scholarly journals Answering for Islam: Journalistic and Islamic Conceptions of Authority

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 435 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael B. Munnik
Keyword(s):  
Media Coverage ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Professional Experience ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Real People ◽  
Official Sources

Media representations of Muslims in Britain have often disappointed both faith practitioners and scholars. Imputed failings include distorting beliefs or practices, essentialising the faith, and amplifying voices that are not representative of Islam. This last factor hinges on questions of authority: what journalists and Muslims recognise as authority can differ in important ways. Drawing on studies of journalism practice, prior professional experience, and ethnographic fieldwork and qualitative interviews in Scotland, I discuss the conventional preference among journalists for “official sources” and the problems this can present in terms of hierarchy in Islam. I contrast this with a less-studied imperative, also present in newsrooms, for “real people”. This category matches well with Islam’s decentralised tradition and presents an opportunity to understand how different kinds of sources are presented in media coverage. It is possible for journalists to ensure that these differing claims to authority are represented properly, though this requires knowledge and responsibility.

A corpus-based study of representation of Islam and Muslims in American media: Critical Discourse Analysis Approach

2021 ◽  
pp. 174804852098744
Author(s):  
Ke Li ◽  
Qiang Zhang
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
New York Times ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
The New York Times ◽  
Strong Conclusion ◽  
American Media

Media representations have significant power to shape opinions and influence public response to communities or groups around the world. This study investigates media representations of Islam and Muslims in the American media, drawing upon an analysis of reports in the New York Times over a 17-year period (from Jan.1, 2000 to Dec. 31, 2016) within the framework of Critical Discourse Analysis. It examines how Islam and Muslims are represented in media coverage and how discursive power is penetrated step by step through such media representations. Most important, it investigates whether Islam and Muslims have been stigmatized through stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination. The findings reveal that the New York Times’ representations of Islam and Muslims are negative and stereotypical: Islam is stereotyped as the unacclimatized outsider and the turmoil maker and Muslims as the negative receiver. The stereotypes contribute to people’s prejudice, such as Islamophobia from the “us” group and fear of the “them” group but do not support a strong conclusion of discrimination.

scholarly journals Conditions for Workplace Learning as a New First-Line Manager in Elderly Care

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karin Wastesson ◽  
Anna Fogelberg Eriksson ◽  
Peter Nilsson ◽  
Maria Gustavsson
Keyword(s):  
Workplace Learning ◽  
Elderly Care ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Professional Experience ◽  
Learning Needs ◽  
Work Experiences ◽  
First Line ◽  
Line Managers ◽  
Learning Conditions ◽  
Line Manager

AbstractThe purpose of this article is to explore first-line managers’ experiences of workplace learning in elderly care, with a particular focus on the conditions for learning when entering a new workplace as the new manager. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 35 first-line managers from three organisations in Sweden. Four learning conditions emerged as being particularly significant for first-line managers: the managers’ previous professional experience, job-specific training, social support, and the joint repertoire of organisational arrangements. These conditions shifted in importance during the process of entering the workplace, and the way in which the conditions gave access to learning for different managers varied. The managers’ professional experience and others’ recognition of them had a considerable impact on their admittance to the new workplace. After the initial entry phase, the other three learning conditions became more significant and played a role in enabling or constraining the managers’ learning and becoming the new manager. One conclusion is that contextual and work experiences from elderly care were significant for learning during the initial phase and in order to gain access to workplace learning. Another conclusion is that high expectations and great responsibility were placed on the managers to satisfy their own learning needs. This implies that professional, social and emotional support that is received informally is just as significant for learning as formalised training for entering a new workplace as a new manager.

The American Ghetto, Gangster, and Respect on the Streets of Copenhagen: Media(tion)s between Structure and Street Culture

2021 ◽  
pp. 089124162110569
Author(s):  
Hakan Kalkan
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Cultural Factors ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Structural Factors ◽  
Perceived Similarity ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Street Culture ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Relationship

“Street culture” is often considered a response to structural factors. However, the relationship between culture and structure has rarely been empirically analyzed. This article analyzes the role of three media representations of American street culture and gangsters—two films and the music of a rap artist—in the street culture of a disadvantaged part of Copenhagen. Based on years of ethnographic fieldwork, this article demonstrates that these media representations are highly valuable to and influential among young men because of their perceived similarity between their intersectional structural positions and those represented in the media. Thus, the article illuminates the interaction between structural and cultural factors in street culture. It further offers a local explanation of the scarcely studied phenomenon of the influence of mass media on street culture, and a novel, media-based, local explanation of global similarities in different street cultures.

We’ve Come a Long Way, But We Could Be Doing Better: Gendered Commentary in U.S. Media Coverage of the 1999 and 2019 Women’s World Cup

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Eileen Díaz McConnell ◽  
Neal Christopherson ◽  
Michelle Janning
Keyword(s):  
Contrast Media ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Hard Work ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
World Cup ◽  
National Team ◽  
Gender Based ◽  
First World ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Over Time

In 2019, the U.S. Women’s National Team earned its fourth FIFA Women’s World Cup. Has gendered commentary in media coverage about the U.S. Women’s National Team changed since winning their first World Cup 20 years ago? Drawing on 188 newspaper articles published in three U.S. newspapers in 2019, the analyses contrast media representations of the 2019 team with a previous study focused on coverage of the 1999 team. Our analysis shows important shifts in the coverage over time. The 1999 team was popular because of their contradictory femininity in which they were “strong-yet-soft.” By 2019, the team’s popularity was rooted in their talent, hard work, success, and refusal to be silent about persisting gender-based disparities in sport and the larger society.

scholarly journals ‘Do We Look like Boy Racers?’ The Role of the Folk Devil in Contemporary Moral Panics

2009 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen Lumsden
Keyword(s):  
Moral Panic ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Moral Panics ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Young Drivers ◽  
The Media ◽  
Collective Process ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Societal Reaction

This article addresses the failure of studies concerning moral panics to take into account the reaction of those individuals who are the subject of social anxiety. It responds to the suggestion by McRobbie and Thornton (1995) that studies of moral panic need to account for the role played by the ‘folk devils’ themselves, for a moral panic is a collective process (Young, 2007). The paper presents findings from ethnographic fieldwork with the ‘boy racer’ culture in Aberdeen, qualitative interviews with members of outside groups, and content analysis of media articles. The societal reaction to the ‘boy racer’ subculture in Aberdeen is evidence of a contemporary moral panic. The media's representation of the subculture contributed to the stigmatization of young drivers and the labelling of the subculture's activities as deviant and antisocial. The drivers were aware of their negative portrayal in the media; however their attempts to change the myth of the ‘boy racer’ were unsuccessful. Although subcultural media can provide an outlet of self-expression for youths, these forms of media can also become caught-up in the moral panic. Ironically the youths’ own niche and micro media reified the (ir)rationality for the moral panic.

“Don’t Mess Around with Gordie”: Hockey Violence, the 1959 Gordie Howe-Lou Fontinato Fight, and Postwar Masculinity

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stacy L. Lorenz ◽  
Braeden McKenzie
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Role Model ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
World War ◽  
Professional Career ◽  
Cultural Constructions ◽  
Second World ◽  
The Ideal

This article explores cultural constructions of hockey, violence, and masculinity through a close examination of one of the game’s most successful and prominent players in the postwar period, Gordie Howe. By combining skill and scoring ability with toughness, physicality, and a willingness to fight when necessary, Howe epitomized many qualities of the ideal hockey player over the course of his lengthy professional career, which extended from 1946 to 1980. In particular, this study focuses on media coverage of Howe’s highly publicized fight against Lou Fontinato of the New York Rangers on February 1, 1959. Using Canadian and American newspapers and magazines as the primary research base, we analyze media representations of Gordie Howe in the context of ideals and anxieties related to North American masculinity following the Second World War. Historians have identified this period as a time when Canadian and American manhood was perceived to be in decline. We argue that Howe demonstrated a combination of controlled violence and humble manliness suggested by his early nickname in the Detroit press, the“Bashful Basher.” Howe’s rational and expert application of violence – especially in contrast to the emotional Fontinato – firmly established his masculine credentials within the culture of hockey, while positioning him more widely as a “modern” yet rugged role model for masculine renewal in postwar Canada. Howe’s example of gentlemanly masculinity normalized and celebrated a culture of fighting in hockey while establishing a standard of conduct for superstar players that persists to the present day. At the same time, cultural constructions of Howe’s manhood contributed to the entrenchment of a dominant version of heroic, white, heteronormative hockey masculinity in Canadian life.

The Eloquent Blood

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manon Hedenborg White
Keyword(s):  
Feminist Theory ◽  
Female Sexuality ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Sexual Freedom ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Positive Reinterpretation ◽  
Feminine Sexuality ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Western Esotericism ◽  
Written Sources

The study analyzes constructions of femininity and feminine sexuality in interpretations of the goddess Babalon, a central deity in the British occultist Aleister Crowley’s (1875–1947) religion Thelema. Babalon is based on Crowley’s positive reinterpretation of the biblical Whore of Babylon and symbolizes liberated female sexuality and the spiritual modality of passionate union with existence. Analyzing historical and contemporary written sources, qualitative interviews, and ethnographic fieldwork in the Anglo-American esoteric milieu, the study traces interpretations of Babalon from the works of Crowley and some of his key disciples—including the rocket scientist John Whiteside “Jack” Parsons and the enigmatic British occultist Kenneth Grant—from the fin-de-siècle to the present. From the 1990s onward, female and LGBTQ esotericists have challenged historical interpretations of Babalon, drawing on feminist and queer thought and conceptualizing femininity in new ways. Femininity has held a problematic position in feminist theory, often being associated with lack, artifice, and restriction. However, the present study—which assumes that femininities are neither exclusively heterosexual nor limited to women—indicates how interpretations of Babalon have both built on and challenged dominant gender logics. As the first academic monograph to analyze Crowley’s and his followers’ ideas from the perspective of gender, this book contributes to the underexplored study of gender in Western esotericism. By analyzing the development of a misogynistic biblical symbol into an image of feminine sexual freedom, the study also sheds light on interactions between Western esotericism and broader cultural and sociopolitical trends.

Media Representations of Domestic Violence

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Meda Chesney-Lind ◽  
Nicholas Chagnon
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Violence ◽  
Sexual Assault ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Routine Manner ◽  
The Media

Though it is generally given less attention than sexual assault, domestic violence is quite often depicted in corporate media products, including news broadcasts, television shows, and films. Mediated depictions of domestic violence share many of the same problems as those of sexual assault. In particular, the media tends to imply that women are somehow culpable when they are being beaten, even murdered, by their partners. News on domestic violence is often reported in a routine manner that focuses on minutiae instead of context, informing audiences minimally about the nature, extent, and causes of domestic violence. Though it is encouraging that over the past several decades the media has begun to acknowledge that domestic violence is a serious problem, this recognition is challenged by antifeminist claims-making in the media. Such challenges generally cite contested social science research as proof that feminist research on domestic violence is biased and inaccurate. Furthermore, media representations of domestic violence often supply racializing and class-biased discourses about abusers and their victims that frame domestic violence as largely the product of marginalized classes, rather a problem that affects the various strata of society. Since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, media coverage of the violence against women abroad, particularly in Islamic nations, has provided more racializing discourse, which juxtaposes “progressive” Western cultures with “backward” Eastern ones. On the domestic front, news focusing on indigenous communities replicates some of the racism inherent in the orientalist gaze applied to domestic violence abroad. Generally, the media do a poor job of cultivating a sophisticated understanding of domestic violence among the public. Thus, many researchers argue such media representations constitute a hegemonic patriarchal ideology, which obfuscates the issue of domestic violence, as well as the underlying social relations that create the phenomenon.

scholarly journals ‘Battle of the sixes’: Investigating print media representations of female professional golfers competing in a men’s tour event

2019 ◽  
Vol 55 (6) ◽  
pp. 664-684 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Bowes ◽  
Niamh Kitching
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Thematic Analysis ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Print Media ◽  
Female Athletes ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Media Representation ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Professional Golfers

In May 2018, the men’s European Tour invited five female professional golfers to compete in its GolfSixes event in England, against 27 professional male players. This was significant, particularly given the female struggle for equality of access, participation, employment and decision making in golf settings. This research investigates the print media representation of these five female professional golfers competing in this male domain. Using the Nexis database, data were collected from print newspapers in the United Kingdom and Ireland over six days before, during and after the event. Following thematic analysis, findings highlight a double-edged sword with regard to media coverage of female athletes competing against men: women received greater media coverage when in the male sport spotlight, but the coverage was framed by gendered discourses. The results document a slow shift towards more equal and equitable print media coverage of female athletes, whilst drawing attention to the problematic ways in which sportswomen are represented.

Beyond ‘Token’ Firefighters: Exploring Women's Experiences of Gender and Identity at Work

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamika Perrott
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Change ◽  
Emergency Services ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Fire Service ◽  
Leadership Roles ◽  
Personal Agency ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Gendered Organizations ◽  
Women's Narratives ◽  
Token Status

Despite the increasing percentage of women entering masculinized workplaces, certain organizations consistently see little change in the gender makeup of their staff. Contemporary scholarship suggests that women in rigidly gendered organizations are often assigned a token status and are victimized due to their gender. This study relocates the conversations of women as tokens towards a fresh conversation of women's agency in masculinized workplaces. This paper uses ten qualitative interviews and ethnographic fieldwork to discuss how female firefighters navigate their gender at work. This article draws on reflexive accounts of everyday gendered negotiations to look at how the female firefighters ‘do gender’ within a specific fire service in Australia. I argue that emergency services, such as firefighting, create a contradictory field where women are located in (1) a paradoxical environment where the ‘female body’ is problematized (2) a work environment where they have to repeatedly prove their cultural competence in order to confirm their professional identity. The findings suggest that while female firefighters do have agency, tokenism locates many of them in a ‘never quite there’ bind that challenges their ability to progress into leadership roles within the service. This article concludes that the nuanced difference between, and at times, within the women's narratives problematizes the bounds of personal agency and cultural change. This consequently results in resistance to policies by some women that may benefit like-situated women, such as affirmative action.

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