Media witnessing: exploring the audience of distant suffering

Kyriakidou, Maria

doi:10.1177/0163443714557981

Cited by 76 publications

(63 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…Studier har vist at lidelse i nyhetsbildet kan ha negativ effekt på mennesker som lider av depresjoner (Potts & Sanchez, 1994, s. 87). Slike resultater beskrives også av Kyriakidou (2015) i hennes undersøkelse av ulike reaksjonsmønstre knyttet til mediert lidelse. I et av reaksjonsmønstrene, «affective witnessing», gjenga informantene lidelsen de hadde fått formidlet gjennom intense, følelsesmessige uttalelser.…”

Section: Nyheter Er Nyttige Men Når Ikke Alleunclassified

Sjeldenkonsumenter av nyheter: Holdning tilnyhetsmedier, medborgerskap og forklaringer på sjeldenkonsum blantunge voksne

Helgerud¹

2017

NMT

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Those who rarely consume news are often described as a democratic problem. While later research has devoted more time to the group, we still lack an understanding of basic concepts regarding their thoughts on the role of news in democracy, as well as their own role as citizens, and, most importantly, explanations concerning their low consumption of news. The informants of this qualitative study speak negatively of the news media, criticizing both content and form in light of their social responsibility. Several of the informants are engaged and interested in the public, while others are to a large extent disconnected from the public sphere. The study finds three explanations related to the low degree of news consumption: (1) overwhelming feelings of compassion towards news of human suffering; (2) focus on close relations and a low interest for both the content and the form of news, and (3) the need to prioritize time, specifically with regards to career development. It is argued that these characteristics play an important role in understanding how the informants see their role as citizens.

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Section: Nyheter Er Nyttige Men Når Ikke Alleunclassified

Sjeldenkonsumenter av nyheter: Holdning tilnyhetsmedier, medborgerskap og forklaringer på sjeldenkonsum blantunge voksne

Helgerud¹

2017

NMT

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“…In the domain cultural studies, such research can often be located under the rubric of 'audience witnessing' or, more mundanely, 'audience reactions' (see e.g Höijer, 2004;Kyriakidou, 2015;Seu, 2010)…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The moral mechanism of counter accounts: The case of industrial animal production

Vinnari

Laine

2017

Accounting, Organizations and Society

111

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Counter accounts are hoped to present a counterforce to hegemonic discourses and bring about emancipatory change in societies. While the political potential of counter accounts has, to an extent, been examined in prior accounting literature, there is a need to analyse the associated moral dimension. Our purpose in this paper is to advance theoretical understanding of the transformative potential of counter accounts by examining how they mediate the suffering of oppressed groups and how that mediation could lead to public action. Through a conceptual lens combining media studies and critical discourse analysis, we analyse counter accounts of animal production created by social movement activists in Finland. We find that, in general terms, the transformative potential of counter accounts is associated with their ability to act as a form of moral and political education, by repeatedly suggesting to their audiences how to feel about, and act publicly on, the suffering of an oppressed group. The moral engagement of the counter accounts' audiences takes place through a combination of semiotic cues that simultaneously present the suffering as an objective fact, evoke sympathy towards the oppressed group and present practical options on how to act on the suffering. We also note that counter accounts can give rise to different ethical discourses and practical engagement options depending on the media and semiotic cues employed in their construction. This leaves room for discourses that acknowledge some of the concerns presented in the counter accounts but point towards actions that do not threaten the status quo.

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“…The latter are described as global, because they are of a "much bigger scale." What renders the loss of the Russian submarine a global disaster, however, as described here by the participant, is the fact that, through its global broadcasting, it places viewers around the world into the position of witnesses (Kyriakidou, 2015). This sense of virtually unmediated witnessing is expressed through temporal and spatial deixis ("you have for entire days a submarine with people inside slowly dying," "and then it finally ends.…”

Section: Connecting To the Global Audiencementioning

confidence: 92%

“…What is mostly interesting, however, is the distinction between disasters in the “broader sense” such as the loss of Kursk submarine and the Challenger space shuttle explosion and disasters such as environmental ones. The latter are described as global, because they are of a “much bigger scale.” What renders the loss of the Russian submarine a global disaster, however, as described here by the participant, is the fact that, through its global broadcasting, it places viewers around the world into the position of witnesses (Kyriakidou, ). This sense of virtually unmediated witnessing is expressed through temporal and spatial deixis (“you have for entire days a submarine with people inside slowly dying,” “and then it finally ends.”), as well as the sense of helplessness created by the spectacle of death (“you feel like you cannot help, you can't do anything”).…”

Section: Connecting To the Global Audiencementioning

confidence: 98%