Media Reproduction of Nationalism in the Czech Republic: Routine, Ritual and the Realm of Popular Culture

ŠTĚTKA, Václav. Media Reproduction of Nationalism in the Czech Republic: Routine, Ritual and the Realm of Popular Culture. In Vašečka, M. (ed.): Nation über alles: Processes of redefinition and reconstruction of the term nation in Central Europe. Bratislava: CVEK, 2008, s. 35-57. ISBN 978-80-970088-7-1.

Základní údaje

• Originální název: Media Reproduction of Nationalism in the Czech Republic: Routine, Ritual and the Realm of Popular Culture
• Autoři: ŠTĚTKA, Václav.
• Vydání: Bratislava, Vašečka, M. (ed.): Nation über alles: Processes of redefinition and reconstruction of the term nation in Central Europe, od s. 35-57, 23 s. 2008.
• Nakladatel: CVEK

Další údaje

• Typ výsledku: Kapitola resp. kapitoly v odborné knize
• Utajení: není předmětem státního či obchodního tajemství
• Organizační jednotka: Fakulta sociálních studií
• ISBN: 978-80-970088-7-1
• Příznaky: Mezinárodní význam, Recenzováno

Anotace

This paper deals with the role of mass media in processes of maintaining and reproducing nationalistic discourse in the Czech Republic. It focuses both on media mechanisms which help sustaining the dominant concepts of Czech nation and national identity, as well as on ways in which the media contribute to challenging the hegemonic notion of what it means to be "Czech" and establishing some new, alternative models for national self-identification of its audience. The opening part of the paper is devoted to the brief presentation of a theoretical framework for analyzing the role of mainstream media as one of the key agents in maintaining and strengthening symbolic boundaries of an established nation-state. Drawing mostly on theoretical contributions of Michael Billig, Daniel Dayan and Elihu Katz, the author reviews some of the most important forms of the nation-integrative effects of the mass media, which are both explicit and ritualistic (media representations of ceremonial events, uniting the national community through the confirmation of its core norms and values) as well as implicit and more "routine" ones (presentation and habitual reproduction of the nationalistic discourse within the sphere of everyday life). Then, the author attempts to empirically examine the working of both of these mechanisms on the present-day Czech media scene. For this purpose, he uses an analytical model developed by Michael Billig, consisting of a textual analysis of headlines of the news stories drawn from a one-day sample of Czech national newspapers, as well as a small sample of texts from several consecutive years, illustrating the way the Czech media frame an event which, from the nationalistic point of view, is perhaps the most significant Czech sports event of every year – the World Ice Hockey Championship. Following that, attention is turned to the realm of popular culture and to the question of whether the new TV genres and formats which are now being broadcast enable for a re-definition of the traditional understanding of national identity and could be opening up space for a more inclusive (or, more "western") concept of the Czech nation. In this context, the author examines the 2005 Czech Search for Superstar contest, a local version of the global format Pop Idol, which, in the final stages of its second run in Spring 2005, raised an interesting and widely welcomed challenge for the tense ethnic relations between the majority society and the Roma minority.