Jelle Mast

Ticket to the Tribes: culture shock and the ‘exotic’ in intercultural reality television

In the past decade, there has been an abundance of representations of the cultural Other or the ‘exotic’ in popular factual television, often in the form of an arranged intercultural encounter. The present article elaborates a case study of a particularly meaningful instance of such highly debated ‘intercultural reality programmes’: the format Ticket to the Tribes, which has ‘ordinary’ Flemish families immerse themselves in the culture and lifestyle of so-called ‘primitive’ tribes. Based on an interpretive formal-thematic analysis of three seasons of Ticket to the Tribes and in-depth interviews with a senior production member and two Flemish participants of the programme, we argue that Ticket to the Tribes is premised on the concept of culture shock, and that this informs the exoticization and exoticism the programme radiates. We conclude that the relationship between culture shock, exoticization and exoticism explains intercultural reality television’s proliferation as a contemporary vehicle for exoticist representations.

When News Media Turn To Citizen-Generated Images of War

This study takes the context of the Syrian war and media blackout as a pertinent case to investigate issues of transparency and graphicness when mainstream news media incorporate citizen-generated images. More specifically, we investigate (1) relative proportions of citizen and professional images used by news media through time; (2) source references, and indications of the non-professional origin of images; and (3) topic and explicitness of the depictions provided by citizens versus professionals. In order to do so, we conducted a systematic-quantifying content analysis of the visual coverage of the Syrian war in three Flemish mainstream news media between March 2011 and December 2012 (N = 768). Citizen-generated images prove to be an invaluable source for traditional news media exceeding the urgency of the initial period. Moreover, it seems that professional and citizen imagery fulfill a complementary role in representing different visual framings of (the Syrian) war. Yet the study also confirms non-professional imagery to be more graphic, and news media to be lacking in transparency.

Hybridity and the news: Blending genres and interaction patterns in new forms of journalism:

This paper introduces the Special Issue’s central theme of ‘hybridity and the news’, defining the scope and setting the scene for the multiple issues and debates covered by the individual contributions in this collection. Opposing both relativist positions that discard hybridity as an analytically useless concept, and preconceived notions that construe hybridity as intrinsically negative or positive, it is argued to move beyond binary thinking and to approach hybridity as a particularly rich site for the analysis of forms and processes of experimentation, innovation, deviation and transition in contemporary journalism. In order to profoundly understand these developments, which come in many forms, manifest themselves on different levels, and serve multiple purposes, a comprehensive, multi- and interdisciplinary perspective is needed. The Special Issue aims to contribute to this research agenda by looking closely into blending categories and interaction patterns in journalistic forms, genres, and practices, encompassing theoretical frameworks and methodological approaches from various disciplinary backgrounds including political and communication sciences, sociology, linguistics, cultural studies, and history. While taking different angles on the subject and being variously located on the macro and micro levels of analysis, the articles assembled here all engage in a careful assessment of ‘hybridity and the news’ through profound conceptualizations and empirical analyses, connecting with and shedding new light on long-standing debates about the nature and meaning of journalism.

Framing Climate Change: A Multi-level Model

Much framing research has focused on climate change, the threat of the 21st century. Drawing on theoretical conceptualizations, however, the authors argue that these empirical studies largely fail to provide more thorough insights: They use frame as a ‘catch-all term’ or do not account for the hegemonic nature of framing. Therefore, attempting to add more depth and breadth to the research on climate change framing, the authors have analyzed three mainstream and two alternative news outlets in northern Belgium. This paper will discuss the five detected frames and their respective ideologically coloured ‘subframes’ in detail, providing comprehensive frame matrices. Of particular interest are the similarities and differences among the subframes, for example, regarding the views on mitigative/adaptive action. These stem from the overarching Anthropocentric and Biocentric Masterframes. Most importantly, this research is one of the first to integrate framing and hegemony research, while also making tangible the deconstruction-reconstruction frames of Brulle (2010).

Constructive journalism: Concepts, practices, and discourses

Constructive journalism as a (news) philosophy and practice is gaining ground around the globe as both new journalistic ventures and legacy news media variously experiment with so-called ‘constructive’ approaches, and specialized (nonprofit) organizations and training programs have been established. While scholarly interest in the subject has steadily grown accordingly, constructive journalism as a research field in its own right is arguably still in need of further development. Therefore, we set out to explore, advance, and shape a research agenda, and to build a theoretical and empirical foundation for constructive journalism, providing a 360° view by bringing together an international body of scholarship approaching the topic and the issues raised through different disciplinary, conceptual, and methodological lenses. As such, we aim, first, to contribute to the conceptual development of constructive journalism by refining its roots in positive psychology and carefully delineating its position along related and divergent types of journalism, identifying its core values and principles, the lineages and digressions. Second, we seek to advance theory building in this nascent research domain based on empirical data and insights variously derived from quantitative and qualitative methodological approaches exploring, describing, and testing through large-scale or in-depth analyses, how constructive journalism can be interpreted and put in practice, how it materializes and with what effect. In doing so, we adopt an overall stance of ‘critical appreciation’ toward the subject, engaging in foundational thinking while not shying away from an assessment of the potential and effective critique or controversy stirred by this proliferating ‘alternative’ branch of journalism.

Reversed positionality, reversed reality? The multimodal Environmental Justice frame in mainstream and alternative media:

Environmental injustice, the unequal distribution of benefits and burdens, is key to understanding climate change. Yet, mainstream media are criticized for only reproducing anthropocentrism when discussing the concern, while this ideology causes socio-environmental problems. Current research is preoccupied with the verbal mode, while visual and verbal modes always work in tandem. This prevents a full understanding of the problems. Also, most studies overlook the alternative media, which may counterbalance the dominant perspective. We have therefore carried out a multimodal framing analysis of a corpus of mainstream and alternative articles published in Belgium. The identified subframes, ‘Unequal Vulnerability’ and ‘Unequal Attribution’, show a remarkable reversal of roles and responsibilities. Yet, the counter-hegemonic subframe is still struggling to find a salient multimodal language to depict complex views. Further development is necessary. We hope that this study incites other research on multimodal framing in general and environmental justice in particular.

Working Mechanically or Organically?: Climate change journalist and news frames in mainstream and alternative media

Climate change frames in the media affect the political and public debate. However, focusing on the frames in texts, most framing research overlooks the factors which influence frame-building by reporters. However, this is crucial for a fuller understanding of the potential implications and meanings of frames. Besides, the existing frame-building research is exclusively engaged with mainstream media. Also, visual frame-building is under-researched. Therefore, we have conducted interviews with 26 climate journalists, photo editors, chiefs and opinion-makers, working for three mainstream and two progressive alternative outlets in northern Belgium. The findings were combined with the outcome of a deductive framing analysis of 114 climate articles. The results show a strong overlap among journalist frames and news frames. Anthropocentric Subframes prevail in the mainstream news articles and among the reporters. A mixture of Biocentric and Anthropocentric Subframes was found in the context of the alternative outlets. We explain this by presenting the studied mainstream newsrooms as machines and the (progressive) alternative newsrooms as organisms. We conclude that the mainstream journalists are guided towards Anthropocentric Subframes by various (internalised) pressures. The practices in the alternative media liberate reporters to introduce a broader variety of frames.

Negotiating the ‘real’ in ‘reality shows’: production side discourses between deconstruction and reconstruction

In this study, we set out to elaborate configurations of the ‘real’ and ‘authentic’ in the discourses of program makers and participants of ‘reality shows’. This production side perspective has more often been the object, rather than the subject, in the debate. We develop our argument through a theoretically informed discussion at the intersection of cultural and documentary studies. Our analysis proceeds through a thematic content analysis of 39 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 14 television professionals and 25 participants involved in the production of formats belonging to various subgenres, all with a border-crossing circulation. The analysis demonstrates that when gauging ‘the real’ in ‘reality shows’, participants and program makers do not subscribe to a ‘naïve realistic’ celebration, as the ‘reality TV’ denominator may suggest, yet, nonetheless still strongly invest in a sense of the ‘real’ or ‘authentic’. As such, they engage in a sophisticated, dynamic and, so it could be argued, strategic shifting to-and-fro deconstructive and reconstructive positions. What ensues from this dialog between deconstruction and reconstruction is a conception of the ‘reality show’ as a nodal point of the multiple and ever-evolving configurations of the ‘real’ and the ‘authentic’ in a reflexive, media-savvy culture.

Book Review: Bignell, J. (2005) Big Brother: Reality TV in the Twenty-first Century. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 189 pp

criticize some of the principles of her Muslim background; in either group she is seen as ‘the enemy within’ (p. 44). Another interesting piece relates to one of the most common arguments diluting free speech: that it must be exercised responsibly. Philip Hensher refutes this selfcensorship in his debatable piece, arguing that free speech does not have to be accompanied by rational dialogue and is at its most potent when exulted through ‘excess and irresponsibility’ (p. 77). He bemoans those who he believes use this argument to cement their own privileged position. The book chronicles several examples of cases where free speech has come under threat, including: the biography of Rabelais, one of the first to satirize the Church, the protests by the Sikh community in Birmingham surrounding the controversial play Behzti, the controversy surrounding the broadcast of Jerry Springer – The Opera and the murder of film-maker Theo Van Gogh in Holland by a Muslim extremist. Indeed, the religion of Islam is given much coverage in the book due to its links with the Religious Hatred Bill and the general feeling of the contributors’ that the bill is a thinly veiled attempt by the Blair government to appease the potentially powerful Muslim electorate. The book concludes with a short historical account of the dualism between those for and those against free speech, and provides a roll-call of writers ‘persecuted for their work in their home countries’ (p. 252): the unsettling statistics reveal nearly 1000 writers either killed, attacked, in hiding or under investigation by their own government. As you would expect from such contributors, this book is well written and the arguments against the curbing of free speech are well articulated. The relatively short narratives move smoothly from passionate personal accounts of those silenced by their critics, to historical and factual accounts of the debates surrounding free expression. Each writer thinks critically about how changes in the law and in the wider use of censorship would affect their own work. The book deserves a wide readership among those interested in the politics of free speech and the re-emergence of religion as a powerful social force. It is published at a difficult time for religious relations in many countries, as religion has moved back into public discourse with ‘a punishing vengeance’ (p. 163). However, as the book reiterates, it is time that these debates are addressed if we are to enter into meaningful dialogue about the future of multiculturalism in European society.