in
Munich that Mr. Mubarak should stay in office to oversee reforms. At the same
summit, Mrs. Clinton emphasised that an orderly transition to democracy “takes time”.
Mr. Obama, who has already called for reforms “right now”, was seething at the
remarks which contradicted his position, his aides said yesterday. (Hines, 2011)
What comes out within the reporting from
The Times
is that Wisner (along with
Clinton, given her comments at the same security conference) complicated the Obama
administration’s efforts to convince Hosni Mubarak that he should step down. Wisner’s
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
183
comments and the apparent rift they caused within the Obama administration over
how to respond to the protests in Egypt were noted within reporting from journalist
Robert Fisk, a well-known, outspoken critic of Western foreign policy in the Middle East
who brought to light Wisner’s business connections with the Mubarak-led Egyptian
government, casting into disrepute Wisner’s status as an independent arbitrator
without any stake in Mubarak’s survival as president and the continuation of the
current political order of Egypt:
Frank Wisner, President Barack Obama’s envoy to Cairo who infuriated the White
House this weekend by urging Hosni Mubarak to remain President of Egypt, works for a
New York and Washington law firm which works for the dictator’s own Egyptian
government.
Mr. Wisner is a retired State Department 36-year career diplomat – he served as US
ambassador to Egypt, Zambia, the Philippines, and India under eight American
presidents. In other words, he was not a political appointee. But it is inconceivable
Hillary Clinton did not know of his employment by a company that works for the very
dictator which Mr. Wisner now defends in the face of a massive democratic opposition
in Egypt.
So why on Earth was he sent to talk to Mubarak, who is in effect a client of Mr.
Wisner’s current employers? (Fisk, 2011)
Wisner’s comments, despite not receiving widespread coverage, nonetheless offer a
possible explanation for the divergence between Obama and Clinton’s posture toward
the protesters, and are important to note for several reasons. Firstly, the Obama
administration did not project a unified front in terms of whether they were backing
the Mubarak-led government or the opposition protesters, with the data from which
side of the protests President Obama was backing versus Secretary of State Clinton
corroborating that point.
Secondly, the fact that Obama and Clinton were the most frequently cited examples
of ‘official opinion’ to make it into coverage, and their divergent viewpoints suggests
that their presence within the reporting had little to do with legitimizing the anti-
Mubarak protesters. However, the divergent positions of Obama and Clinton perhaps
opened a space within the reporting for the voice of the anti-Mubarak opposition to
ascend to a position of dominancy, where they possessed considerable leverage in
shaping how the media covered them given the disunity within the Obama
administration. Overall, Obama and Clinton’s presence seemed to have more to do
with which sort of voices British and American newspapers sought out in order to
make sense of how certain political officials with overwhelming global clout were
reacting to the protests in Egypt, lending credence to the notion official opinion served
as sort of a guarantor of ‘objectivity’ within coverage of the protests.
Yet, before definitively concluding that the role of American official opinion within
coverage was more about perhaps providing an ‘objective’ voice to balance the anti-
Mubarak opposition, it is necessary to see where former or current American officials
of lesser significance than Obama and Clinton fell in terms of which camp they were
found to be supporting within news coverage of the revolution.
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
184
C. U.S. Officials: Former or current
Current or former U.S. politicians (excluding Obama and Clinton), officials, or
general references to governmental entities or agencies were included within 96
(25%) articles from British newspapers. A general reference to a U.S. official or
officials was most frequently cited or quoted before all others within 27 (28%) of those
96 articles, followed by a general reference to the White House, Obama administration
and related officials within 11 (11%) articles, and then Frank Wisner (former U.S.
ambassador to Egypt and Israel) amongst many others who were not mentioned to
any sort of significant degree. Table 5 lays out their position within British newspapers,
where they were found to be supporting the anti-Mubarak opposition more often than
not:
Table 5: Who were U.S. Official(s) coded as supporting within British newspapers?
Anti-Mubarak Opposition
44%
Neutral
28%
Mubarak/Mubarak-led government
28%
Within the American media, U.S. officials or agencies were mentioned within 99 (44
percent) articles. Similar to the British media, a general reference to a U.S. official or
officials was most often cited or quoted above all others within 14 (14%) of those 99
articles, followed by a general reference to the White House or the Obama
administration and related officials within 9 (11%) articles, and then lastly a variety of
current or former American officials not mentioned to any sort of significant degree.
Table 6 demonstrates that though the dominant position of U.S. officials within
American news coverage was one of neutrality, they were determined to be supporting
Mubarak more often than the anti-Mubarak opposition:
Table 6: Who were U.S. Officials coded as supporting within American newspapers?
Anti-Mubarak Opposition
11%
Neutral
68%
Mubarak/Mubarak-led government
21%
Interestingly enough, though U.S. officials were found to be supporting the anti-
Mubarak opposition more frequently within British newspapers, they were more
frequently coded as supporting Mubarak within the American press.
With that said, the inclusion of President Obama, Secretary of State Clinton, and
U.S. officials (considering their different stances towards the anti-Mubarak opposition
protesters) suggests that their presence within coverage may have been more about
more about serving as a point of reference for the journalists covering the events in
Egypt, and did not impact the media representation of the anti-Mubarak opposition
protesters in a direct manner.
Indeed, the divergent positions of U.S. officials towards the anti-Mubarak
opposition gives credence to the suggestion that disunity amongst American elites
possibly provided the journalists covering the events in Egypt greater editorial agency
within their coverage. While elite disunity and objectivity may help explain the results
presented within this paper, there is a need to consider what other factors may have
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
185
been at play, as exclusively focusing on professional norms such as objectivity, as well
as discord amongst American officials runs the risk of reducing the role of journalists to
that of uncritical stenographers merely reproducing the opinion of political elites,
rather than as “active and thinking agents who purposefully produce news.” (Cottle,
2000, p. 22).
To further expand on that idea, the positive representation of the protesters, their
dominance as a news source, and the attention given to the variety of motivations
compelling them to fill the public spaces of Egypt (Fitzgerald, 2016) can be best
contextualized by Cottle (2000), who questioned whether news frames originate within
the various layers of wider culture, or whether they are most influenced by institutional
sources. (p. 430).
Considering the results presented within this study, it could be that wider cultural
and political values embedded within national cultures, as suggested by Loughborough
University (2012), and the role of the press in countries such as the United Kingdom
and United States influenced the positive framing of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution
within British and American newspapers.
CONCLUSION
What this study has revealed is that the anti-Mubarak opposition was most
frequently cited or quoted as the first source within British and American newspaper
coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. Breaking the results down further, the anti-
Mubarak opposition protesters were most often cited or quoted as the second, third,
fourth, and fifth sources within the sample of British newspapers, while being cited or
quoted second-most as the second, third, fourth, and fifth sources within the sample
of American newspapers. The dominance of the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters as
the go-to news source for British and American newspapers undoubtedly contributed
to their positive media representation found in previous studies. (Fitzgerald, 2016).
More importantly, it also demonstrates the rise of non-elite news sources (i.e. Egyptian
citizens) to the status of ‘primary definers’ in this instance, buttressing previous studies
from Hermida et al. (2014) and Van Leuven et al. (2015), both of which noted the
emergence of regular citizens as important sources of information within media
coverage of the ‘Arab Spring’ protests. Drawing off of Hall et al. (1999), this provided
the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters with the opportunity to “set the limit for all
subsequent discussion by framing what the problem” or issue is. (p. 255).
The status of the anti-Mubarak opposition as ‘primary definers’ also demonstrates
how the results presented herein diverge from Tuchman’s (1978) study, where it was
found that journalists rarely privilege the voice of those affiliated with social
movements, and instead privilege the voice of official political sources within their
reporting. (p. 81). This is not to devalue Hall et al. or Tuchman’s critically important
scholarship, but to show how media coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution was
unusual in how it broke with conventional professional routines described within their
studies in addition to previous research that found journalists typically rely on national
figures over local, on-the-ground sources. (Clausen, 2004; Lee et al., 2005).
This study’s significance is best demonstrated by the fact that the anti-Mubarak
opposition protesters were a go-to, dominant news source within British and American
newspapers, highlighting how the journalists covering the 2011 Egyptian Revolution
for British and American newspapers did not reflexively align their coverage with the
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
186
opinions of official political sources. On one level, this could be due to the fact that a
single, unified position was not present within the commentary from American officials
(since British officials were all but absent), as President Obama was determined to be
supporting the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters more often than not, while
Secretary of State Clinton’s position towards the protests could be defined as largely
neutral (but more supportive of Hosni Mubarak and the Egyptian government than the
opposition protesters). Even some of the reporting noted active disagreement within
the Obama administration in terms of who the United States should be supporting,
with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and special envoy to Egypt Frank Wisner
seemingly undermining President Obama’s attempt to pressure Hosni Mubarak to leave
office. (Hines, 2011). It could be that the aforementioned disunity amongst American
political elites opened up a space within coverage for the anti-Mubarak opposition to
gain more credibility as a dominant news source, and thereby influence the way they
were covered by Western media.
This, in a sense, speaks to Wolfsfeld’s (1997) political contest model where
journalists evaluate the goals, grievances, and methods of individuals or groups
seeking change independent of official political opinion (p. 155), and Robinson’s (2001)
policy-media interaction model where there exists “the possibility of an influential
media as part of the elite debate” shaping policy decisions or outcomes. (p. 540). At
the minimum, the lack of a single, unified position on the part of American political
elites did not represent a competing frame for the journalists to weigh their coverage
against, and allowed the voice of the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters to remain in a
position of power within the reporting published by British and American newspapers.
Another interesting finding pertaining to the subject of news sources indicated that
social media did not function as a prominent source of information within the reporting
on the 2011 Egyptian Revolution from prominent British and American newspapers.
Consider the fact that social media was used as a source within the British press only
10 times throughout the course of the sampling period, versus the fact that it was
used as a source within American newspapers 54 times (over 5x as much than the
British press). Indeed, within the American press, social media was used as the first
source within five articles, as the second source within five articles, and as the third
source within a further six articles. By contrast, social media was not used as the first
source within any articles from the British press, appeared as the second source within
two articles, and did not appear as the third source within any articles.
This reveals something interesting about the way news media outlets cover events
in a difficult, if not dangerous setting, as Egypt was during the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution. What can be inferred considering the diminutive presence of social media
as a news source within British and American newspapers is that such platforms will
not impact the way journalists cover political events in a foreign country if they are
able to report (in some capacity) from the nation in which the event is taking place, as
they were able to do in Egypt.
This is not to suggest that the reporting environment in Egypt was a space bereft
of hostilities towards international media outlets and the journalists reporting for them,
but what it does indicate is that social media does not figure prominently as a news
source, even in a hostile reporting environment. This finding is corroborated by Knight
(2012) who, in researching the use of social media as a news source within coverage
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
187
of the 2009 Iranian presidential election protests (another hostile reporting
environment), determined that journalists “relied most on traditional sourcing
practices: political statements, expert opinion, and a handful of ‘man on the street’
quotes for colour.” (p. 68). Ansari (2012) found that questions emerged on the
reliability of information emanating from social media networks during the 2009
Iranian presidential election protests, so perhaps similar considerations compelled
British and American journalists covering the 2011 Egyptian Revolution to rely on more
traditional sourcing methods.
Perhaps the relative significance of the number of times social media was not used
as a source within the British press versus the number of times that it was used within
the American press suggests that American newspapers were more likely to utilize
such platforms as a news source because of the geographic distance separating the
United States and Egypt. Given the financial costs of maintaining foreign bureaus
(Sambrook, 2011), it may be that social media (specifically Facebook & Twitter) acted
as a primary source of information (Archetti, 2011) for some of the journalists writing
for American newspapers.
The limitations of the current study also provide substantive and highly relevant
directions for future research. Questions surrounding the presence and usage of the
anti-Mubarak opposition, official political/governmental figures, and social media as
sources of information could have been answered through in-depth interviews with the
journalists who covered the protests and ethnographic newsroom research of the
publications examined within this paper. These approaches could have revealed
whether the favorable media representation of the anti-Mubarak opposition protesters,
and their dominance as a news source within British and American newspapers had
more to do with the political and cultural values of the United Kingdom and United
States, along with the role of the press within these Western, democratic nations, as
suggested by previous research. (Loughborough University, 2012).
In-depth interviews and ethnographic research could have also revealed whether
the journalists covering the protests “felt it necessary to abide by professional
standards of objectivity and present the perspectives of both the anti-Mubarak
opposition and the Mubarak government.” (Fitzgerald, 2016, p. 169). Additionally, this
study only examines the sourcing patterns within British and American newspaper
coverage of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, and does not examine whether those
patterns were similar to, or differed from the reporting of other regional protest
movements in Tunisia, Libya, and Syria, to name a few. Without a doubt, scholars
should go beyond examining print news coverage and include broadcast and digital
media outlets into future studies. Furthermore, such studies should contrast sourcing
patterns present within coverage from Western media outlets against the patterns
present within coverage by news organizations from the Middle East and North Africa
in order to provide a broader, more holistic picture of how the ‘Arab Spring’ protests
were covered across international news media.
Sourcing Patterns within British and American Newspaper Coverage of the 2011 Egyptian
Revolution: The Rise of Non-Elite Primary Definers
188
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117212 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
COMMUNICATION AND “THEATRALIZATION” OF THE
ITALIAN CRISIS IN THE DIALECTIC BETWEEN DARIO
FO, BEPPE GRILLO AND GIANROBERTO CASALEGGIO
ARMANDO ROTONDI
ABSTRACT
In the last 20 years, during berlusconismo period, a new form of politics and new reality of
the “MoVimento 5 Stelle”, created by Beppe Grillo and Gianroberto Casaleggio (1954-2016),
have risen in Italy, reaching an essential role after the 2013 election. Aim of this paper is to
show how, with Grillo’s activities, the teatro della politica has become a teatro della crisi in the
use of a theatrical language and contemporary dramatic expression. From a theatrical
perspective, Nobel laureate Dario Fo (1926-2016) has become a noble father of the movement.
Following Fo’s sample, Grillo, entertainer and activist, has theatralized the crisis with one-man
shows and theatre happenings, where the performance was essential. The dialectic between Fo
and the two founders of the movement is developed in the book Il Grillo canta sempre al
tramonto, constructed as a theatrical play where the chapters are similar to acts, the sub-
chapters to scenes.
Keywords: Italy, political communication, elections, Dario Fo, Beppe Grillo, Gianroberto
Casaleggio, MoVimento 5 Stelle, political crisis, theatre.
INTRODUCTION
In the last 20 years of Italian political history, political language has changed in a
fast and not a gradual way, due to two main reasons: first of all, the use of different
kinds of media, from the massive use of television since 1994 onwards with the
“discesa in campo” of Silvio Berlusconi, to the use of the Internet and of blogs in order
to create an alleged e-democracy; secondly, a change in the figure of the politician, no
longer a real professional of politics, or, more precisely, no more a politician whose
only profession is politics, but people who come from a different environment and for a
wide range of reasons, mainly of expediency, they enter the political arena.
Without dwelling on the “Berlusconian” use of television, even if not limited to
Berlusconi’s activity, my purpose is to focus specifically on the case of Beppe Grillo,
underlining a fundamental paradox in his way of doing politics: on the one hand, the
Full-Time Lecturer in “Performance History, Theory and Criticism” and “Story-Telling”, Coordinator of the
MA Programme in Acting, IAB – Institute of the Arts Barcelona, Spain, a.rotondi@iabarcelona.es
Communication and “Theatralization” of the Italian Crisis in the Dialectic Between Dario Fo,
Beppe Grillo and Gianroberto Casaleggio
194
use of new media, apparently used in innovative ways, such as blogs in order to
outline the guidelines of “MoVimento 5 Stelle” and to carry out an e-campaign for the
movement – for specific bibliography on “MoVimento 5 Stelle” see the reference list;
on the other hand, at the same time, a return, in the language used by Grillo, to a
dialectic that is purely theatrical. Examples of this are Grillo’s speeches during political
rallies, where he employs techniques of theatre monologues, in the tradition of one-
man shows, in a style more American than Italian. With some differences in location
and audience, this way of “acting” is similar to that of Lenny Bruce, who, among other
things, stated: “The truth is what is, not what it should be. What should be is a dirty
lie”. And then: “Satire is tragedy plus time. If you wait long enough, the audience and
the reviewers will help you to make satire of it. And it is rather ridiculous, if you think
about it” (see Cohen 1967, Bruce 1984, Thomas 1989, and Collins-Skover 2002).
These sentences by Lenny Bruce could be very well attributed also to Grillo. In his
relationship to theatre, politics and political communication, it is necessary first to
investigate Grillo’s possible precursors.
FO-GRILLO: a possible parallelism?
In the article Per una drammaturgia transmediale della crisi italiana ovvero perché i
clown vincono le elezioni (2013) which appeared in the monographic section of Culture
Teatrali 2013, under the overall title “Realtà della scena:
Giornalismo/Teatro/Informazione”, Oliviero Ponte di Pino analysed, in a pseudo-
profound way, the relationship between comedians, theatre and politics in Italy, from
Gabibbo in the TV program Striscia la notizia to Maurizio Crozza, focusing, obviously,
on the figure of Beppe Grillo. In particular, in one paragraph, he specifically identifies a
prototype of the Genoese comedian in Dario Fo, drawing a series of parallels between
them:
“I parallelismi tra le carriere di Grillo e Fo sono diversi, a cominciare dall’atto che
inaugura le loro “seconde vite”, quando entrambi godevano di una fama costruita
prima nei teatri e poi amplificata dalla televisione dove erano protagonisti di
trasmissioni di successo. [The parallels between the careers of Grillo and Fo are
several, starting with the event that launched their “second lives” when they both
enjoyed a fame constructed first in theatres and then enhanced by television, where
they were the protagonists of successful shows]”. (Ponte di Pino 2013: 56)
Ponte di Pino refers to Canzonissima, presented by the duo Dario Fo-Franca Rame
in 1962, and to Fantasico 7, in 1986, which resulted in Grillo's long exile from
television, but was also the prime reason for his emergence into the arena of political
activism. In the case of Fo-Rame: “All’improvviso i conduttori abbandonarono la
trasmissione per ‘divergenze artistiche e ideologiche’ con i dirigenti della Rai. La causa
del clamoroso dissidio fu uno sketch dove si parlava di infortuni mortali sul lavoro”.
[“Suddenly the presenters abandoned the show because of ‘ideological and artistic
disagreements’ with RAI managers. The cause of the dramatic disagreement was a
sketch where they spoke about work-related fatalities”]. (56)
Then referring to Beppe Grillo, he added: “In una barzelletta, ironizzava sul viaggio
in Cina della delegazione di socialisti italiani guidata da Bettino Craxi e Claudio Martelli:
con vari pretesti venne di fatto allontanato dai teleschermi per anni”. [“In a joke, he
satirized on the Chinese journey of the delegation of the Italian Socialist Party led by
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
195
Bettino Craxi and Claudio Martelli: with various pretexts, he was effectively removed
from TV screens for years”]. (56)
This exclusion from TV for both artists, in reality more for Grillo than for Fo in the
view of Ponte di Pino, has as a consequence led to their increased presence in
theatres, especially in the alternative circuits: Fo used to play in factories, case del
popolo (clubs linked to the PCI), cultural associations and occupied premises; Grillo
staged his shows in stadiums, piazzas and auditoriums. Ponte di Pino added: “Per
entrambi, l’esilio catodico si è rivelato una traversata del deserto prima della terra
promessa, una lunga marcia verso la trasfigurazione finale: per Dario Fo è stato il
Premio Nobel nel 1997, per Beppe Grillo è stato il trionfo elettorale del 2013”. [“For
both, the cathodic exile has been a journey through the desert before reaching the
promised land, a long march to the final transfiguration: for Dario Fo it was the Nobel
Prize in 1997, for Beppe Grillo it was the electoral triumph of 2013”]. (56)
In fact, although Fo has to be considered as a constant influence in Grillo’s political
career, as is evident in the participation of the Nobel Prize laureate in “MoVimento 5
Stelle” events and the writing of the book Il Grillo canta sempre al tramonto. Dialogo
sull’Italia e il MoVimento 5 Stelle (2013), he is not present in the same way in Grillo’s
career as a comedian, artist and theatre practitioner. Grillo’s prototypes have to be
found in other performing traditions, for instance the already mentioned Lenny Bruce’s
shows, and a typically American tradition of one-man shows, transformed by Grillo into
a loud-mouthed, no-holds-barred performance-harangue in the piazzas of Italy.
It is true that there was in Fo, after a period in late ’50s and early ’60s that could
be called “bourgeois” (although this is a term to be used cautiously), a clear ideological
awareness and overt criticism of the system through explicitly political theatre, but it is
also true that in Fo there is in addition a clear theatrical architecture and a plot,
although these elements became progressively thinner and eschewed the rules of
logic. In Fo, as pointed out on several occasions by Joseph Farrell, the shows ended
with a “third act”: “Dal ’68 e durante i primi anni ’70, il teatro di Fo era apertamente
un comizio, dove ogni recita finiva con un ‘terzo atto’, una discussione con il pubblico
sul significato della commedia e delle sue implicazioni per la loro vita”. [“From ’68 and
in the early ’70s, Fo’s theatre became openly a political rally, when each performance
ended with a ‘third act’, a discussion with the audience about the meaning of the play
and its implications for their lives”]. (Farrell 2015: 35. See also Farrell-Scudieri 2000,
Farrell 2001, and Farrell 2014)
The discussion in Fo took place at the end of the play and the use of the play to
serve as a “prologue” to the political rally establishes a gulf between Fo and Beppe
Grillo, in which speech and performance seem to be the same.
In reality there is a point of contact among them as regards one aspect not
sufficiently noted by critics, for example by Ponte di Pino. Farrell notices how Dario Fo
can be regarded as a political revolutionary and, at the same time, a theatrical
conservative. This definition is probably the one that, most of all, can link Fo and
Grillo. The latter is even more explicitly revolutionary and political, but has overall
remained conservative and loyal to himself in his communication and artistic practice,
even if he no more appears only in piazzas or auditoriums, but prefers to use the web
as a forum.
With Grillo, the result is a clear “theatralization” of politics and political
communication, a process that emerged as a point of contrast to the direct political
Communication and “Theatralization” of the Italian Crisis in the Dialectic Between Dario Fo,
Beppe Grillo and Gianroberto Casaleggio
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address which Berlusconi, with his control of TV, was able to develop for his own
purposes. On the figure of Silvio Berlusconi, Dario Fo wrote one of his most significant
play of the last decade, L’anomalo bicefalo (2004), a text of satire and political
counter-information.
Il Grillo canta sempre al tramonto by Fo, Grillo, and Casaleggio: the
theatrical dialectic of the crisis.
From a general point of view, and not only in Fo and Grillo, the relationship
between theatre and politics has always been very close, as highlighted by Ida Libera
Valicenti:
“[…] l’equazione politica-teatro, ovvero la natura drammaturgica della politica, fa
parte della sua stessa storia. La rappresentanza richiama, inevitabilmente, la
rappresentazione e la concreta messa in scena della volontà popolare da parte dei suoi
rappresentanti. Le aule parlamentari e lo stesso spazio pubblico mediatizzato
divengono luoghi di messa in scena della politica. Da sempre, coloro che governano
ricorrono alla teatralità. La teatralità è uno degli strumenti per comunicare e, dunque,
per fondare la propria legittimità e per segnalare la propria distanza dai governati,
tanto nelle monarchie, quanto nelle democrazie moderne. [...the equation of politics-
theatre, or the dramatic nature of the politics, is part of the history of both. Political
representation recalls, inevitably, theatrical performance and the actual staging of the
popular will by its representatives. The halls of Parliament and the media-friendly
public spaces become sites of political productions. It has always been the case that
those who govern have recourse to theatricality. Theatricality is one of the instruments
to communicate and, therefore, to establish its own legitimacy and to mark out its
distance from the governed, both in monarchies and in modern democracies].” (2014:
8)
In this perspective, it is surprising how Oliviero Ponte di Pino, although focusing on
the relationship between Dario Fo and Beppe Grillo, mentions only briefly Il Grillo canta
sempre al tramonto, written in dialogue form by the two actors with Gianroberto
Casaleggio, and even at that he considers it a mere electoral book. (Ponte di Pino
2013: 82)
The book does include some elements that bring out clearly the idea of the
dramatization and “theatralization” of the Italian political crisis not only in the choice of
themes for discussion and the way these themes are addressed, but also in the
structure of the book, an element that should not be underestimated.
I will start with this latter aspect. Il Grillo canta sempre al tramonto is written as a
dialogue involving three main “characters”. Dario Fo, who is also author of the
“Prologo” (not an introduction, but a real prologue, using in this case a common
theatrical term), leads the dialogue and sets the tone for the entire volume. He
establishes the subject for the speeches and dialogues, and he divides the book into
chapters and then sections: “Censure e pregiudizi. Dalla Grecia antica alla rete”
(“Censure and prejudices. From ancient Greece to the network”); “L’invenzione delle
parlamentarie” (“The invention of parliamentary primaries”), “I problemi sociali:
carcere e immigrazione” (“Social problems: immigration and prison”), “E qui comincia
la rivoluzione” (“And here begins the revolution”), “La democrazia diretta” (“Direct
democracy”), “La cultura in piazza” (“Culture in the piazza”), “Nella rete del
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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MoVimento” (“In the network of the MoVimento”), “Cambio di prospettiva per fermare
la crisi” (“Change of perspective to stop the crisis”), “Tappa finale” (“Final stage”). In
addition, there is a conclusion, not in form of a dialogue, entitled “Qui ad Atene noi
facciamo così” (“Here in Athens we act in this way”).
Beyond the issues discussed by the authors, indicated by the title of the different
chapters, the construction of the dialogue has an architecture that is almost dramatic
and performative, due primarily to the idea of movement: the three authors/characters
are travelling through Greece, taking as a pretext the trip described by Lucian of
Samosata – Lucian was also subject of Fo’s monologue Fabulazzo osceno (1982) –,
with the intention of creating a metaphor for a long journey and for the madness of
the Italian political condition, as stated by Dario Fo in his prologue.
The chapters are not similar to the acts of theatre play (there would be nine, too
many when compared to the standard two or three act format), but rather to tableaux
in the theatrical sense of the term, with as many scenes as the number of paragraphs
that compose each chapter.
This theatricality of the text emerges from two other elements. The first is the
presence in the dialogue of “lines” that give an idea of dramatic action as well as stage
directions or other kinds of instructions. One example:
GC Prima si parlava dell’uso delle parole, di come i nuovi concetti passino attraverso
un linguaggio diverso. Noi abbiamo cercato di ridefinire il linguaggio politico. Ci hanno
accusato di aver utilizzato appellativi offensivi per definire i nostri politici. Noi
applichiamo la corruzione sarcastica delle parole alla politica incrociando volutamente
campi espressivi diversi.
DF (indicando davanti a sé, al lato di un grande bosco) Oddio, dove siamo qua?
D’accordo che sono tanti anni che non vengo nel Peloponneso, ma quell’enorme teatro
non me lo ricordavo.
GC Accidenti, è davvero grande, con quella cascata di scalinate così ripide:
dev’essere Epidauro.
DF No, Epidauro è almeno a 100 chilometri da qui. Forse è Astanasos, un teatro del
IV secolo restaurato dai Romani.
BG Ci stanno lavorando ancora, guarda quei camion che entrano nell’emiciclo.
DF Ma cosa trasportano?
BG Immondizia, rifiuti…
GC Eh già, stanno trasformando un teatro in una discarica.
[GC Before we were talking of the use of words, how new concepts are conveyed
by a different language. We have tried to redefine the political language. We were
accused of using offensive nicknames to define our politicians. We apply the sarcastic
corruption of words to politics, deliberately mixing different kinds of expression.
DF (pointing straight ahead, to the side of a large wood) Oh God, where are we? I
agree I haven't been in Peloponnese for ages, but I did not remember that huge
theatre.
GC Oh, it really is huge, with that cascade of steep steps: it must be Epidaurus.
DF No, Epidaurus is at least 100 kilometres far from here. Maybe it is Astanasos, a
theatre of the IV century restored by the Romans.
BG It must be still a work in progress, look at those trucks going into the hemicycle.
DF What are they carrying?
Communication and “Theatralization” of the Italian Crisis in the Dialectic Between Dario Fo,
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198
BG Garbage, waste ...
GC Yeah, they are transforming the theatre into a landfill].
(Fo-Casaleggio-Grillo 2013:11)
The excerpt, almost at the beginning of the book, gives an idea of the key elements
of the dialogue between the three characters, and of the constant presence of a
theatrical element in their speeches and discussions. At a deep level, there is some
sort of juxtaposition of purpose and horizon. Fo frequently switches the focus to
theatre authors and subjects, from Greek drama to Ruzzante and to his own plays (he
specifically mentions Lo Santo Jullàre Francesco, 1999), as though to emphasize the
crucial role that theatre has played in the cultural evolution of mankind and in the
critique of society, as carried out by the “giullare”.
Grillo and Casaleggio, respectively frontman and theoretical leader of the
“MoVimento 5 Stelle”, focus instead on the political issues addressed by the
movement, as well as on the new media and new ways of communication used by
them.
The three characters start a real game (or play), a tug of war in which everyone
tries from time to time to bring the interlocutor in his own area: the theatre for Fo;
politics and communication for Grillo and Casaleggio.
Different cultural prototypes are referred to: Pericles, Eratosthenes, Leonardo,
Ruzante for Fo; Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams, authors of Wikinomics: How
Mass Collboration Changes Everything (2008), or Karl Polanyi of the classical The Great
Transformation 1944, recent edition 2001) for Grillo and Casaleggio.
Stage directions or captions are scattered throughout the volume, for instance:
(In quel momento il cielo ellenico è solcato da un jet luminoso).
BG Ah, ci mancava un caccia della Nato! Le nostre splendide ali di protezione.
[(At that time a jet crossess the Greek sky).
BG All we needed was a NATO fighter! Our magnificent wings of protection].
(Fo-Casaleggio-Grillo 2013: 19)
And then:
(Altri jet sfrecciano in senso opposto e più in basso un gruppo di elicotteri si alza in
volo).
BG Oh, che bel traffico!
GC Beppe, questi ce l’hanno tutti con te, ti hanno inquadrato coi radar.
BG (saltellando qua e là fra le piante che delineano la strada) Fate come me.
L’unico modo per uscire dal loro controllo è portarsi sotto le piante. Ecco, hai visto? Se
ne vanno, ci hanno perso di vista.
DF Ma a nostra volta abbiano perduto anche il filo del discorso. Di che si parlava?
GC Dei Greci! Il loro esempio, da Pericle in avanti, può essere letto con riferimento
alla rete.
[(Other jets whiz in the opposite direction and further down a group of helicopters
lifts off).
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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BG Oh, what lovely traffic!
GC Beppe, they’re after you, they've got you on their radar.
BG (hopping here and there among the trees plats that line the street) Do the same
as me. The only way to escape their control is to hide under the plants. There, you
see? They’re away. They’ve lost sight of us.
DF But we also have lost the thread of our conversation. What were we talking
about?
GC About the Greeks! Their example, from Pericles forward, can be read with
reference to the network].
(Fo-Casaleggio-Grillo 2013: 11)
The second clearly theatrical element is, instead, the introduction of some
secondary characters. An example is the man with the container (“l’uomo della tanica
– UT”), who joins the protagonists Dario Fo (DF), Beppe Grillo (BG) and Gianroberto
Casaleggio (GC), in the paragraph/scene “La storia falsificata di Ipazia” (“The falsified
story of Hypatia”) at the end of the chapter/tableau “L'invenzione delle parlamentarie”
(“The invention of the parliamentary primaries”):
La storia falsificata di Ipazia
BG Scusate, ma lì c’è una fonte, fatemi bere un attimo.
GC Questa è una buona idea, anch’io ho bisogno di bere.
DF E io mi metto in coda.
(Davanti alla fonte un uomo sta riempiendo una tanica d’acqua. Come ci vede
arrivare fa cenno di accomodarci. Beppe ringrazia. “molto gentile”, e si curva sul getto
d’acqua per dissetarsi).
GC (indicando la stele che incornicia la fonte) Guardate un po’ qua, c’è una dedica
sulla trabeazione. Purtroppo è in greco.
DF Ma tu non lo conosci il greco, così colto che sei?
GC Qualcosa, ma questo è greco moderno, chi ne capisce…
(Si avvicina l’uomo della tanica [UT]).
UT Io lo conosco il greco!
DF Oh, un italiano!
UT No, io sono greco, però ho vissuto quindici anni in Italia. Ho lavorato in un
sacco di città del Veneto e della Lombardia. Ecco, qui c’è scritto, ve lo traduco
direttamente in italiano, “Ipazia, la tua vita è stata chiara e onesta come quest’acqua.
Fa’ che chi viene a dissetarsi alla tua fonte impari dal tuo sacrificio il significato di
libertà”.
DF Bello! Ipazia? Vuoi vedere che si riferisce alla famosa scienziata greca di qualche
secolo dopo Cristo?
UT Sì, è lei.
BG Venne massacrata da cristiani di un movimento fanatico.
UT Ho visto uno spettacolo che hanno messo in scena laggiù ad Astanasos. L’attrice
che interpretava la martire era giovane e bellissima. Ipazia era una maestra di non so
cosa.
GC Sì, era una filosofa, rappresentante del pensiero neoplatonico pagano. Ci hanno
fatto perfino un film ultimamente, brutto, pieno di effetti melodrammatici. E hanno
pure falsificato la sua storia.
Communication and “Theatralization” of the Italian Crisis in the Dialectic Between Dario Fo,
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200
[…]
UT Scusate, purtroppo ho dei clienti che aspettano l’acqua fresca.
BG Clienti?
UT Sì, gestisco un’osteria laggiù. Se prima di proseguire nella vostra passeggiata
scendete a farmi visita per me sarà un piacere.
BG, GC, DF (in coro) Senz’altro, grazie.
[…]
(Così discutendo i tre si incamminano verso l’osteria. Entrano, ordinano qualcosa da
mangiare e continuano nel loro dialogo).
[The falsified history of Hypatia]
BG Sorry, but there's a fountain, give me a moment to get a drink.
GC Good idea. I need a drink too.
DF And I'll join the queue.
(In front of the fountain, a man is filling a container with water. When he sees us
arriving, he nods asking us to sit down. Beppe thanks him, with a “very kind”, and
bends over the fountain to quench his thirst).
GC (pointing the structure that frames the fountain) Look here, there is an
inscription on the entablature. Unfortunately, it is in Greek.
DF Don’t you know Greek. And you're supposed to be so cultured!
GC A bit, but this is modern Greek. Who knows that? ...
(The man with the container – UT – approaches).
UT I know Greek!
DF Oh, an Italian!
UT No, I'm Greek, but I have lived in Italy for fifteen years. I’ve worked in a lot of
cities in Veneto and Lombardy. Here, it says, I will translate directly into Italian,
“Hypatia, your life has been clear and honest like this water. May those who come
here to drink at your fountain learn from your sacrifice the meaning of freedom”.
DF Beautiful! Hypatia? Maybe it refers to the famous Greek scientist who lived a
few centuries after Christ?
UT Yes, it’s her.
BG She was massacred by Christians of some fanatical movement.
UT I saw a show staged there in Astanasos. The actress who played the martyr was
young and beautiful. Hypatia was a teacher, but I don't remember of what.
GC Yes, she was a philosopher, a representative of pagan neo-Platonic thought.
Recently, they even made a movie, ugly, full of melodramatic effects. And they also
falsified her story.
[...]
UT Sorry, unfortunately I have customers waiting for the fresh water.
BG Customers?
UT Yes, I run an inn there. If, before continuing your walk, you will come and visit
me, for me it will be a pleasure.
BG, GC, DF (chorus) No doubt, thank you.
[...]
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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(Continuing their discussion, the three walk towards the inn. They enter, order
something to eat and continue their dialogue)].
(Fo-Grillo-Casaleggio 2013: 40-43)
The quoted passage is of particular interest for understanding the theatrical
practice of the dialogues between Fo, Grillo and Casaleggio. There are some elements
that are clearly dramatic: the “coup de théâtre” of the Greek who speaks Italian, thus
allowing the dramatic action to continue, and the final stage direction. In this
perspective, it should be noted that the “La storia fasificata di Ipazia” is the last
paragraph/scene of the chapter/tableau “L’invenzione delle parlamentarie” and this
dialogue facilitates the entrance into the next chapter/tableau and the raising of other
issues.
CONCLUSION
The dramatization of the political crisis, triggered by Grillo through his speech-
performances in public rallies, such as “V-Day” or the “Tsunami Tour”, finds in Il Grillo
canta sempre al tramonto its most complete form. Grillo’s political rallies become,
thanks to the architecture given by Dario Fo and the dialogues with Gianroberto
Casaleggio, a real theatrical script.
In this sense, it is evident that the revolution advocated by the “MoVimento 5
Stelle” is given added strength by the use of a traditional theatrical style that
characterizes the dialectic between the three, who can be considered not only as
authors but also as characters of the text. The result is one of the most structured
versions of the identification between politics and the theatre of politics.
Communication and “Theatralization” of the Italian Crisis in the Dialectic Between Dario Fo,
Beppe Grillo and Gianroberto Casaleggio
202
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Rise of an American Icon. Naperville: Sourcebooks.
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autorizzata del comico che ha fatto tremare la casta. Reggio Emilia: Aliberti.
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Journal of Media Critiques [JMC]
doi: 10.17349/jmc117213 P-ISSN: 2056-9785 E-ISSN: 2056 9793
http://www.mediacritiques.net jmc@mediacritiques.net
DANIELLE KNAFO and ROCCO LO BOSCO: THE AGE
OF PERVERSION: DESIRE and TECHNOLOGY in
PSYCHOANALYSIS and CULTURE. LONDON:
ROUTLEDGE, 2017
Reviewed By
JACOB JOHANSSEN
INTRODUCTION
When it comes to the term “perversion” it may be considered a distinct
psychoanalytic concept which has fully penetrated everyday language, similarly to
words such as “Freudian slip”, “repression” or “the unconscious”. Commonly used, the
term perversion is often thought to denote sexual deviance or sexualised practices that
venture beyond the norms of a society. Perversion has often been linked to sexual
practices and some may have been labelled as “perverse” in the past but have been
rendered “normal” or struck off the list of perversions over time (e.g. homosexuality).
Danielle Knafo and Rocco Lo Bosco’s book The Age of Perversion: Desire and
Technology in Psychoanalysis and Culture (2017) is a rigorous and immersive effort to
define and develop perversion in the clinical sense and to analytically relate it to a
range of phenomena (such as dolls, online communication, surveillance or
organizational structures), technology and contemporary digital media. The book may
be situated within an emerging area, which I call psychoanalytic media studies, that
makes use of psychoanalytic concepts and methods for thinking about digital media
and how they affect subjectivities and societies today (Dean 2010; Krzych 2010; Turkle
2012; Rambatan and Johanssen 2013; Bainbridge and Yates 2014; Balick 2014; Singh
2014; Johanssen and Krüger 2016). The authors begin their book by offering an
overview of perversion today and how it relates to social matters that go beyond
individual psychopathology or mental health. They define perversion as a movement
on a “crooked path” (Knafo and Lo Bosco 2017: 2) that navigates away from the norm
and what is considered normal. Perversion is a slippery term to define and one may
speak of perverse tendencies in a subject, or in a relationship, which may not quite be
the same as perversion per se. It is always located somewhere on a wide spectrum.
Perversion may be impossible to define properly. The book does not offer a clear
definition of what the term exactly means. This is one of its strengths. The term is not
Jacob Johanssen, University of Westminster, Communication and Media Research Institute (CAMRI),
Westminster School of Media Art & Design, Harrow Campus, Watford Road, Northwick Park Middlesex HA1
3TP
Danielle Knafo And Rocco Lo Bosco: The Age of Perversion: Desire and Technology in
Psychoanalysis and Culture
206
closed down but instead used to cover a range of phenomena that are messy,
excessive and slippery themselves.
The fundamental argument in the book is that technology, information and
communication technology in particular, and its rapid growth have facilitated a culture
of perversion. To that end, Knafo and Lo Bosco diagnose that contemporary societies
are structured by a dehumanization of people and a humanization of objects at the
same time. In part, this constitutes perverse tendencies. Digital technology (and
examples like online dating, hook-up apps, sexting, MMORPGs, dolls or robots) has
profound effects on social and cultural dimensions of our lives today. The authors
identify both technology and perversion as transgressive forces that seek to move
beyond limits and existing frameworks. Through specific case studies, the book sets
out to explore how. Following an introduction to the concept of perversion and how it
has been variously, and differently, conceptualised within psychoanalytic thinking
beginning with Freud, the authors move one to discuss specific case studies. When it
comes to sexual perversion, psychoanalysis more generally regards perversion as an
acting out of sexual fantasies. They are lived out in specific scenarios. Post-Freudians
in particular identified an element of hostility and a disavowal of reality in perversion.
Particularly the object-relations tradition regards perversion as occurring in
relationships. Those with perversions treat the other in a relationship as an object that
they fill with hatred, cruelty and humiliation (Bach 1994; Stein 2005). A perverse
relationship is a semblance of recognition and care while those attributes are in reality
betrayed. “Perversion as a mode of relatedness points to relations of seduction,
domination, psychic bribery and guileful uses of ‘innocence,’ all in the service of
exploiting the other” (Stein 2005: 780-781). What psychoanalysts emphasise is that a
relationship that is structured by dynamics of perversion constitutes the creation of a
singular world that shuts out reality and external influences. New rules for and in the
relationship are created. Perversion is thus always an attempt to ignore, subvert or
actively go against the law (Lacan 1994). The pervert’s object – whether it be a real
person or an object - is (ab)used and manipulated while at the same time being
idealized and cherished (Khan 1979; Celenza 2014). While perversion may feature a
specific fetish, this may not always be the case. The authors discuss that perversion is
often gendered and that it appears that mainly men suffer from perverse tendencies
rather than women. Perversion is an act of mastery which denies human fragility,
dependency on others, and ultimately death (Ogden 1996; McDougal 1972, 1995).
While perversion, in its more common usage, entails a negative judgment, the book
also highlights the potentially positive aspects of perversion. It is a form of creativity,
transgression and a crossing of boundaries that may be liberating (Chasseguet-
Smirguel 1984). Perverse tendencies, such as specific fetishes, may also be an
(unconscious) way of working through trauma and a means to live with it.
The authors identify six characteristics that unite different psychoanalytic
discussions of perversion. Perversion is universal; it functions across a spectrum of
varying degrees; it may relate to trauma and loss which is disavowed and masked
through perversion; it may feature sado-masochistic dynamics in relationships; it
features experiences of excitement, mastery and illusion; and it is expressed differently
by men and women (Knafo and Lo Bosco 2017: 52-54).
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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Chapters 2 details a case study based on one of Danielle Knafo’s patients. Knafo,
who is also a practising psychoanalyst, discusses her patient’s relationship with a life-
like, human-size sex doll: the RealDoll. Her patient is described with great empathy
and understanding. His use of the doll is not (only) rendered pathological but also
explored as a way of helping him with feelings of loneliness and experience of trauma.
Nonetheless, real human relationships can of course not be replaced with dolls. While
this chapter details a case study of a patient who felt a sense of unease in being with
the doll and eventually let go of her, Chapter 3 discusses Davecat, who lives with three
dolls. He has been widely covered in the media e.g. on TLC’s My Strange Addiction
(Johanssen 2012) and maintains active Twitter profiles of himself and his dolls. For
Davecate, the dolls he lives with have become real because he treats them as human
beings with distinct character traits and life histories. Similarly to the previous chapter,
the authors spend some time discussing Davecat’s life history and how he became a
collector of RealDolls. “Davecat’s world is one that transcends law and embodies the
wish that things could be different from the way they are.” (Knafo and Lo Bosco 2017:
89). The chapter details a fascinating account of how Davecat both makes sense of his
dolls and narrates their life histories and functions for him and themselves. He is fully
aware that they are dolls, yet speaks about them as if they are humans. Knafo and Lo
Bosco approach Davecat with warmth, empathy and curiosity. They nonetheless take
the phenomenon of the life-like doll as perversion and a cultural symptom of how
sexuality is becoming intertwined with technology on a wider level whereby a
“disavowal of the human” (82) is taking place. Chapter 4 similarly covers women who
collect life-like baby dolls (mostly known as Reborn dolls), who, not unlike the RealDoll
community, sell their dolls online and interact with each other in online discussion
forums. The collecting of baby dolls often serves as an (unconscious) means to cope
with experiences of trauma.
The book then shifts from exploring perversion as a subjective, pathological state to
explore perversion as a socio-cultural phenomenon in the next three chapters. The
second half of Chapter 4 explores examples of perversion in different settings (such as
corporate greed and corruption or the collusion of APA members with the US
government in drafting torture guidelines to be used against terrorist suspects). The
authors argue that capitalism itself manifests a perverse structure in which
exploitation, workplace bullying, greed and profit maximization at all costs are
championed in corporate cultures (see also Long 2008). In other words, the treatment
of workers in contemporary capitalism signifies a “disavowal of vulnerability, pleasure
in harm, soaking in excess, boundary violations, fixity, casting illusions, means– end
reversal, dehumanization” (Knafo and Lo Bosco 2017: 174).
Chapter 6 of the book is entitled Technology and its discontents: The dark side of
cyberworld. In it Knafo and Lo Bosco explore “the underbelly of the Internet” (183). To
begin with, they focus on the “deep web”, realms of the Internet that are not indexed
by Google and are more difficult to access but can be found through software such as
Tor. They are often used for illegal or outlawed activities in order to go unnoticed by
law enforcement agencies. The book highlights the split off, dark aspects of the
Internet (selling of weapons, recruitment of terrorists, illegal pornography, selling of
drugs, etc.) but does not mention that Tor is also used for activist purposes in order to
bypass censorship in totalitarian countries for example. While such examples may
convincingly reflect perverse structures within the Internet, the discussion is too one-
Danielle Knafo And Rocco Lo Bosco: The Age of Perversion: Desire and Technology in
Psychoanalysis and Culture
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sided here. It fails to highlight other usage of Tor for example. The authors then move
on to addiction to Internet pornography and illustrate their discussion with vignettes
from clinical cases which vividly highlight pathological (ab)uses of the online sphere.
The chapter also includes a discussion of the creation of fake profiles on social media
that are used to create identities which do not really exist in order to convey a
particular impression to others for the sake of false romances, cyberbullying or fraud.
“Yet the question remains as to whether people’s online selves express a self-state or
something different and separate from the self.” (203). At this point, it may have been
useful for the authors to engage with the work of Aaron Balick, who has explored this
question in his book (Balick 2014) in some length and heads down a slightly different
route from Knafo and Lo Bosco. For Balick, we do not live in an age where online
communication is characterised by narcissism and fake profiles.
Chapter 7 further explores the social side of perversion by relating it to George
Orwell’s novel 1984. The book has lost nothing of its significance given the mass
surveillance practices in the Western world revealed by Edward Snowden. Their
essential re-telling of the novel is a little lengthy and could have been shortened, for it
is very clear that the book serves as a perfect example to illustrate perverse structures
of ubiquitous surveillance. The authors brilliantly tease out the book’s themes and how
they show perversion at work and relate them to totalitarian states (such as Nazi
Germany). The chapter could have engaged more fully with the surveillance of spy
agencies and corporate bodies that has come to define contemporary societies.
Towards the end of it, the authors discuss that since 9/11 the US and allied forces
have been engaged in a war which is seemingly without end and have also intensified
surveillance activity of citizens across the world as well as security measures. All of this
has been accompanied by a sophisticated surveillance regime by the NSA. “While
heads of state talk of endless war without raising an eyebrow, throngs of citizens wait
in line for hours for the latest version of the iPhone. How much this phenomenon is
resulting from a subterranean government agenda or an unfortunate confluence of
events is open to debate.” (232). What is not mentioned in that sentence is that there
have also been wide-ranging protest movements in response to the endless wars and
privacy invasions. The discussion of the more recent 1984ization of the Western world
comes across as too hasty and leaves little space for resistance, protest or subversion.
It also would have been interesting if the authors had focussed on some of the aspects
in more detail and e.g. analysed NSA surveillance and its official response narratives by
politicians and NSA members in more detail through the prism of perversion.
The final chapter wraps up the book and further illuminates our age of perversion
us exemplified by a whirlwind of phenomena that have become mainstream: sado-
masochistic fashion and popular culture; reality television and ritualised shaming;
celebrity culture. Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror is taken as a telling description of
techno-perversion today and how it might evolve in the future. The chapter then
moves on to discuss advances in robotics towards posthumanity and there is a sense
of scepticism found between the lines as to whether robots who are capable of
expressing emotions and engage in conversation for example are benefitting humanity.
The book presents a rigorous, complex, vivid and engaging effort to demonstrate
the applicability of a clinical, psychoanalytic concept – perversion – for analysing
individual and social realms within contemporary societies. It is this psychosocial
Journal of Media Critiques [JMC] – Vol.3 No.10 2017
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combination that brings together detailed case studies from Knafo’s consulting room
with wider structural questions that make the book such a fascinating read. It is the
analytical clarity with which perversion is applied as a lens to look at both subjects as
well as objects and their increasing entanglements that makes the book a highly
relevant one. The book also serves as a detailed introduction to psychoanalytic
concepts but can equally be appreciated by readers who are familiar with
psychoanalytic terminology. It is therefore highly recommended to both media and
communication scholars, as well as psychoanalysts alike. The book is very well-written
and, importantly, does not pathologize the many patients whose case histories are
explored but approaches them with empathy, warmth and understanding. However, it
is open to debate to what extent the examples drawn on constitute niche phenomena
that are followed by minorities and are artificially heightened by the media. They may
therefore appear to be mass phenomena. Do we therefore really live in an age of
perversion? Or are there rather perverse tendencies at work in different spheres and to
varying degrees? The authors define perversion as a spectrum and subsume a variety
of different phenomena under it, but such phenomena are always situated within other
psychic structures both subjectively and socio-culturally that may compete with or
negate them at the same time. What is then the relationship between perverse
tendencies and other forces that complement them, or are in opposition to them?
Sometimes the Knafo and Lo Bosco make rather sweeping statements and sound a
little too negative and deterministic about technology. For example, the authors state
that: “Connectivity replaces communion, chat rooms replace community, texting
replaces talking, tweeting replaces meaning, and virtual worlds replace reality.” (23). It
may be a little more nuanced than that. It also seems that the authors sometimes
could not help themselves and engaged in predictions about the future, while, as they
themselves do acknowledge throughout the book, it is entirely uncertain how the
future will look like with regards to our use of and becoming of objects, media and
machines. This may be exemplified by the following quotes: “Furthermore, I believe
both genders will participate in this new sexual revolution, especially at the point at
which robots that closely resemble human beings enter mainstream life.” (108) or “We
predict that laws will prohibit humans from driving in the future due to this
technological advantage [of self-driving cars].” (149). Apart from this point, The Age of
Perversion is an important book which illuminatingly demonstrates the power of
psychoanalysis for thinking about issues of subjects / objects in and beyond the
consulting room today.
Danielle Knafo And Rocco Lo Bosco: The Age of Perversion: Desire and Technology in
Psychoanalysis and Culture
210
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