The Political in Cultural Journalism

Abstract

This article explores how nine Swedish cultural editors and managers in mainstream media institutions define cultural journalism and its political dimensions during times of increased digitization and media convergence. Swedish cultural journalism is aesthetic and political critique applied to subject areas (music, literature, etc.) and contemporary societal and ethical issues. Drawing on Zelizer we ask whether there is a common interpretive community of cultural journalists in different media regarding: (1) how they define their scope, (2) how they understand "the political" in cultural journalism and its implications for democracy, and (3) how they view media convergence and digitalization. We find that although editors/managers from different media share a basic understanding of cultural journalism as an alternative perspective to news, "the political" in cultural journalism is approached differently in the press and the public service broadcast media. Furthermore, due in part to structural conditions, they also see the effects of digitization differently, forming sub-communities on two counts. This study thus contributes new knowledge to a field previously focused almost exclusively on newspapers.

Cultural journalism—Journalism about culture

“…Few single country studies of production cultures have focused on the role perceptions and professional norms of cultural editors and journalists, especially in Northern-European contexts (Harries & Wahl-Jorgensen, 2007;Hovden & Knapskog, 2015;Riegert et al, 2015;Sarrimo, 2017;see Botma for the South-African context, 2008, though a broad, global comparison has also been made (Hovden & Kristensen, 2018). As indicated, these studies show that the cultural journalism production culture differs from other types of journalism cultures, but also that media systemic contexts matter.…”

“…Media systemic, market, and organisational structures may accentuate this diversity. Regional and local media often have fewer resources for designated cultural reporters or critics, while some national news media may use a strong cultural department as part of their media brand (e.g, Jaakkola, 2015;Kristensen, 2010;Riegert, Roosvall, & Widholm, 2015).…”

“…Others have argued that cultural journalists appear loyal towards artists and cultural producers, as they are often closely intertwined professionally or even personally, sharing the same passion for arts and culture (e.g., Forde, 2003;Kristensen, 2018). Hovden and Kristensen (2018) show that monitoring elites is less important to cultural journalists, who are more inclined to educate the audience, tell stories, and promote tolerance, i.e., to provide "a cultural filter" (Riegert et al, 2015;Roosvall & Widholm, 2018) on sociocultural issues. This is inconsistent with the adversary or watchdog role.…”

“…Chong (2017), among others, outlines how arts and cultural journalists are driven by different types of subjectivism, especially in reviews: bias, e.g., which cultural works are chosen for review, aka cultural gatekeeping; emotionality in terms of critical tone; and self-interest in terms of balancing self-publicising and giving due consideration for the work under review. In addition, cultural journalism and cultural criticism have a tradition of being performed by not only professionally trained journalists but also public intellectuals, critical thinkers, academics, and cultural columnists (e.g., Kristensen & From, 2015b;Riegert et al, 2015;Sarrimo, 2017) adhering to truth claims grounded in subjectivity, analysis, and expertise. They provide their interpretations, reflections, and multifaceted perspectives or their "cultural filter" in a distinct voice.…”

“…A common argument of much of this research is that scholars should abandon dichotomies such as fact/interpretation, objectivity/subjectivity, emotion/rationality, and hard/soft news. Interpretation, emotionality, and subjectivity cannot be reduced to the pejorative opposite of facts, rationality and objectivity, and the boundaries are blurring between hard news and soft news-and between the political and the cultural in journalism, one could add (Kristensen & Roosvall, 2017;Riegert et al, 2015;Roosvall & Widholm, 2018).…”