An investigation into the popularity of Nigerian movies in Zambia: a reception study of Lusaka viewers
- Authors: Phiri, Diana
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Motion pictures, Nigerian Motion picture audiences -- Zambia
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3509 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007615
- Description: Motivated by a concern as to why Zambians are attracted to foreign media in the form of Nigerian movies, this thesis is a qualitative audience study which investigates the popularity of Nigerian movies in Zambia with a focus on Lusaka viewers. Against the dominance of Western media and most especially Hollywood movies, this study explores the popularity of Nigerian movies in Zambia which highlights the circulation of media within and between non-Western countries. This is an aspect of trans-national cultural flows that has been ignored in theories of media imperialism. The thesis argues that the widespread popularity of Nigerian movies in Africa and in Zambia in particular necessitates a revision of the conceptions of global cultural flows that privilege the centrality of the West but ignore other centres engaged in contemporary cultural production.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Phiri, Diana
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Motion pictures, Nigerian Motion picture audiences -- Zambia
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3509 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007615
- Description: Motivated by a concern as to why Zambians are attracted to foreign media in the form of Nigerian movies, this thesis is a qualitative audience study which investigates the popularity of Nigerian movies in Zambia with a focus on Lusaka viewers. Against the dominance of Western media and most especially Hollywood movies, this study explores the popularity of Nigerian movies in Zambia which highlights the circulation of media within and between non-Western countries. This is an aspect of trans-national cultural flows that has been ignored in theories of media imperialism. The thesis argues that the widespread popularity of Nigerian movies in Africa and in Zambia in particular necessitates a revision of the conceptions of global cultural flows that privilege the centrality of the West but ignore other centres engaged in contemporary cultural production.
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An investigation into the popularity of the Zimbabwean tabloid newspaper, uMthunywa: a reception study of Bulawayo readers
- Authors: Mabweazara, Hayes Mawindi
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: uMthunywa (Zimbabwe) Tabloid newspapers -- Zimbabwe Journalism -- Zimbabwe Newspapers -- Marketing -- Zimbabwe Mass media -- Social aspects -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3454 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002908
- Description: The development of the tabloid press has stirred heated debate among media scholars. Critics have argued against the relevance of tabloids in society, often framing them as the ‘journalistic other’ deserving no place in ‘serious’ journalism. Much of this criticism, however, has not been based on a close interrogation of the phenomenon, or an examination of the reasons for their popularity amongst readers. It is against this background that this study investigates the reasons behind the popularity of the Zimbabwean state-controlled tabloid newspaper uMthunywa, among its Bulawayo readers. In particular, it explores the meanings obtained from the content of the paper and the relevance of this content to the readers’ everyday lives. In undertaking this investigation, the study draws primarily on qualitative research methods, particularly qualitative content analysis and in-depth interviews (both group and individual). As the study demonstrates, these methods uncover the complex manner in which Bulawayo readers are attracted to uMthunywa and how they appropriate its textual meanings to their lived realities. The study establishes that despite uMthunywa being state-controlled, it offers space through which the conventional ways of presenting reality are challenged, and the importance of the newspaper being written in isiNdebele. As the study indicates, the popularity of the newspaper is largely dependent on its excessive formulaic and sensational stories, which cover issues experienced by its readers in their lived circumstances. The study thus argues that the newspaper constitutes an alternative mediated public sphere that finds space in the deeper social conditions that have alienated the people of Bulawayo from the macropolitical life of the nation and the ‘power bloc’.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Mabweazara, Hayes Mawindi
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: uMthunywa (Zimbabwe) Tabloid newspapers -- Zimbabwe Journalism -- Zimbabwe Newspapers -- Marketing -- Zimbabwe Mass media -- Social aspects -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3454 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002908
- Description: The development of the tabloid press has stirred heated debate among media scholars. Critics have argued against the relevance of tabloids in society, often framing them as the ‘journalistic other’ deserving no place in ‘serious’ journalism. Much of this criticism, however, has not been based on a close interrogation of the phenomenon, or an examination of the reasons for their popularity amongst readers. It is against this background that this study investigates the reasons behind the popularity of the Zimbabwean state-controlled tabloid newspaper uMthunywa, among its Bulawayo readers. In particular, it explores the meanings obtained from the content of the paper and the relevance of this content to the readers’ everyday lives. In undertaking this investigation, the study draws primarily on qualitative research methods, particularly qualitative content analysis and in-depth interviews (both group and individual). As the study demonstrates, these methods uncover the complex manner in which Bulawayo readers are attracted to uMthunywa and how they appropriate its textual meanings to their lived realities. The study establishes that despite uMthunywa being state-controlled, it offers space through which the conventional ways of presenting reality are challenged, and the importance of the newspaper being written in isiNdebele. As the study indicates, the popularity of the newspaper is largely dependent on its excessive formulaic and sensational stories, which cover issues experienced by its readers in their lived circumstances. The study thus argues that the newspaper constitutes an alternative mediated public sphere that finds space in the deeper social conditions that have alienated the people of Bulawayo from the macropolitical life of the nation and the ‘power bloc’.
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An investigation into the popularity of Zimbabwe's first health communication soap opera, Studio 263 : a qualitative reception study of Bulawayo students aged between 15 and 20 years
- Authors: Bhebhe-Mpofu, Adilaid
- Date: 2007 , 2014-08-18
- Subjects: Studio 263 (Television program) , Television soap operas -- Zimbabwe , Television viewers -- Zimbabwe , Mass media and children -- Zimbabwe , Television and children -- Zimbabwe , AIDS (Disease) -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3531 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1013310
- Description: Within the context of debates concerning the reception and interpretation of media texts by television audiences, this qualitative reception study explores how a sample of Bulawayo students negotiate meanings from Zimbabwe's first health communication soap opera, Studio 263. The study thus examines the reasons behind the popularity of this programme with this target audience. The findings of the study reveal that meaning making is a complex process that is dependent on a variety of factors which include, among others, the socio-cultural context of media consumption, gender, economic disposition and age. It particularly maintains that gender and lived realities influence the interpretation and negotiation of meanings in this particular study. , Adobe Acrobat Pro 11.0.0 Paper Capture Plug-in
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- Authors: Bhebhe-Mpofu, Adilaid
- Date: 2007 , 2014-08-18
- Subjects: Studio 263 (Television program) , Television soap operas -- Zimbabwe , Television viewers -- Zimbabwe , Mass media and children -- Zimbabwe , Television and children -- Zimbabwe , AIDS (Disease) -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3531 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1013310
- Description: Within the context of debates concerning the reception and interpretation of media texts by television audiences, this qualitative reception study explores how a sample of Bulawayo students negotiate meanings from Zimbabwe's first health communication soap opera, Studio 263. The study thus examines the reasons behind the popularity of this programme with this target audience. The findings of the study reveal that meaning making is a complex process that is dependent on a variety of factors which include, among others, the socio-cultural context of media consumption, gender, economic disposition and age. It particularly maintains that gender and lived realities influence the interpretation and negotiation of meanings in this particular study. , Adobe Acrobat Pro 11.0.0 Paper Capture Plug-in
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Race against democracy: a case study of the Mail & Guardian during the early years of the Mbeki presidency, 1999-2002
- Authors: Steenveld, Lynette Noreen
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Mbeki, Thabo -- In mass media , Mail & Guardian , South African newspapers , Press -- South Africa , Press and politics -- South Africa , Journalism -- South Africa , Mass media and race relations -- South Africa , Racism in the press -- South Africa , Mass media -- Political aspects -- South Africa , South Africa -- Politics and government -- 20th century
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:3537 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1015572
- Description: This thesis examines the 1998 complaint of racism against the Mail & Guardian, a leading exponent of South Africa's alternative press in the 1980s, and important contemporary producer of investigative journalism. The study is framed within a cultural studies approach, analysing the Mail & Guardian as constituted by a 'circuit of production': its social context, production, texts, and audiences. The thesis makes three main arguments. First, that the claim of racism cannot be understood outside of a consideration of both the changing political milieu, and subtle changes within the Mail & Guardian itself. Significant social changes relate to the reconfiguration of racial and class identities wrought by the 'Mbeki state'. Within the Mail & Guardian, the thesis argues for the importance of the power and subjectivity of the editor as a key 'factor' shaping the identity of the paper, evidenced in its production practices and textual outputs. In this regard, the thesis departs from a functionalist analysis of particular 'roles' within the newsroom, drawing instead on a post-structuralist approach to organisational studies. Based on this production and social context, the thesis examines key texts which deal with aspects of South Africa's social transformation, and which exemplify aspects of the Mail & Guardian's reporting which led to the complaint of racism by the Black Lawyers Association (BLA) and the Association of Black Accountants (ABASA). Their complaint was that the Mail & Guardian's reporting impugned the dignity of black people, and in so doing was a violation of their rights to dignity and equality which are constitutionally guaranteed. However, as freedom of the press is also guaranteed by the South African constitution, their complaint to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) resulted in public debate about these contending rights. My second argument relates to the jurisprudential approach to racism, and the related issue of affirmative action, which informed the complaint against the paper. Contrary to the 'normative', liberal approach to these issues, this thesis highlights Critical Race Theory as the jurisprudential basis for both the claimants' accusation of racism against the Mail & Guardian, and aspects of its implicit use in South African human rights adjudication. The thesis argues that in failing to recognise these different philosophical and political bases of legal reasoning, the media, including the Mail & Guardian, in reporting on these matters failed in their purported role of serving the public interest. The thesis concludes by applying Fraser's critique of Habermas's notion of a single, bourgeois public sphere to journalism, thereby suggesting ways in which the critiques of some of the Mail & Guardian's own journalists could be employed to enlarge its approach to journalism - giving voice to constituencies seldom heard in mainstream media.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Steenveld, Lynette Noreen
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Mbeki, Thabo -- In mass media , Mail & Guardian , South African newspapers , Press -- South Africa , Press and politics -- South Africa , Journalism -- South Africa , Mass media and race relations -- South Africa , Racism in the press -- South Africa , Mass media -- Political aspects -- South Africa , South Africa -- Politics and government -- 20th century
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:3537 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1015572
- Description: This thesis examines the 1998 complaint of racism against the Mail & Guardian, a leading exponent of South Africa's alternative press in the 1980s, and important contemporary producer of investigative journalism. The study is framed within a cultural studies approach, analysing the Mail & Guardian as constituted by a 'circuit of production': its social context, production, texts, and audiences. The thesis makes three main arguments. First, that the claim of racism cannot be understood outside of a consideration of both the changing political milieu, and subtle changes within the Mail & Guardian itself. Significant social changes relate to the reconfiguration of racial and class identities wrought by the 'Mbeki state'. Within the Mail & Guardian, the thesis argues for the importance of the power and subjectivity of the editor as a key 'factor' shaping the identity of the paper, evidenced in its production practices and textual outputs. In this regard, the thesis departs from a functionalist analysis of particular 'roles' within the newsroom, drawing instead on a post-structuralist approach to organisational studies. Based on this production and social context, the thesis examines key texts which deal with aspects of South Africa's social transformation, and which exemplify aspects of the Mail & Guardian's reporting which led to the complaint of racism by the Black Lawyers Association (BLA) and the Association of Black Accountants (ABASA). Their complaint was that the Mail & Guardian's reporting impugned the dignity of black people, and in so doing was a violation of their rights to dignity and equality which are constitutionally guaranteed. However, as freedom of the press is also guaranteed by the South African constitution, their complaint to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) resulted in public debate about these contending rights. My second argument relates to the jurisprudential approach to racism, and the related issue of affirmative action, which informed the complaint against the paper. Contrary to the 'normative', liberal approach to these issues, this thesis highlights Critical Race Theory as the jurisprudential basis for both the claimants' accusation of racism against the Mail & Guardian, and aspects of its implicit use in South African human rights adjudication. The thesis argues that in failing to recognise these different philosophical and political bases of legal reasoning, the media, including the Mail & Guardian, in reporting on these matters failed in their purported role of serving the public interest. The thesis concludes by applying Fraser's critique of Habermas's notion of a single, bourgeois public sphere to journalism, thereby suggesting ways in which the critiques of some of the Mail & Guardian's own journalists could be employed to enlarge its approach to journalism - giving voice to constituencies seldom heard in mainstream media.
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Reading the Sowetan's mediation of the public's response to the Jacob Zuma rape trial: a critical discourse analysis
- Authors: Stent, Alison
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Zuma, Jacob -- Trials, litigation etc Zuma, Jacob -- Public opinion Sowetan (Johannesburg, South Africa) Populism -- South Africa Social choice -- South Africa Social justice -- South Africa Ethnicity -- Political aspects -- South Africa Rape -- Public opinion Women -- Crimes against -- South Africa Sex discrimination against women -- South Africa Trials (Rape) -- South Africa Rape in mass media Crime and the press -- South Africa Mass media and women -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3485 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002940
- Description: In this minithesis I conduct a critical discourse analysis to take on a double-pronged task. On the one hand I explore the social phenomenon of the contestation between supporters of then-ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma and supporters of his rape accuser. The trial, which took place in the Johannesburg High Court between mid-February and early May 2006, stirred intense public interest, both locally and internationally. The performance of thousands of Zuma’s supporters and a far smaller number of gender rights lobby groups, both of whom kept a presence outside the court building throughout the trial, received similar attention. Second, I examine how the Sowetan, a national daily tabloid with a black, middle-class readership, mediated the trial through pictures of the theatre outside the court and letters to the editor. The study is informed by post-Marxist and cultural studies perspectives, both approaches that are concerned with issues of power, ideology and the circulation of meaning within specific sociocultural contexts. A rudimentary thematic content analysis draws out some of the main themes from the material, while the critical discourse analysis is located within a theoretical framework based on concepts from Laclau & Mouffe’s theory of meaning, which assumes a power struggle between contesting positions seeking to invalidate one another and to either challenge or support existing hegemonies. This is further informed by, first, Laclau’s theorisation of populism, which assumes that diverse groupings can unite under a demagogue’s banner in shared antagonism towards existing power, and second, by concepts from Mamdani’s theorisation of power and resistance in colonial and post-colonial Africa, which explicates three overarching ideological discourses of human rights, social justice and traditional ethnic practices. The study, then, explores how these three discourses were operationalised by the localised contestations over the trial.
- Full Text: false
- Authors: Stent, Alison
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Zuma, Jacob -- Trials, litigation etc Zuma, Jacob -- Public opinion Sowetan (Johannesburg, South Africa) Populism -- South Africa Social choice -- South Africa Social justice -- South Africa Ethnicity -- Political aspects -- South Africa Rape -- Public opinion Women -- Crimes against -- South Africa Sex discrimination against women -- South Africa Trials (Rape) -- South Africa Rape in mass media Crime and the press -- South Africa Mass media and women -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3485 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002940
- Description: In this minithesis I conduct a critical discourse analysis to take on a double-pronged task. On the one hand I explore the social phenomenon of the contestation between supporters of then-ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma and supporters of his rape accuser. The trial, which took place in the Johannesburg High Court between mid-February and early May 2006, stirred intense public interest, both locally and internationally. The performance of thousands of Zuma’s supporters and a far smaller number of gender rights lobby groups, both of whom kept a presence outside the court building throughout the trial, received similar attention. Second, I examine how the Sowetan, a national daily tabloid with a black, middle-class readership, mediated the trial through pictures of the theatre outside the court and letters to the editor. The study is informed by post-Marxist and cultural studies perspectives, both approaches that are concerned with issues of power, ideology and the circulation of meaning within specific sociocultural contexts. A rudimentary thematic content analysis draws out some of the main themes from the material, while the critical discourse analysis is located within a theoretical framework based on concepts from Laclau & Mouffe’s theory of meaning, which assumes a power struggle between contesting positions seeking to invalidate one another and to either challenge or support existing hegemonies. This is further informed by, first, Laclau’s theorisation of populism, which assumes that diverse groupings can unite under a demagogue’s banner in shared antagonism towards existing power, and second, by concepts from Mamdani’s theorisation of power and resistance in colonial and post-colonial Africa, which explicates three overarching ideological discourses of human rights, social justice and traditional ethnic practices. The study, then, explores how these three discourses were operationalised by the localised contestations over the trial.
- Full Text: false
Satellite television use among Zimbabwean professionals : an investigation into audience consumption of SABC Africa's '60 Minutes live in Africa'
- Authors: Mugoni, Petronella Chipo
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Direct broadcast satellite television -- Zimbabwe Television viewers -- Zimbabwe Television viewers -- Zimbabwe -- Case studies Television broadcasting of news -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3512 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007707
- Description: Within the context of debates surrounding the consumption of global media by local audiences in Third World countries, this study explores the reasons behind satellite television subscription, and consumption of international news among a sample of young professional men and women in contemporary Zimbabwe. The study seeks to uncover how the research participants respond to news broadcast on SABC Africa's '60 minutes live in Africa', a programme which they can only access via satellite television in their country. Working within the frame of audience studies which insists on understanding media consumption and reception in context, this study examines how the respondents, situated within the specific Zimbabwe context, characterised as it is by serious social, economic and political challenges, respond to both regional news and news about their country on '60 minutes live in Africa'. Within the frame of qualitative research the study employs a two-stage sampling procedure and data collection strategy to uncover the factors that underpin international media consumption and reception by professional men and women situated in a country undergoing rapid change. The findings of the study point to the various social and individual factors that underlie media consumption choices as well as to the different socially patterned reasons why local audiences are either attracted to, or reject global media. The study found that SABC Africa's '60 minutes live in Africa' is more popular and better received than Western-broadcast programmes on channels such as BBC, CNN, and Sky News among Zimbabwean professionals. I also uncovered some evidence that cultural proximity and relevance are of supreme importance in determining which media audiences chose to consume and what level of engagement they bring to their reception of global media. These and other findings directly confront media models that privilege beliefs in cultural imperialism and the dominance of Western media and their effects on Third World audiences.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Mugoni, Petronella Chipo
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Direct broadcast satellite television -- Zimbabwe Television viewers -- Zimbabwe Television viewers -- Zimbabwe -- Case studies Television broadcasting of news -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3512 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007707
- Description: Within the context of debates surrounding the consumption of global media by local audiences in Third World countries, this study explores the reasons behind satellite television subscription, and consumption of international news among a sample of young professional men and women in contemporary Zimbabwe. The study seeks to uncover how the research participants respond to news broadcast on SABC Africa's '60 minutes live in Africa', a programme which they can only access via satellite television in their country. Working within the frame of audience studies which insists on understanding media consumption and reception in context, this study examines how the respondents, situated within the specific Zimbabwe context, characterised as it is by serious social, economic and political challenges, respond to both regional news and news about their country on '60 minutes live in Africa'. Within the frame of qualitative research the study employs a two-stage sampling procedure and data collection strategy to uncover the factors that underpin international media consumption and reception by professional men and women situated in a country undergoing rapid change. The findings of the study point to the various social and individual factors that underlie media consumption choices as well as to the different socially patterned reasons why local audiences are either attracted to, or reject global media. The study found that SABC Africa's '60 minutes live in Africa' is more popular and better received than Western-broadcast programmes on channels such as BBC, CNN, and Sky News among Zimbabwean professionals. I also uncovered some evidence that cultural proximity and relevance are of supreme importance in determining which media audiences chose to consume and what level of engagement they bring to their reception of global media. These and other findings directly confront media models that privilege beliefs in cultural imperialism and the dominance of Western media and their effects on Third World audiences.
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Selecting stories to tell: the gatekeeping of international news at SAfm
- Authors: Ticha, Abel Akara
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: South African Broadcasting Corporation SAfm (South Africa) Radio broadcasting -- South Africa Foreign news -- South Africa Radio journalism -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3499 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004520
- Description: The premise of this thesis is that the selection of international news to be aired on the bulletins of SAfm by SABC Radio News staff is influenced by more complex factors than could be seen solely from the prism of an empirical journalistic paradigm. Drawing from data obtained through participant observation and interviewing, it is noted that there has been a revolution from a propagandist approach during apartheid to a professional approach following the demise of apartheid, in the selection of international news for bulletins on SAfm. Using Lewin's theory of forces in decision making and locating it within four out of five levels of a framework of gatekeeping analysis provided by Shoemaker (1991) and Shoemaker et al (200 I), it is concluded that the delimiting well-tested routines of newsmaking act as powerful companions of individuals' selection decisions of international news broadcast on SAfm's bulletins. However, these routines are adapted to meet the organisational demands of the SABC, which as a Public Service Broadcaster (PBS) has embraced the discourse of South African nationalism/panAfricanism, as a major philosophy underpinning the Corporation's coverage of the world. Therefore, some individual, routine and organisational factors influencing the se lection of international news broadcast on SAfm's bulletins, are predetermined and co-determined by the social system (the ideological/discursive structure), which is promoted by certain social institutions. Instances of spokespersons of such institutions as governments, international governmental and non-governmental organisations, etc., officiating the news abound; the gatekeepers use them to meet routine professional standards of journalism. This potentially works to sustain the hegemonic discourses of the powerful in international affairs (in tenns of core/peripheral nations relations, and elite classlruled majority relations) though there is a conscious oppositional effort to modify or dwarf stories that explicitly promote imperialism and to hold rulers accountable to the public. It is posited that the time is ripe for newsworkers responsible for the production of bulletins for SAfm to take the risk that may be necessary to inject a few changes in routine practices that could limit the engineering of consent to the powerful elites in the international arena.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Ticha, Abel Akara
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: South African Broadcasting Corporation SAfm (South Africa) Radio broadcasting -- South Africa Foreign news -- South Africa Radio journalism -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3499 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004520
- Description: The premise of this thesis is that the selection of international news to be aired on the bulletins of SAfm by SABC Radio News staff is influenced by more complex factors than could be seen solely from the prism of an empirical journalistic paradigm. Drawing from data obtained through participant observation and interviewing, it is noted that there has been a revolution from a propagandist approach during apartheid to a professional approach following the demise of apartheid, in the selection of international news for bulletins on SAfm. Using Lewin's theory of forces in decision making and locating it within four out of five levels of a framework of gatekeeping analysis provided by Shoemaker (1991) and Shoemaker et al (200 I), it is concluded that the delimiting well-tested routines of newsmaking act as powerful companions of individuals' selection decisions of international news broadcast on SAfm's bulletins. However, these routines are adapted to meet the organisational demands of the SABC, which as a Public Service Broadcaster (PBS) has embraced the discourse of South African nationalism/panAfricanism, as a major philosophy underpinning the Corporation's coverage of the world. Therefore, some individual, routine and organisational factors influencing the se lection of international news broadcast on SAfm's bulletins, are predetermined and co-determined by the social system (the ideological/discursive structure), which is promoted by certain social institutions. Instances of spokespersons of such institutions as governments, international governmental and non-governmental organisations, etc., officiating the news abound; the gatekeepers use them to meet routine professional standards of journalism. This potentially works to sustain the hegemonic discourses of the powerful in international affairs (in tenns of core/peripheral nations relations, and elite classlruled majority relations) though there is a conscious oppositional effort to modify or dwarf stories that explicitly promote imperialism and to hold rulers accountable to the public. It is posited that the time is ripe for newsworkers responsible for the production of bulletins for SAfm to take the risk that may be necessary to inject a few changes in routine practices that could limit the engineering of consent to the powerful elites in the international arena.
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The representation of South African women politicians in the Sunday Times during the 2004 presidential and general elections
- Authors: Katembo, Tina Kabunda
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Sunday Times (Johannesburg, South Africa) Women politicians -- South Africa Women in mass media Mass media -- Political aspects -- South Africa Elections -- South Africa South Africa -- Politics and government -- 1994-
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3445 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002899
- Description: This study analysed the representation of South African women politicians in the Sunday Times’ election news during the 2004 Presidential and general elections, by drawing on perspectives from cultural studies, the constructionist approach to representation and the sociology of news production. Using content analysis and critical discourse analysis, the study found that very few women politicians were used as news actors/sources in the Sunday Times, and that when women politicians were figured, the paper tended to present them in ways that serve to sustain women’s subordinate status in society. Using content analysis, the study analysed 106 news items published between January 1, 2004 and April 30, 2004, and found that of all the 588 identifiable news actors/sources counted, 135 were women and 453 were men. Of these, only 7.67% (or 26) were women politicians and 92.33% (or 313) were men politicians. On average however, the amount of words allocated to a woman politician was more than that allocated to a man politician. The discourse analysis also revealed how the Sunday Times managed to reproduce textually the hegemonic power relations between women and men, by constructing different subject positions for women politicians and men politicians, which generally tended to be negative and positive respectively. In the representation of women politicians, the study revealed patterns that tended to ascribe them negative personality traits, accentuate their passivity and dependency on men, and construct them as incompetent political leaders. This study’s conclusions pose a challenge to the role of the national newspaper in the transformation of gender relations and the promotion of equal access to political and decision-making positions, and to the news media. News discourse, as a social practice, both determines and is determined by the social structure in which it is produced. By systematically reproducing subordinate subject positions for women in the news, the Sunday Times helps to further women’s subordinate status in society. Particularly, as part of the broader social cultural context that is embedded in patriarchal and gender ideologies, the Sunday Times does not merely reflect but actively and effectively constructs the reality it claims to be representing.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Katembo, Tina Kabunda
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Sunday Times (Johannesburg, South Africa) Women politicians -- South Africa Women in mass media Mass media -- Political aspects -- South Africa Elections -- South Africa South Africa -- Politics and government -- 1994-
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3445 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002899
- Description: This study analysed the representation of South African women politicians in the Sunday Times’ election news during the 2004 Presidential and general elections, by drawing on perspectives from cultural studies, the constructionist approach to representation and the sociology of news production. Using content analysis and critical discourse analysis, the study found that very few women politicians were used as news actors/sources in the Sunday Times, and that when women politicians were figured, the paper tended to present them in ways that serve to sustain women’s subordinate status in society. Using content analysis, the study analysed 106 news items published between January 1, 2004 and April 30, 2004, and found that of all the 588 identifiable news actors/sources counted, 135 were women and 453 were men. Of these, only 7.67% (or 26) were women politicians and 92.33% (or 313) were men politicians. On average however, the amount of words allocated to a woman politician was more than that allocated to a man politician. The discourse analysis also revealed how the Sunday Times managed to reproduce textually the hegemonic power relations between women and men, by constructing different subject positions for women politicians and men politicians, which generally tended to be negative and positive respectively. In the representation of women politicians, the study revealed patterns that tended to ascribe them negative personality traits, accentuate their passivity and dependency on men, and construct them as incompetent political leaders. This study’s conclusions pose a challenge to the role of the national newspaper in the transformation of gender relations and the promotion of equal access to political and decision-making positions, and to the news media. News discourse, as a social practice, both determines and is determined by the social structure in which it is produced. By systematically reproducing subordinate subject positions for women in the news, the Sunday Times helps to further women’s subordinate status in society. Particularly, as part of the broader social cultural context that is embedded in patriarchal and gender ideologies, the Sunday Times does not merely reflect but actively and effectively constructs the reality it claims to be representing.
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