Journal Articles
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://mro.massey.ac.nz/handle/10179/7915
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Item Seven theses about the so-called culture war(s) (or some fragmentary notes on ‘cancel culture’)(1/01/2023) Phelan SHow might we understand the forms of mediatized politics that are signified under the dreary heading of the ‘culture war(s)’? This article addresses this question in the form of seven theses. Informed by a distinct theoretical reading of Laclau and Mouffe’s concept of antagonism, I highlight the anti-political character of culture war discourses, particularly as amplified in a public culture dominated by the social media industry. The seven theses are prefaced by an overview of the category of ‘cancel culture’, in light of its recent prominence as an object of culture war discourse. I highlight the primary role of far-right actors in the normalization of culture-war conflicts that persecute different identities, but also critique the online left’s entanglement in sedimented antagonisms that primarily benefit reactionary actors. The theses stress the repressive effects of culture war discourses on our collective political imagination. They redescribe some of the fault lines of a familiar terrain by thematizing the differences between a moralized and radical democratic understanding of political antagonism.Item 'Just doing their job?' Journalism, online critique and the political resignation of Metiria Turei(SAGE Publications, 18/03/2019) Phelan S; Salter LAAbstract When Metiria Turei resigned as co-leader of the Green party of Aotearoa New Zealand in August 2017, there was clear disagreement about the role played by journalism in her resignation. The controversy began after Turei confessed to not disclosing full information to the authorities about her personal situation as a welfare recipient in the 1990s. Journalists insisted they were simply ‘doing their job’ by interrogating Turei’s story, while online supporters accused the media of hounding her. This article examines the media politics of the controversy by putting Carlson’s concept of metajournalistic discourse into theoretical conversation with Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory, especially their concept of antagonism. We explore what the case says about traditional journalistic authority in a media system where journalism is increasingly vulnerable to online critique from non-journalists.Item Journalism ‘fixers’, hyper-precarity and the violence of the entrepreneurial self(1/07/2023) Ashraf SI; Phelan SThe figure of the so-called journalism ‘fixer’ has received overdue academic attention in recent years. Scholars have highlighted the role played by fixers in international news reporting, a role historically obscured in the mythos of the Western foreign correspondent. Recent research has produced useful insights about the work done by fixers in ‘the shadows’ of the international news economy. However, it has also tended towards a domestication of the role, where the local ‘fixer’ finds their place in a collaborative relationship with those officially consecrated as ‘journalists’ from elsewhere. This article presents a critical theoretical analysis of this functional role, building on the image of the fixer as a kind of ‘entrepreneur’. Rather than interpreting the latter designation as a source of empowerment or agency, we approach it as a euphemism for the hyper-precarious and exploitative underpinnings of fixer-labour. Our argument draws on different theoretical sources, including Foucault-inspired work on the entrepreneurial rationality of the neoliberal self, Bourdieu’s notion of symbolic violence, and Rancière’s concept of politics. The theoretical argument is supported by the first author’s reflections of working as a Pakistani-based ‘fixer’ during the U.S-led war on terror.Item Neoliberalism and authoritarian media cultures: a Vietnamese perspective(1/03/2022) Yến-Khanh N; Phelan S; Gray EThis study asks how the concept of neoliberalism can be adapted to a critical analysis of authoritarian political and media cultures that cannot be adequately understood through the Western-centric narratives that dominate the literature on neoliberalism. We examine the case of Vietnam, a country where the relationship between the media system and the political system is defined primarily by the power of the party-state autocracy. We explore the extent to which neoliberalism is a useful theoretical category for grasping the relationship between state, market, and civil society actors in Vietnam, especially as it relates to the media system. Supported by an analysis of how Vietnamese news media cover healthcare and education for people with autism, we conclude by extrapolating three theoretical-methodological guidelines that will be useful to researchers examining the relationship between neoliberalism and authoritarian political and media cultures in different countries.
