FROM FEAR OF TELEVISION TO FEAR FOR TELEVISION

New media technologies are often met with political and public ambivalence, as they are perceived to threaten established activities, values and institutions, as well as bring progress and improve political, cultural and social life. Taking the Norwegian history of television as an empirical case study, this article relates to an international research agenda focusing on the cultural political debates in the early phases of broadcast media. The article is structured according to five key conjunctures where significant new media and technologies were introduced with corresponding political debates: the introduction of television (1940s–1950s), of colour television (1960s–1970s), of satellite, cable and commercial television (1980s), of digital distribution (1990s–2000s) and the expansion of television to new platforms (2000s). The article addresses the key arguments and dividing lines in these political debates, as well as the change in the perception of television when the medium is no longer new, but has become an integrated part of people's everyday life.     

MAKING TELEVISION HISTORICAL

This article considers the role of cultural memory in the interpretation of a long-standing television programme by analysing the development of cultural memory on the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) on Finnish television and print media from 1961 to 2005. Following a cultural historical approach to television history, the article identifies four memory discourses on the ESC: Eurovision history as a national narrative of disappointment (from the 1960s onwards); histories of decline (from the 1970s onwards); the ESC as part of a national heritage of popular culture (from the 1980s onwards); and camp readings of Eurovision history (increasingly in the 2000s). The case study illustrates how even a live television event like the ESC, although not explicitly concerned with history, produces a wealth of memory discourses. The article also shows how the ESC has been commemorated increasingly since the 1980s, anticipating the current memory boom in television culture.     

THE CONTINGENCIES OF ORDINARY CITIZEN APPEARANCES IN POLITICAL TELEVISION NEWS

While few would deny the crucial role of citizens in democratic governance, there are still only a few studies that focus on ordinary citizens’ inclusion in political news coverage. First, we present a number of factors conditioning ordinary citizens’ appearances in the news. Second, based on the discussion of these factors, we formulate a number of research questions. After conducting an extensive content analysis covering almost 6000 actors appearing in political news coverage in the two major Danish broadcasters, DR1 and TV2, between 1994 and 2007, we find that ordinary citizens appear more often in reports on intrusive issues such as welfare, that they appear more often in news items positioned later in the news bulletins, that they, largely speaking, appear more often closer to election day, but that there are almost no differences between commercial and public service broadcasting. These findings are discussed in the light of past research on media source use and the ongoing changing foundations of political communication.     

THE WAGES OF SYNERGY

In the current economic environment, message synergy may result in a perceptible manifestation of ownership's impact on media content. That influence raises ethical issues: journalistic independence and access to the media marketplace for a variety of messages. This project analyzes the “soft news” content of the two most popular morning television news shows, The Today Show and Good Morning America during November 2007 sweeps. The analysis demonstrates that “soft news” story topic selection appears to be strongly influenced by economic connections to the parent corporation. The potential impact of this distortion of the cultural public sphere for journalists, viewers, creative artists and advertising at the institutional level are analyzed. The wages of synergy include a restriction of journalistic autonomy, confining viewers to a role that is exclusively consumption oriented, and, at the institutional level, jeopardizing the credibility of news programming which could have a long-term impact on advertising revenues.     

中文机读目录字符集的完整性

本文通过分析中国机读目录格式中有关字段对字符集引用所作的规定, 以及汉字字符集的国家标准体系和国际标准体系, 提出中文机读目录字符集不完整的原因, 并找出解决办法。     

THE HIERARCHY OF JOURNALISTIC CULTURAL AUTHORITY

Print and broadcast journalists attempt to patrol the boundaries of the field. They compete with consumer perceptions and the consequent power of television that have led to a shift in traditional definitions of journalism. Among journalists from print, national and network radio and network (non-local) television, a clear discrepancy emerges between the level of esteem journalists of each medium have among their colleagues, and their popular status with the public. This study documents and analyzes the ways in which members of the American journalistic community have articulated their beliefs about who has the authoritative voice in journalism, and who is qualified to make decisions about boundaries of the craft and preferred practices. This study finds that internally, newspaper journalists are still regarded as the legitimate craftsmen. The fame that some television journalists have achieved both reflects the appreciation of TV journalism and a loathing of it, primarily due to how this fame functions in journalistic cultural authority, as well as in practices of promotion and financial compensation for journalists. Despite these tensions, journalists of different media are also shown to exhibit solidarity and recognition that they are all colleagues in a larger community with a common goal.     

热处理材料晶体结构的相变研究

金属材料经过热处理过程使材料具有优良的组织和性能,广泛应用于先进科技和日常生活中。金属材料的微观显微组织是研究金属材料组织性能的有效方法。金属材料微观组织的形成是金属材料合金成分在金属晶体晶胞中的溶入析出,金属晶体的晶格结构从体心立方晶格转变成面心立方晶格和密排六方晶格。金属材料不同的热处理过冷转变温度形成不同的微观形态的相结构。金属材料从加热状态冷却到室温,金属材料微观晶格结构的变化我们称之为相变。     

KILLER AND VICTIM ISSUES: ISSUE COMPETITION IN THE AGENDA-SETTING PROCESS OF GERMAN TELEVISION

The capacity of the mass media to cover issues as well as thecapacity of recipients to be concerned about issues is limited.The coverage on and the concern about new issues will consequentlyremove old issues from the agenda of both the mass media andthe general public. The present study investigates two modelsof this process of issue competition. The equal-displacementmodel assumes that a rise of one issue in the media by a givennumber of stories is matched by an equal fall in all other issuessumming up to a similar number of issues. The restructuringmodel assumes that unexpected, surprising or otherwise newsworthyevents create killer issues that move several other issues completelyoff the agenda and leave others untouched. A content analysisof all news shows of the two major TV stations in Germany and53 weekly surveys regarding 16 different issues covering thewhole year 1986 shows that—within the media agenda—therewere no killer issues affecting the coverage of the TV stations.In the public agenda, however, some killer issues could be identified.Coverage of these issues increased public concern about themand decreased concerns about other issues. Consequences of theseresults for agenda-setting theory and for politics are discussed.     

THE SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS OF CABLE TELEVISION: RESTRUCTURING CONNECTIONS WITH SELF AND SOCIAL GROUPS

The present study deals with the social implications of cablebroadcasting and explores the possible links between the spreadof global media and the development of individualistic and globalisticorientations. The study examined the function of televisionin strengthening individuals' cognitive and affective connectionswith their own selves, with social groups such as primary andethnic groups, with their society (the nation-state), and withthe global community. The beginning of the cable era in Israelcreated a unique situation which made possible the comparisonof two research populations, subscribers and non-subscribers,which were similar in all background variables, yet differentin their television supply. The main conclusion of this studywas that there are differences between the two groups in termsof their assessments of gratifications obtained from television,and concerning the strengthening of their connections with varioussocial groups and with their own selves. Moreover, there isa clear difference in the structure of the assessments of thetwo groups as presented graphically in two SSA maps-among thesubscribers there is a well defined region of variables relatedto the connection with the global community, while among thenon-subscribers these variables are scattered among variablesrelated to connections with other social groups. In addition,our data suggest that the gratifications obtained from televisionfor the self are complimentary to the gratifications relatedto connections with the global community.     

THE IMPORTANCE OF RITUAL IN CRISIS JOURNALISM

The mass media are expected to play a key role in providing relevant and accurate information during a crisis. While numerous studies have explored how well the media perform in providing information during crises, less attention has been given to journalism's ritual aspects, such as those related to remembering, celebrating, mourning and sharing among members of a community. In the culturalist tradition, journalism is as much about ritual and meaning-making as it is about providing information. One of the most important ways of performing this ritual function is through live, on-the-spot journalism—a form of journalism that has becoming increasingly commonplace due to technological developments, and at the very least, it is connected with crisis news coverage. Based on interviews with broadcast media journalists about their decision-making strategies and motives during two crises (11 September 2001 and the Anna Lindh murder in 2003), we link crisis communication with journalism's ritual and symbolic functions. We argue that key journalistic strategies such as immediacy and competition are motivated just as much by rituals related to affirming community and journalistic organisational needs as by informational motivations. We conclude by suggesting that in times of crisis, the roles of psychologist, comforter and co-mourner should be considered journalistic role conceptions especially in a live, 24-hour news culture.     

THE MISSION OF THE PUBLIC LIBRARY

The author briefly describes arguments used in the quality versus demand debate, discusses how a number of public librarians have compromised between the two in their selection practices, and shows how battle lines are being redrawn with the rise of public libraries which claim to be exclusively demand‐oriented.

The bulk of the paper, however, reviews research done during the last quarter‐century in public libraries to determine whether any evidence has been found to support claims that demand‐oriented public libraries are filled with materials of dubious quality. While a great deal has been written on the quality versus demand issue, the author notes that much of it is rhetoric only; the research itself is scanty, in part due to the complexities of defining and measuring quality. However, three factors are identified which have been assumed to affect collection quality: the financial resources the library devotes to book purchases, the educational background of individual selectors, and the degree of contact such selectors have with the public. The author reviews studies relating to these factors and concludes that to date, there is no evidence to corroborate the belief that the quality of books in demand‐oriented libraries is less than that of their quality‐oriented counterparts. Suggestions for future research needed are included.     

e-Government readiness: Does national culture matter?

e-Government readiness varies significantly across nations. This research explored the relationship of national culture values and practice to e-Government readiness. Eighteen hypotheses were formulated and tested. With the exception of performance orientation and assertiveness, national culture values and practices correlated negatively and positively with e-Government readiness. In addition, gender egalitarianism, institutional collectivism, performance orientation, and uncertainty avoidance values were found to be key determinants of e-Government readiness. The findings of this research provide a foundation for culturally-based policies and strategies aiming at enhancing e-Government readiness across nations.     

Transnational audience reception as a theater of struggle: young Filipino women's reception of Korean television dramas

This study examines the ‘theater of struggle’ in young Filipino women's reception of Korean television dramas in view of the American cultural imperialism that is deeply entrenched in the Philippine society. Mainly anchored on Gramsci's concept of hegemony and Stuart Hall's encoding-decoding theory, the researcher conducted a reception analysis through a textual analysis of selected Korean television comedy-dramas and focus group discussions with young Filipino women in different colleges. The young Filipino women expressed cultural affinity with the culture, storylines, values, and environment in Korean and other Asian television dramas that have invaded the Philippines in the twenty-first century. ‘Negotiation, resistance, and struggle’, in Hall's sense, against both the liberalism in American dramas and the pre-modern themes in local dramas were manifested in the young women's discourses. Consequently, American cultural imperialism in the Philippines was undermined, challenged, and to some extent subverted. The study also looked into the young women's dominant, negotiated, and oppositional readings of the dominant capitalist patriarchal values and ideologies that were embedded in selected Korean dramas. While there were young female participants who subscribed to global capitalist values showing their cooptation within Western cultural hegemonic domains, the young women largely articulated negotiated readings of capitalist values and oppositional readings with regard to the dominant ideology of capitalist patriarchy. In reading the selected Korean dramas reflexively, the young women identified social pathologies of poverty, class inequality, and capitalist patriarchal values and constructed emancipatory discourses with regard to these.     

西方家族档案的文化传承

家族档案是档案的一部分,是社会历史文化不可或缺的组成部分,每一个名门世家都有家族档案。西方名门家族的兴盛及其在世界范围有着极为重要的影响,皆源于他们世代相传的家族文化传承。其文化传承主要表现为拼搏、团结、勤奋的家族精神和责任意识等,这对世人起到了与家族人同样的惊醒作用和启示作用。研究和整合碎片化的西方家族档案,实现它们的文化价值,传承优秀家族文化,从而推动社会文化发展和文明进步。     

INTERPRETING THE NEWS

This paper examines a news genre that is designed for the enactment of interpretive journalism: the live studio correspondent commentary on Swedish news. We trace how the role of expert commentator/interpreter of events has evolved during a 30-year period with a focus on the relation between interaction and surrounding context. How is the expert interpreter role multimodally achieved, and how do technologies enable or constrain the enactment of an expert identity in these dialogues? As we discuss our results, also basing our argument on other studies of the same interactional phenomena, we will propose that the existence of this particular news format can be related to an ongoing power struggle between journalists and politicians. We see these interactions as providing journalism with a perhaps yet underestimated powerful resource in the framing of news, and argue that they should not be written off as merely supplying lightweight, gossipy comments about politics in a glossy studio environment.     

"剩时代"的交友——对电视文化"奇观"的另类解读

本文以婚恋约会型真人秀节目为例,对电视文化奇观进行深层次解读,认为娱乐性、消费性、审美性是当前电视文化奇观的另类表征。     

THE PERFECT CUT

This study examines how politicians act as sources on Dutch television news. It argues that due to the mediatization of politics and a shift towards more interpretive forms of journalism, journalists use politicians' quotes and sound bites first and foremost to support their interpretation of news events. Previous research has shown that because of the growing importance of media logic, journalists are more autonomous and powerful in their relations with sources. This case study shows, however, how the format of news items, especially the use of interviews and quotes, supports the interpretive nature of television news. While there is less on-screen interaction between journalists and politicians on television news, interviews are cut into short sound bites of politicians without the context of the actual interview. Detached reporting of what politicians say because of its newsworthiness has become less important than fitting suitable quotes into predetermined news frames. The analysis is based on a case study of the 2010 local council election coverage by the two major Dutch television news programs, NOS Eight O'Clock News (NOS Achtuurjournaal) and RTL News (RTL Nieuws).     

THE NEWS-GENERATING MACHINE

This paper examines the reporter–source interview in television news production. The starting point is that the interview as part of news production is largely ignored as a subject of research, especially considering its central importance in journalism. The interview is usually looked at as a method to gain information from interviewees. This study looks at the interview in a more constructivist way. The central claim is that the interview functions as a “news-generating machine” that compels replies from interviewees that can be used as raw material for news stories. The article brings forth the importance of the “pre-interview”, it examines and exemplifies standard question strategies, such as negative questions, and how the interviewee replies are edited and represented as news. In doing so, the article also shows how certain questions’ strategies are linked with the making of such common news frames as “the problem frame”, “the attraction” and “psychological news narratives”.