Nordicom Information 2008(4)

Foreword The media and communication research associations of the Nordic countries in coopera- tion with Nordicom have held conferences every second year since 1973. These Nordic conferences have contributed greatly to the development of media and communication research in the Nordic countries. The 18th conference in the series was held in Helsinki, Finland, 16th-19th August 2007. Host for the conference was the Finnish Association for Mass Communication Research (TOY). About 320 scholars from Denmark (48), Finland (79), Greenland (1), Iceland (4), Norway (79) and Sweden (76) gathered to discuss current research and findings. In addition, some participants came from further afield, from the Baltic States, Austria, France, Germany and Great Britain in Europe, and also from Australia, Canada and the USA. The conference proceedings included plenary sessions with keynote speakers and thematic seminars in 23 different working groups. In addition participants enjoyed a number of social gatherings and cultural events. The theme of the plenary sessions this year was Generations, Communication and Media Philosophy. This special issue of Nordicom Review contains all the lectures held in plenary sessions. As usual, the main business of the conference took place in the working group sessions. About 230 research papers were presented in 23 working groups. A number of the papers presented at the conference have been revised and edited to become articles that were then submitted for review for publication in English. Together, the articles presented in this issue of Nordicom Review give the reader some idea of the breadth and depth of Nordic scholarship in the area. Responsibility for arranging the conferences is divided into two parts. More compre- hensive questions, such as the theme, keynote speakers, working groups and fees are the responsibility of a Nordic Planning Committee, whose members are appointed by the national media and communication research associations and Nordicom. Members of the Committee that planned the conference in Helsinki were Gunhild Agger, SMID (Den- mark); Henrika Zilliacus-Tikkanen, TOY (Finland); Leif-Ove Larsen, NML (Norway); Monica Löfgren Nilsson, FSMK (Sweden); Epp Lauk, University of Tartu (Estonia); and Ulla Carlsson, Nordicom. A Local Planning Committee was responsible for the arrangements and details of the conference: Irma Kaarina Halonen (Chair), Åbo University; Anu Kantola, Ullamaija Kivikuru, Hannu Nieminen, Esa Väliverronen and Henrika Zilliacus-Tikkanen, Univer- sity of Helsinki; Anneli Lehtisalo and Risto Kunelius, University of Tampere; Raimo Salokangas, University of Jyvääskylä. Jenny Hokka served as coordinator for the conference as a whole. The next Nordic Conference on Media and Communication Research is to be held in Karlstad, Sweden, 13th-1th August 2009. Göteborg in October 2008 Ulla Carlsson Editor Generations, Communication and Media Philosophy The 18th Nordic Conference on Media and Communication Research A distinguishing generational experience is a precondition for belonging to a certain generation. The 1960s was a time of great changes in media research as youth culture, rock and film had an impact on the interests of researchers. The Vietnam war in the 190s speeded up the consideration of media ethics and at least in Finland the turn of the 1980s and 1990s is remembered as the beginning of financial recession. The interaction of technology and culture, mediation and global networks are setting new demands for media ethical and media philosophical considerations in the 21st century. The links between media and power have become more complicated and invisible than before. The Internet has revolutionized the research of media and created a new generation of researchers whose minds are occupied with media philosophical questions, such as What is media? What is mediation? What is mediated activity? While the marxist philosophy of the 1970s was considering the influences that the society system had on the actions of people, in the 21st century one must cross boarders of nations and societal forms and pay attention to functional contexts and networks worldwide. Media research has entered a new phase where influences are adapted from different sources and research is taking place even more on no-mans land, for instance in societies and by using the new web technology. Face-to-face interaction has changed into computer-to-computer communication. One distinctive feature of the change of generation can also be an important event that shakes a person so profoundly that it can crucially change his/her world of thoughts and values. The media researchers of my own generation are connected, not only by Nordic conferences, but also by societal crisis like the collapse of the socialistic system in Europe, the unification of Europe and the digitalization of media. The reporting of global catastrophes in media can also produce generation based experiences. The Nordic Conferences on Media and Communication Research have functioned as a meeting point and a crossroad already for quite some generations. The conferences that begun in Voksenåsen, Norway in 1973 have discussed current issues about communication and media research. Although modern communication technology can replace face-to-face meetings, it can’t deliver the humane forms of interaction even at its best. The interaction between the different generations of researchers has to be cherished in a concrete place and atmosphere. The younger generation of researchers is still in the need of support and opportunities for meeting other researchers. The conference is a special opportunity to say out ones thoughts aloud and for communication with the researchers of the field, which can result in new ideas and forms of interaction. The conference is medium par excellence. Irma Kaarina Halonen President (2006-2008) TOY Finnish Association for Mass Communication Research PLENARY I. Global, Hybrid or Multiple? Global, Hybrid or Multiple? Cultural Identities in the Age of Satellite TV and the Internet JOSEPH D. STRAUBHAAR Globalization-impacts of Satellite TV and the Internet There is a strong presumption by many that first satellite TV in the 1990s and now the Internet in the new millennium has begun to strongly globalize people’s identities. Ho- wever, many questions lurk behind this surface of apparent change. What is truly easily available to people, not only in physical access, but also in terms of effective access to understand or enjoy? How many new information and entertainment sources are truly global, versus transnational, national, regional and local? What are people actually choosing to read and watch amongst all these new options? What structural, economic, cultural and other factors guide people’s choices as they choose among all the new possibilities? What is the role of cultural history, language and proximity? What has been shared historically and what is coming to be shared now, in part through the new media themselves? What impacts do global media have compared to national, regional or other media have upon culture? In a larger sense, what impacts do today’s global media have on people’s identities and how should we understand both those impacts and the identities themselves in this new world? And what impacts to all of these phenomena and have on the structuring of cultural spaces and markets in at local, national, regional and global levels? The movement from traditional local life to modern interaction with mass media has produced identities that are already multilayered with cultural geographic elements that are local, regional (subnational but larger than the very local), transnational based on cultural-linguistic regions, and national (Anderson, 1983). In this study, we argue that new media users around the world continue to strongly reflect these layers or aspects of identity while many also acquire new layers of identity that are transnational, or global. In this paper, we examine the relationship between processes of hybridization of identity and culture over time and the buildup, maintenance, and even defense of various layers of multilayered identities. These layers of identity are articulated with a variety of media, such as television and the Internet, but not in a simple sense of being primarily influenced by media. Some layers of identity, such as those religious traditio- nalists hold, may actively resist many of the ideas most television channels and Internet sites and messages carry. These increasingly multilayered identities are articulated with a variety of changing structures. As we shall see below, social class and geography strongly structures who can access what new channels. Further, the media institutions themselves are becoming 11 JOSEPH D. STRAUBHAAR more complexly multilayered, even as they reach further geographically. Models, such as commercial TV networks globalize, but are also localized and regionalized as they engage the specific histories and institutions of a variety of cultures, media traditions and regulatory systems. Because of these kinds of adaptations and localizations, another notable theoretical strand we shall use here is hybridity. In our model, hybridity and multi-layeredness coexist and interact. Layers like the institutions, program genres, and audience identities for public service co-exist with layers for commercial networks, genres and audiences. Both can acquire and maintain substantial solidity, but both are also changing, in part as they interact with and change each

Load more