Mainstream Media Discourse! Or the Divine Word of the Postmodern?

• Authors: Yasser Rhimi
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

This paper calls into question the growing tendency of quasi-absolutism within postmodern mainstream media discourse under the guise of objectivity. The tendency’s major aim is to ascribe more believability to its discourse by re-presenting that which it covers as the vehicle of objective truth to the mainstream audience. Two interweaving discourses have marked such objectivity: one in the form of indoctrinating and omnipresent narratives, which via effective propaganda become tantamount to ritualism, the other epitomised in the nostalgia for rationalisation, already inherent in western positivist thought through the exponential increase of quasi-empiricism (e.g. investigative reporting or speculative statistics). Accordingly, what the media cover exists. What they do not remains in the order of myth. The article starts by rethinking objectivity within modern western academia, a discourse whose objectivity is already flawed from within. Then, with respect to human experience and media coverage, the paper concludes by raising the question of postmodern mainstream media’s substitution of religious quasi-absolutist narratives, be they secular or non-secular. Subjectivity thus emerges as the ultimate ground upon which our being may be legitimate.

Keywords

EN

Ex-act; Subjective-embodiment; Propaganda; Ritualism; Rationalisation; Quasi-absolutism; Transcendence; (de)Legitimation

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Human and Social Studies
• Year: 2016
• Volume: 5
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 40-73

Dates

published

2016-06-01

online

2016-07-07

Contributors

author

Yasser Rhimi

• University of Tunis, Tunisia

References

• Abu Nimah, H. (2009). “Covering up Israel’s Gaza Crimes with UN Help.” The Electronic Intifada. 12 May 2009. Web. 12 Oct. 2015. <>
• Aloni, U. (2010). “Judith Butler: As a Jew, I Was Taught It Was Ethically Imperative to Speak Up.” Haaretz. Web. 24 Feb.2010. < <>
• Amnesty International. “USA: Stop Arms Transfers to Israel Amid Growing Evidence of War Crimes in Gaza.” Web. 31 Jul. 2014. <>
• Baudrillard, J. (1994). Simulacra and Simulation. Trans. Sheila Faria Glaser. Michigan: U of Michigan Press. Print.
• Bourdieu, P. (1998). On Television. Trans. Priscilla Parkhurst Ferguson. NY: NY Press. Print.
• “Charlie Hebdo Attack: Three Days of Terror.” BBC.com. Web. 07 Jan. 2015. <>
• Chomsky, N. (2002). Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda (2nd edition). NY: Open Media. Print.
• Chomsky, N. (2014). Chomsky, Noam. Power Systems: Conversations with David Barsamian on Global Democratic Uprisings and The new Challenges to US Empire. London: Penguin Books. Print.
• Coronel, S. (2014). “Is It Really Investigative Reporting’s Golden Age? Global Investigative Journalism Network. 21 Oct. 2014. Web. 02 Oct. 2015. <>
• Corwin, P. (2011). “Foreword.” The Srebrenica Massacre: Evidence, Context, Politics. Ed. Edward S. Herman. Creative Commons Attribution, 2011. Web. 02 Oct. 2015. <>
• Cranford, N. (2015). “Difference Between Positivist, Interpretive and Critical Sociology.” Demand Media. Seattlepi. Web. 10 Jun. 2015. <>l
• Dallaire, R. (2007). “The Media Dichotomy.” The Media and the Rwanda Genocide. Ed. Allan Thompson. London: Pluto Press. Print.
• Debord, G. (2006). The Society of the Spectacle. Trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith. NY: Zone Books. Print.
• Erickson, B. (2015). “How The NY Times Hides the Scandal of US-Israeli War Crimes.” TimesWarp. Web. 21 Sep. 2015. >
• Foucault, M. (2002). The Archaeology of Knowledge. Trans. A. M. S. Smith. London: Routledge Classics. Print.
• Friedman, M. (2014). “What the Media Gets Wrong About Israel.” The Atlantic. Web. 30 Nov. 2014. <>
• Gonzalez-Mena, J., et al. (2010). “The Media as an Influence on Socialization.” Education.com. Web. 20 Jul. 2010. <>
• Hassan, R. (2004). Media, Politics and the Network Society. NY: Open UP. Print.
• Hartley, J. (2002). “Mediasphere”. Communication, Cultural and Media Studies: The Key Concepts (3rd. ed.).London: Routledge.
• Herman, Edward. S., and Noam Chomsky. (1988). Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass media. NY: Pantheon Books. Print.
• History.<>
• Hussain, E. and M. Jahanzaib. (2015). “Genocide of Muslims in Myanmar.” Daily Times Pakistan. Web. 06 Jun. 2015. <>
• Husserl, E. (2008). Historical Dictionary of Existentialism. Ed. Stephen Michelman. Toronto: The Scarecrow Press. Print.
• “ISIS Sex Atrocities: Child rape, Forced Virginity Surgeries Exposed in UN Report.” Russia Today. Web. 09 May 2015. <>
• “Journalistic Objectivity.” Pediaview: Open Source Encyclopedia. Web. 01 Oct. 2015.<>
• Kamalipour, Y. R., and Nancy Snow, eds. (2004). War, Media and Propaganda: A Global Perspective. NY: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers. Print. 2015. <>
• Katz, J. M. (2015). “In Chapel Hill, Suspect’s Rage Went Beyond a Parking Dispute.” The New York Times. Web. 03 Mar. 2015. <>
• Laville, S. (2015). “UN Aid Worker Suspended for Leaking Report on Child Abuse by French Troops.” The Guardian. Web. 29 Apr. 2015. <>
• Lyotard, J.-F. (1984). The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge. Trans. Bennington and Brian Massumi. Manchester: Manchester UP. Print.
• Machin, D. and T. Van Leeuwen. (2007). Global Media Discourse: A Critical Introduction. London: Routledge. Print.
• McKibben, B. (2006). The Age of Missing Information. NY: Random House, 2006. Print.
• Merleau-Ponty, M. (2005). Phenomenology of Perception. Trans. Colin Smith. London: Routledge. Print.
• Moran, J. (2002). Interdisciplinarity. London: Routledge. Print.
• Murphy, E. (2010). “Perceptions of the International Media in Post-Conflict Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina.” Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection, (2010): 1-39. Web. <>
• “Objective.” Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (New 8th edition): International Student’s Edition. Oxford: Oxford UP., 2010. Print.
• Ore, J. (2015). “Royal Baby Birth Heralded by Politicians, Fans and Brands on Social Media.” CBS News. Web. 02 May 2015. <>
• Popper, K. (1957). The Poverty of Historicism. Boston: Beacon Press. Print.
• Popper, K. (1962). Conjectures and Refutations. London: Basic Books, 1962. Print.
• Popper, K. (2005). The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London: Routledge. Print.
• Robertson, R. (1995). “Glocalization: Time-Space and Homogeneity-Heterogeneity.” Global Modernities. Eds. Mike Featherstone, Scott Lash, and Roland Robertson. London: Sage Publications. 25-44. Print.
• Shelmon, C. (2013). Framed: How Colin Powell’s U.N. Speech on Iraq Set the News Agenda for American and British Television News. MA. Maryland: Maryland U.P., 2013. Web. 27 May 2015. <>
• Shermer, M. (2007). “The Really Hard Science.” Scientific American. 12 Sep. 2007. Web 02 Oct. 2015. <>
• Spivak, G. C. (1997). “Preface.” Of Grammatology (corrected edition). By Jacques Derrida. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins UP. Print.
• “The Big Four.” New Internationalist Magazine, 100 (June, 1981), n.a. Web. 03 Jun. 2015. <>
• “The Rwandan Genocide.” History. Web. 05 Oct. 2015. <>
• Turow, J. (2009). Media Today: An Introduction to Mass Communication (3ed ed.). NY: Routledge, 2009: 56. Print.
• Warren, M. (2012). “Interpretive and Critical Research: Methodological Blasphemy!” African Journal of Business Management 6.1, (January, 2012): 1-6.
• Žižek, S. (2012). Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism. London: Verso. Print.
• “19th Century Scientific Historiography.” Philosophy of History. The Internet Encyclopedia of History. Web. 02 Oct.2015.

Identifiers

DOI

10.1515/hssr-2016-0013