Journal of Communication Inquiry recent issues

Guest Editor Introduction: Media Reform and Public Policy

Schejter, A., Stein, L. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Interview With Robert McChesney

Stein, L., Schejter, A. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Taking Root in the Sunshine State: The Emergence of the Media Reform Movement in the State of Florida

Proffitt, J. M., Opel, A., Gaccione, J. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

This paper explores the emergence of the media reform movement in the state of Florida in 2008. Focusing on the development of a statewide coalition, the paper details the tensions between local and national policy agendas, the barriers faced by local activists as they attempt to build support for the concept of media reform in their communities, and the diversity of interests represented under the banner of media reform. This case study also reveals an ideological bias toward the left among the movement activists currently working in Florida, signaling a need to harness the broad-based dissatisfaction that exists across the political spectrum.

Public Participation and Agency Discretion in Rulemaking at the Federal Communications Commission

Gangadharan, S. P. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

In recent years, many practitioners, policymakers, and scholars have embraced participatory politics in communications policymaking at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) with the expectation that mass involvement by the public will—and should—influence regulatory outcomes. However, calls for participation may not be sufficient; a commitment to public-spirited decision making among agency officials is also needed alongside procedural safeguards for participation. The following analysis uses a Habermasian framework to move beyond participatory politics and advocates for a deliberative understanding of the role of the public and policymakers in producing legitimate outcomes. Looking at legal and legislative history of the Commission and of administrative procedure more generally, the article reconsiders the value of agency discretion and turns attention to the importance of public participation in debates about communications regulation outside the rulemaking system. If members of the public generate, circulate, and make audible their opinions in a public sphere and agency officials are open to and active listeners of a public sphere, agency discretion can guide officials towards public-spirited rather than narrowly interested decisions. Overall, Habermas's model suggests that policymakers and public coproduce legitimacy in a process that is doubly challenging but arguably more profound.

Reforming Policy to Promote Local Broadband Networks

Hoplight Tapia, A., Powell, A., Ortiz, J. A. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Most existing assessments of local Wi-Fi projects have concentrated on either top-down, government-driven endeavors, or bottom-up projects developed by volunteers or community organizations. In both Canada and the United States, existing local Wi-Fi projects—both top down and bottom up—have failed to fulfill expectations that they could increase digital inclusion. Current policy frameworks may play some role in these failures. This article argues for a policy approach that favors hybrid public broadband that is neither completely bottom up nor top down, and for the development of policy frameworks that support hybrid public broadband.

Efficient Servants of Pluralism or Marginalized Media Policy Tools?: The Case of Swedish Press Subsidies

Ots, M. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

For more than 30 years, Sweden’s media policy has relied on positive incentives to promote diversity. That is, competition law has rarely been used to prevent dominant newspapers from acquiring smaller ones, but rather press subsidies have been used to increase survival rates and promote independence among the latter. Internationally, the broad trend toward concentration in newspaper markets has been of concern to policy makers, and the Swedish model has attracted considerable interest as a possible path to a more heterogeneous media landscape. However, over the last decade, ownership distribution on the newspaper market has started to change at an accelerating pace, and Swedish media policy stands at a crossroad—to increase reliance on subsidies or to make way for something new. The arising questions regarding how to reshape media policy have several parallels to the ongoing international debate. This case study explores the performance of subsidies from the perspective of pluralism and discusses alternative political responses and future policy directions.

Open Sourcing Our Way to an Online Commons: Contesting Corporate Impermeability in the New Media Ecology

Milberry, K., Anderson, S. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Understanding the social dynamics shaping the internet is vital as media power takes on new dimensions in the digital realm. The internet is increasingly necessary for participation in social life yet corporations continue to shape the online architecture to suit their own narrow commercial interests. In their drive to enclose the internet, online media companies create synergistic membranes with prescribed circuits that constrain user freedoms. Taken together, these synergistic membranes form a new layer of the internet — the Google layer, which constrains and commodifies users' range of motion within a narrow, privatized slice of the world wide web. This jeopardizes the creation of a commons-based communications system with a public service orientation, something that is essential to participatory and democratic dialogue. The open architecture of the internet, characterized and supported by free and open source software (FOSS), defends the digital commons against cyber-enclosure. Social practices and values that distinguish FOSS comprise a liberatory praxis as well as an alternative vision of social organization offline that prefigures a more democratic media system, and broadly construed, a more democratic society.

Resisting Abridgment Librarianship as Media Reform

Nappo, C. M. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Media reform is a vital component for sustaining public access to information, and supports libraries in fulfilling their mission as what educator Robert D. Leigh termed "a public agency of communication,". In many ways, the struggles for media democracy are waged side by side with those of librarians. Like media activists, librarians are deeply concerned about issues related to information production, dissemination, and access. In this article, the author will describe how American librarianship complements a democratic media system and will provide examples of how libraries have played a key role in providing public access to independent media (i.e., alternative, noncorporate, or small press) in print and electronic formats. Finally, considering the interdependency of their goals and interests, the author wishes to advocate for greater collaboration between the media reform movement and library activists.

Book Review: Hall, G. (2008). Digitize This Book! The Politics of New Media, or Why We Need Open Access Now. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 301 pages, $19.95

Howard-Spink, S. — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Thanks to Reviewers

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:21:40 PDT

Facing Barack Hussein Obama: Race, Globalization, and Transnational America

Parameswaran, R. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

Arguing that race does not receive enough attention in studies of globalization, this article examines the implications of Barack Hussein Obama's successful presidential candidacy for both expanding and reducing the meanings of Blackness in relation to transnational America. In contrast to the "Third World" racioscape of Black America that became visible to the world during Hurricane Katrina, Obama's biography produced new tropes of Black identity that registered both the viability of the "American dream" and a cosmopolitan global sensibility. The article notes that Obama's victory has the potential to stretch Black racial identity beyond its hegemonic anchoring to America, but at the same time it is equally important to question nationalist discourses of American exceptionalism that surrounded Obama's campaign for minimizing the institutional contexts of race and class inequality.

Love as Redemption: The American Dream Myth and the Celebrity Biopic

Smith, G. D. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

This research documents the American Dream in two popular biopics: Ray (2004) and Walk the Line (2005). In both films, the American Dream, framed by the ideology of individuality, follows a particular trajectory: Struggle, individual effort, responsibility, and talent lead to material wealth, but the protagonists' immoral behaviors overwhelm them, thus creating a host of professional and personal problems. The relevance of racism and class struggle, long identified as significant barriers to upward mobility, is minimized for a more personal issue, psychological trauma, to explain their moral declines. Both films resolve the natural tensions between the material (individualism) and the moral (brotherhood) by introducing the Hollywood love story as an acceptable narrative for the lead character's redemption. The mythology allows for a more feminine narrative (heterosexual romantic love) as moral resolution, one that avoids the more complicated notions of brotherhood (racial and class equality) as part of the ideological equation.

Social Control in an American Pacific Island: Guam's Local Newspaper Reports on Liberation

Dalisay, F. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

Not much research has examined the social roles of local media in the Pacific Islands. In an attempt to fill this gap, this article critically analyzes news articles, opinion pieces, letters to the editor, and editorials printed in Guam's local newspaper, the Pacific Daily News (PDN). The items were published between the 50th and 60th anniversaries (1994-2004) of the American liberation of Guam. My analysis revealed that the PDN downplayed a conflict between pro-American and prolocal ideological stances. It rallied behind American interests, and when it reported about the resistances of prolocal actors in news articles, it first reaffirmed the actors' loyalty to the United States. This article concludes that the PDN served to hegemonically maintain Guam's society as an unincorporated American territory.

Media Criticism as Competitive Discourse: Defining Reportage of the Abu Ghraib Scandal

Carlson, M. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

This article treats media criticism as a specific form of discourse that aspires to define what journalism is, what it should aspire to, and who should speak about it. Recognizing journalists' cultural role of creating shared meaning, criticism either strives to uphold journalistic norms and isolate problematic incidents as deviant or calls attention to a faulty underlying framework of news production and presents foundational alternatives. Aside from being competitive discourse, media criticism is also collective by constructing various groups through its discourse by addressing specific audiences in an effort to create boundaries of acceptability. As a site for inquiry, the article tracks criticism surrounding reportage of the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal in April and May of 2004. Specific critical arguments regarding the scandal are systematically examined in four different spheres: within the news, the journalism trade press, from the left, and from the right.

Dialogues in Communication Research: Bratich, J. Z. (2008). Conspiracy Panics: Political Rationality and Popular Culture. Albany: State University of New York Press

Fenster, M., Bratich, J. Z. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

Book Review: Haraway, D. J. (2008). When Species Meet. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota

Heinricy, S. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

Book Review: Gray, J., Jones, J. P., & Thompson, E. (2009). Satire TV: Politics and Comedy in the Post-Network Era. New York: NYU Press

Collins, S. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

Book Review: Park D. W., & Pooley, J. (Eds.). (2008). The History of Media and Communication Research: Contested Memories. New York: Peter Lang

Tracy, J. F. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:09:32 PDT

Editor's Introduction

Johnson, R. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

Where the Girls Are in the Age of New Sexism: An Interview With Susan Douglas

Hye Jin Lee, , Huike Wen, — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

Constructing Breast Cancer in the News: Betty Ford and the Evolution of the Breast Cancer Patient

Dubriwny, T. N. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

In this article, the author explores a key moment in breast cancer history—the publicity surrounding Betty Ford's radical mastectomy in 1974—and points to the ways in which the print news coverage of Ford's mastectomy offers an identity, or subject position, for breast cancer patients that is constrained by stereotypical gender roles, particularly the need for breast cancer patients to maintain their femininity. Betty Ford is articulated as an "ideal patient" within a medical success narrative that tells a story of breast cancer diagnosis and treatment in a progressive, linear fashion that minimizes the complexity of breast cancer as a disease and the questions surrounding best treatment practices. The aestheticization of breast cancer in the coverage of Betty Ford's mastectomy is one of the primary discursive building blocks of the contemporary subjectivity of the breast cancer survivor.

A Concept of Autonomy for Critical Communication Studies

Kim, J. W. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

The concept of autonomy has had an integral and enduring role in political economic reflection on the relationship between culture and the economy. A prevailing version of the concept, developed in postmodernist scholarship, has suggested the erosion, if not complete demise, of autonomy. The article contends that autonomy, as an aesthetic concept in these debates, has mainly overlooked its function in critical thinking about capitalism's expansion to the sphere of culture. By building on recent research on the Frankfurt School, in particular, the work of Theodor Adorno, it is possible to reassert the importance of a version of the concept of autonomy in the critical analysis of culture today.

Blasphemous Allusion: Coming of Age in South Park

Gournelos, T. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

Through an examination of narrative developments in South Park and a deeper textual analysis of two of the television show's episodes in particular, this article discusses the ramifications of anarchic and aggressive critiques of reified gender identity in popular culture. It draws primarily on Haraway and Butler, engaging gender precisely through its performative or blasphemous potential for oppositional culture. The episodes discussed demonstrate the possibility for a fluid conception of gender and a highly inter-textual approach to gender development. Rather than asserting a coherent political position, South Park examines and disrupts gender norms precisely through multiplicity and fragmentation, demonstrating an emergent paradigm for social activism.

Walking in Fear: An Autoethnographic Account of Media Framing of Inner-City Crime

Waymer, D. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

For decades, scholars have studied the powerful effects of media. More specifically, researchers have found that media can be considered agents of socialization—shaping and influencing people's identities and identity formations. Because media is often our only "gateway" to witness what occurs outside of our view, it becomes the lens in which we use to view our world—especially when it comes to the framing of crime in the inner city. In this essay, I use the events surrounding Cincinnati, Ohio, and its race riots of 2001 as the case for analysis. Specifically, I use an autoethnographic account to detail the impact that news coverage on crime in Cincinnati can have on minority individuals who do not reside in the inner city. Finally, this essay further establishes the role—intentional or unintentional—that reporters and journalists play in community and public relations issues.

Book Review: Thussu, D. K. (2007). News as Entertainment: The Rise of Global Infotainment. London: Sage

Kumar, S. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

Book Review: Goldstein, P., & Machor, J. L. (2008). New Directions in American Reception Study. New York: Oxford University Press

Roessner, A. — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:19:59 PST

Editor's Introduction

Johnson, R. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

Marketing Science: The Corporate Faces of Genetic Engineering

Fennell, D. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

The controversy over genetically engineered foods can be seen as a struggle over knowledge, whose version of truth will be accepted. Drawing off frameworks from social studies of science, the following is a qualitative content analysis of the corporate ideology of "life science" companies. The texts of five companies, from the time period of 2000 to 2003, are analyzed. Somewhat paradoxically, companies attempt to juggle the multiple tasks of branding/selling a unique product while acting as a teacher to the general public and presenting seemingly unbiased and objective knowledge. Companies rely on many of the discursive tactics previously outlined by researchers, while appearing to modify them somewhat to respond to public controversy. However, although it has been asserted that modern times have created a postmodern society where science loses its grand authority, companies work to reaffirm modern notions of science as progress even though claiming they are engaging in dialogue with the public.

Coming to You "Live": Exclusive Witnessing and the Battlefield Reporter

Brockus, S. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

Operation Iraqi Freedom marked not only the U.S. military's second foray into Iraq in just over a decade but also an unprecedented partnership between the U.S. government and corporate media outlets. Some 600 journalists—sanctioned, select teams of reporters and camera crews—were given battlefield training and allowed to live and travel with U.S. troops. This article argues that embed accounts thus were exclusive, both as the purview of a given network and as a form of reporting that excluded more expansive coverage in favor of a highly individualized viewpoint.

Authenticating Subcultural Identities: African American and Jamaican English in Niche Media

Kuppens, A. H. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

This article discusses the hybrid language practices of presenters of hip-hop and reggae programs in Flemish niche media. A qualitative linguistic analysis shows that different varieties of English are employed depending on the particular subcultural affiliation of these programs. In-depth interviews with presenters reveal that in using African American and Jamaican English, they authenticate their subcultural membership vis-à-vis their listeners. It is concluded that by mixing these varieties with standard American English and Dutch, presenters exemplify an adherence to a "hybrid authenticity," in which the global (subcultural) and the local are creatively fused.

Digital Subculture: A Geek Meaning of Style

McArthur, J.A. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

Recent scholarship in critical/cultural studies and ethnography has suggested studies of youth subculture can no longer be solely centered around musical preference and that the Internet may be a new resource for the affiliation and expression of subcultural identity. This study furthers this scholarship through the analysis of one such group: the "geeks." Through examination of Internet sites devoted to the subculture, this analysis argues that geeks who affiliate in self-assigned Web-based chat rooms demonstrate the characteristics, community, and style common to the expanding conceptualizations of Internet-based subculture. This study adds strength to the argument that the Internet can simultaneously be a gathering site for subculturalists and a medium for expression of subcultural identity.

Book Review: Virno, Paolo. (2008). Multitude: Between Innovation and Negation. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e)

Bratich, J. Z. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

Book Review: Ouellette, L., & Hay, J. (2008). Better Living Through Reality TV: Television and Post-Welfare Citizenship. Malden, MA: Blackwell

Hye Jin Lee, — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

Book Review: Thiel Stern, Shayla. (2007). Instant Identity: Adolescent Girls and the World of Instant Messaging. New York: Peter Lang

Vickery, J. R. — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:36:40 PST

Journal of Communication Inquiry recent issues

Guest Editor Introduction: Media Reform and Public Policy

Interview With Robert McChesney

Taking Root in the Sunshine State: The Emergence of the Media Reform Movement in the State of Florida

Public Participation and Agency Discretion in Rulemaking at the Federal Communications Commission

Reforming Policy to Promote Local Broadband Networks

Efficient Servants of Pluralism or Marginalized Media Policy Tools?: The Case of Swedish Press Subsidies

Open Sourcing Our Way to an Online Commons: Contesting Corporate Impermeability in the New Media Ecology

Resisting Abridgment Librarianship as Media Reform

Book Review: Hall, G. (2008). Digitize This Book! The Politics of New Media, or Why We Need Open Access Now. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 301 pages, $19.95

Thanks to Reviewers

Facing Barack Hussein Obama: Race, Globalization, and Transnational America

More Than Just Free Content: Motivations of Peer-to-Peer File Sharers

Love as Redemption: The American Dream Myth and the Celebrity Biopic

Social Control in an American Pacific Island: Guam's Local Newspaper Reports on Liberation

Media Criticism as Competitive Discourse: Defining Reportage of the Abu Ghraib Scandal

Dialogues in Communication Research: Bratich, J. Z. (2008). Conspiracy Panics: Political Rationality and Popular Culture. Albany: State University of New York Press

Book Review: Haraway, D. J. (2008). When Species Meet. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota

Book Review: Gray, J., Jones, J. P., & Thompson, E. (2009). Satire TV: Politics and Comedy in the Post-Network Era. New York: NYU Press

Book Review: Park D. W., & Pooley, J. (Eds.). (2008). The History of Media and Communication Research: Contested Memories. New York: Peter Lang

Editor's Introduction

Where the Girls Are in the Age of New Sexism: An Interview With Susan Douglas

Constructing Breast Cancer in the News: Betty Ford and the Evolution of the Breast Cancer Patient

A Concept of Autonomy for Critical Communication Studies

Blasphemous Allusion: Coming of Age in South Park

Walking in Fear: An Autoethnographic Account of Media Framing of Inner-City Crime

Book Review: Thussu, D. K. (2007). News as Entertainment: The Rise of Global Infotainment. London: Sage

Book Review: Goldstein, P., & Machor, J. L. (2008). New Directions in American Reception Study. New York: Oxford University Press

Editor's Introduction

Marketing Science: The Corporate Faces of Genetic Engineering

Coming to You "Live": Exclusive Witnessing and the Battlefield Reporter

Authenticating Subcultural Identities: African American and Jamaican English in Niche Media

Digital Subculture: A Geek Meaning of Style

Book Review: Virno, Paolo. (2008). Multitude: Between Innovation and Negation. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e)

Book Review: Ouellette, L., & Hay, J. (2008). Better Living Through Reality TV: Television and Post-Welfare Citizenship. Malden, MA: Blackwell

Book Review: Thiel Stern, Shayla. (2007). Instant Identity: Adolescent Girls and the World of Instant Messaging. New York: Peter Lang