- Dep. of Media Studies and Journalism
Faculty of Social Studies
Masaryk University
Jostova 10
60200 Brno
Czech Republic - +420-54949-4740
Jakub Macek
Masaryk University, Department of Media Studies and Journalism, Faculty Member
- Media Studies, Media Sociology, New Media Studies, Digital Media, Digital Journalism, Computer-Mediated Communication, and 27 moreMass media, Mass Communication, Cybercultures, Intermedia, Digital Culture, Interactive and Digital Media, Discourse Analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis, Mediated Discourse Analysis, New Media, Media Theory, Media and Cultural Studies, Ethnography, Video Games, Virtual Communities, Cyberculture, Political Theory, Democracy, Twitter, Media and Democracy, Radical Democracy, Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC), Democracy and Cyber-Democracy Theory and Practice, Digital Theory and Culture, New Models Of Democracy, Political Participation, and Civic Engagementedit
This is an open access book. Media industry research and EU policymaking are predominantly tailored to large (and, in the latter case, Western) European markets. This open access book addresses the specific qualities of smaller media... more
This is an open access book. Media industry research and EU policymaking are predominantly tailored to large (and, in the latter case, Western) European markets. This open access book addresses the specific qualities of smaller media markets, highlighting their vulnerability to global digital competition and outlining survival strategies for them. New online distribution models and new trends in the consumption of audiovisual content are limited by, and pose new challenges for, existing audiovisual business models and their legal framework in the EU. The European Commission’s Digital Single Market (DSM) strategy, which was intended e.g. to remove obstacles to the cross-border distribution of audiovisual content, has triggered a heated debate on the transformation of the existing ecosystem for European screen industries. While most current discussions focus on the United States, Western Europe, and the multinational giants, this book approaches these industry trends and policy questions from the perspective of relatively small and peripheral (in terms of their population, language, cross-border cultural flows, and financial and/or symbolic capital) media markets.
Research Interests: Media Studies, Cultural Policy, Digital Media, Media Industries, Copyright (Law), and 15 moreFilm Industries, Film Distribution, Czech Cinema, International Copyright Law, Eastern European Cinema, Territoriality, Online Media, Media Industry, Copyright Law, Media Markets, Media Industry Studies, Video on Demand, Media Culture and Creative Industries, Video-On-Demand (VoD), and Digital single market
This book presents the research findings from a three-year project entitled “New and Old Media in Everyday Life: Media audiences in the time of transformational media usage”. Utilizing qualitative and quantitative insights and drawing... more
This book presents the research findings from a three-year project entitled “New and Old Media in Everyday Life: Media audiences in the time of transformational media usage”. Utilizing qualitative and quantitative insights and drawing upon Anthony Giddens’ Theory of Structuration, the author identifies four primary dimensions to the evolving transformation of current Czech media audiences: (1) the dematerialization of media content linked with the increased fragmentation of media-related practices as well as transforming relations between audiences and media producers, (2) the increasing mediatization of everyday life and social interactions, (3) notable shifts in audiences' attitude towards shared public and political spheres and (4) a spatiotemporal transformation of everyday life.
Kniha shrnuje zjištění autorova tříletého výzkumného projektu "Nová a stará média v každodenním životě: mediální publika v čase proměny mediálních praxí". V návaznosti na kvalitativní a kvantitativní šetření a s oporou v Giddensově teorii strukturace se věnuje čtyřem základním dimenzím transformace současných českých mediálních publik: (1) dematerializaci mediálních obsahů a s ní související fragmentaci mediálních praxí a změně vztahů mezi členy mediálních publik a producenty mediálních obsahů, (2) sílící mediatizaci každodennosti a sociálních interakcí, (3) proměnám ve vztahu členů publika ke sdílenému veřejnému a politickému prostoru a (4) časoprostorové proměně každodenního života.
Kniha shrnuje zjištění autorova tříletého výzkumného projektu "Nová a stará média v každodenním životě: mediální publika v čase proměny mediálních praxí". V návaznosti na kvalitativní a kvantitativní šetření a s oporou v Giddensově teorii strukturace se věnuje čtyřem základním dimenzím transformace současných českých mediálních publik: (1) dematerializaci mediálních obsahů a s ní související fragmentaci mediálních praxí a změně vztahů mezi členy mediálních publik a producenty mediálních obsahů, (2) sílící mediatizaci každodennosti a sociálních interakcí, (3) proměnám ve vztahu členů publika ke sdílenému veřejnému a politickému prostoru a (4) časoprostorové proměně každodenního života.
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The book deals with new media studies – a wide, interdisciplinary meta-field of studies focused on social theory and research of what is commonly referred to as new media. A central goal of the book is to summarize historical and... more
The book deals with new media studies – a wide, interdisciplinary meta-field of studies focused on social theory and research of what is commonly referred to as new media. A central goal of the book is to summarize historical and epistemological roots and developments of the meta-field and, consequently, to formulate a theoretically based concept of new media. The concept is conceived as a three-dimensional model derived from Anthony Giddens’ theory of structuration. The three mutually constitutive dimensions of the model include uses of new media (agency), and a techno-textual object and contexts (both playing roles of structures). Such notion of new media should serve as a non-reductionist explanatory framework enabling a theoretically settled, and holistic empirical analysis of new media as complex phenomena constituted on levels of object, social action and wider everyday contexts as well as cultural, political and economical milieu.
Kniha se věnuje studiím nových médií – širokému interdisciplinárnímu akademickému metapoli zastřešujícímu společenskovědní výzkum a teoretickou reflexi takzvaných nových médií. Text shrnuje historické a epistemologické kořeny studií nových médií a jejich vývoj a následně formuluje teoretický koncept nových médií. Tento koncept má podobu třídimenzionálního modelu odvozeného z Giddensovy teorie strukturace, přičemž tři jeho dimenze zahrnují užití nových médií (jednání) a technotextuální artefakt a kontexty (coby formy struktur). Koncept by měl sloužit jako neredukcionistický výkladový rámec umožňující teoreticky ukotvenou celostní analýzu nových médií jako komplexního fenoménu utvářeného na úrovních artefaktu, sociálního jednání a každodenních kontextů i širšího kulturního, politického a ekonomického milieu.
Kniha se věnuje studiím nových médií – širokému interdisciplinárnímu akademickému metapoli zastřešujícímu společenskovědní výzkum a teoretickou reflexi takzvaných nových médií. Text shrnuje historické a epistemologické kořeny studií nových médií a jejich vývoj a následně formuluje teoretický koncept nových médií. Tento koncept má podobu třídimenzionálního modelu odvozeného z Giddensovy teorie strukturace, přičemž tři jeho dimenze zahrnují užití nových médií (jednání) a technotextuální artefakt a kontexty (coby formy struktur). Koncept by měl sloužit jako neredukcionistický výkladový rámec umožňující teoreticky ukotvenou celostní analýzu nových médií jako komplexního fenoménu utvářeného na úrovních artefaktu, sociálního jednání a každodenních kontextů i širšího kulturního, politického a ekonomického milieu.
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Úvodová učebnice určená vysokoškolským studentům humanitních a společenskovědních oborů poskytuje základní vhled pro problematiky společenskovědní reflexe nových médií a jejich uživatelů a publik.
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This chapter tackles one of the main methodological and conceptual challenges to current audience research: fragmentation of viewers’ practices of reception. The use of digital and networked media and the consequent multiplication of... more
This chapter tackles one of the main methodological and conceptual challenges to current audience research: fragmentation of viewers’ practices of reception. The use of digital and networked media and the consequent multiplication of screens, distribution channels and content sources have further complicated the notion of “watching television” and, along with that, academic and applied audience research. The chapter reintroduces Maria Bakardjieva’s concept of uses genres and connects it with the concept of media ensemble, suggesting that for research on the domestic consumption of films and TV series, the application of these concepts in qualitative (ethnographic) research and in audience surveys comes with strong advantages. Firstly, the concepts help to identify distinct types of consumption practices linked with specific technological objects, with specific audiovisual content and with typical everyday situations, and they enable us to analyze consumption explicitly within the contexts of the spatiotemporal and social organization of everyday life. Secondly, in cases of small- and peripheral-market audiences, the concepts enable us to identify specifics in audiences’ practices linked with the characteristics of these markets (e.g., with localized and non-localized content, with domestic and global production, etc.). And thirdly, the concepts explicitly acknowledge power both involved in and shaping the analyzed practices by emphasizing the “generative process of technology,” i.e., the transformative role of users’ practices in shaping technological and economic systems.
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This paper presents an exploratory typological analysis of young people (aged 15-30) as political and civic actors in Estonia and the Czech Republic. We compare youth civic engagement patterns in these two East European countries, sharing... more
This paper presents an exploratory typological analysis of young people (aged 15-30) as political and civic actors in Estonia and the Czech Republic. We compare youth civic engagement patterns in these two East European countries, sharing similar socio-historical contexts, and analyse the socio-demographic and attitudinal profiles of the resulting participation types. The study draws on Estonian and Czech data sets collected from November to December 2016 within the Horizon 2020 project 'CATCH-EyoU-Constructing AcTive CitizensHip with European Youth: Policies, Practices, Challenges and Solutions'. Two independent methods (latent class analysis and cluster analysis) demonstrated shared patterns in the political and civic activities employed by the Estonian and Czech participants, suggesting the existence of four clearly distinguishable types of young citizens. A more detailed analysis revealed that the socio-demographic and attitudinal profiles of active young people, and therefore, the factors of political socialization, differed quite substantially in the two countries.
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The relationship between news audiences to local media, more specifically local news, is presumed as intensive, and news audiences used to be described as highly interested in local news. This presumption is concurrently criticized as an... more
The relationship between news audiences to local media, more specifically local news, is presumed as intensive, and news audiences used to be described as highly interested in local news. This presumption is concurrently criticized as an inaccurate myth of the local, which draws mainly upon U.S. or U.K. experiences, inapplicable to other media systems. This exploratory study focuses on Czech local audiences and provides evidence-based reconsideration of the myth. Employing data from quantitative survey of the Czech adult population and qualitative interviews, this study demonstrates local news consumption by Czech audiences. Findings suggest that the audiences of local news—typical for their relatively low interest in local news—constitute a serious challenge for the prevailing optimistic notion of local news audiences. The study employs cluster analysis of Czech audiences of local news and qualitative interviews to assess a more nuanced understanding of the local audiences, and more specifically considers contextual influences forming the Czech local news media.
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This exploratory paper applying cross-cultural and developmental perspective analyses and discusses trust in alternative media and its relation to trust in professional media, seeking to identify the national specifics of media trust and... more
This exploratory paper applying cross-cultural and developmental perspective analyses and discusses trust in alternative media and its relation to trust in professional media, seeking to identify the national specifics of media trust and its developmental patterns. Employing 2016 survey data of Czech, Estonian and Greek youth (aged 14–25, N = 3654) collected as part of the international CATCH-EyoU project (Horizon 2020), the study outlines the typology of media trust, comprising trust in alternative and professional media, and compares social and political predictors influencing media trust in the three countries. The study illustrates the diversity of relations between the two types of media trust, concluding that differences in selected predictors of media trust and the distribution of media trust types across national sub-samples illuminate the strong role national context plays, illustrating the varying pathways development of media trust follows in these varied contexts along socioeconomic and cultural lines.
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This exploratory study draws upon data from a 2014 survey of the Czech adult population, focusing on differences between traditional and convergent domestic audiences of film and TV. Employing statistical methods of hierarchical cluster... more
This exploratory study draws upon data from a 2014 survey of the Czech adult population, focusing on differences between traditional and convergent domestic audiences of film and TV. Employing statistical methods of hierarchical cluster analysis and multinomial logistic regression, this empirical paper considers traditional and convergent modes of content consumption, various forms of the curation of content, the viewers’ attitudes to content, socio-demographic variables, and culture in general. On this basis, an evidence-based typology of Czech domestic audiences is formulated, suggesting four types of film and TV viewers: traditional passive audiences, traditional engaged audiences, convergent passive audiences and convergent engaged audiences. Consequently, the study looks for cultural and socio-demographic predictors of the resulting types of audiences.
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This empirical-research-based chapter focuses on the Czech post-TV audiences and their uses of alternative and non-authorized online sources of films and TV series. The chapter draws on descriptive data from a representative survey of the... more
This empirical-research-based chapter focuses on the Czech post-TV audiences and their uses of alternative and non-authorized online sources of films and TV series. The chapter draws on descriptive data from a representative survey of the Czech population (2014) and on two distinct qualitative inquiries into the everyday practices of Czech audiences (2012-2015). In the text we reconstruct the general picture of the post-TV practices related to the consumption of "pirated" content and we map the audiences' motivations for such practices as well as the audiences' ethical reflexivity regarding the phenomenon. At the same time, we focus on the ways that members of the post-TV audiences choose particular technological interfaces and sources of content as well as the particular content they consume. In this regard, we identify three major distinct modes of content choice: expert curation, social curation and data-consultation curation. The survey data plausibly show that post-TV audiences significantly differ in these practices from the audiences relying on reception from TV broadcasting. Theoretically we address the topic drawing on Anthony Giddens' theory of structuration: we employ the structuration model of media, a theoretical model applying Giddens' notion of social agency on media-related practices and emphasising the position of media-related practices within the contexts of everyday life. In this regard, we avoid both media-centric and normative approach to the topic. Instead, we employ the context-oriented approach taking into the account the fact that the reception of content from illegal online sources is part of a broader set of practices and that it is subordinated to particular moral economies. Our conclusion is that the post-TV audience could hardly be seen as "pirates" or immoral pragmatists on the one hand, or, on the other, as highly reflexive and empowered actors intentionally challenging the media industries. Instead, our respondents could be seen as common viewers aiming to "reasonably" fulfil their textual needs - viewers that are mostly aware of their possible conflict with the Czech legal regulation but that are, regarding Czech specifics of online content distribution, conceiving their practices as ethically more or less non-problematic.
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After a long history, research on the relation between participative and communicative practices was revived in the late 1990s because of the proliferation of new media. New studies have taken into account both online and offline... more
After a long history, research on the relation between participative and communicative practices was revived in the late 1990s because of the proliferation of new media. New studies have taken into account both online and offline participation and the ability of new media to provide citizens with easier access to information and a broader repertoire of actions. In this article, which is based on a representative survey of the adult Czech population and a survey of Czech adolescents, we address participative and communicative practices as intertwined sets that are typically preferred by certain groups of citizens. As media-related and political practices usually vary due to generational and historical experience, the aim is to discover whether people with similar generational backgrounds and with similar repertoires of action manifest similar sets of communication practices, i.e. similar media ensembles. Hence, we build this study on the assumption that the political and media-related agencies are structured by historical experience as well as by biographical experience linked with life-cycle phases. Using cluster analysis, we focus on the various participative and communicative practices employed by three distinct adult generational groups and by contemporary adolescents, all of whom experienced the process of socialization in their own specific historical contexts.
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The article discusses qualitative research on the mundane civic practices of some Czechs, with a specific focus on the role of new media. It works with a context-oriented approach in order to avoid media-centrism. Our research is focussed... more
The article discusses qualitative research on the mundane civic practices of some Czechs, with a specific focus on the role of new media. It works with a context-oriented approach in order to avoid media-centrism. Our research is focussed on the ways in which civic practices are structured by immediate and wider social and political contexts and how they are experienced by post-socialist citizens from villages and large cities. The role of new media and the place of civic practices in everyday life is analysed with respect to these contexts. The research based on semi-structured in-depth interviews with 22 politically and publicly active citizens indicates that Czechs experience a similar crisis in relation to institutional politics as their counterparts in long established democracies and it reveals telltale differences between the social spaces of villages and cities both in participatory practices and in civic uses of new media. However, the study does not indicate a radical, new media-driven transformation of citizenship, rather it suggests subtle shifts in practices and a pragmatic mixing of face-to-face communication and traditional media (print, public address systems, noticeboards) with new communication technologies.
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The chapter deals with diffused participation and the role of social media in mundane civic and political practices. Drawing on previous research and employing a structuration model of media for its theoretical framework, the chapter aims... more
The chapter deals with diffused participation and the role of social media in mundane civic and political practices. Drawing on previous research and employing a structuration model of media for its theoretical framework, the chapter aims to illustrate that the uses of social media are structured by affordances of the media as well as by the immediate and broader social, cultural, and political contexts in which political and civic practices are embedded. Three distinct perspectives have emerged in the course of ongoing research – the first emphasizes the role of collective membership and the pressure to conform; the second focuses on being a member of a performative audience; and the third takes political contexts into account.
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The paper presents a case study of the Czech online activist group Žít Brno. The group that challenges local representatives and employs tactics of political satire, parody and culture jamming, evolved from a spontaneous one-off event to... more
The paper presents a case study of the Czech online activist group Žít Brno. The group that challenges local representatives and employs tactics of political satire, parody and culture jamming, evolved from a spontaneous one-off event to an ongoing political project and eventually became an institutionalized political actor. The case study, based on interviews with group members, content analysis of the project website, longitudinal observation of the group's activities and other additional material, enables us to research the limits and the potential of online tactics and the way online practices are intertwined with a more traditional repertoire of collective action. Building on debates about online political participation and the broadening concept of the political, we interpret the group's protest as a reaction to the crisis of institutionalized local politics and we discuss the actual role of new media in such a protest. The conclusion is that online protest and new media, despite their criticized action-less character, could enable a functional bridge to “real” politics but at the same time they do not play an exclusive role in successful protest politics and have to be interpreted within the context of a particular political action.
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Why and on what bases do people choose content and share it in an online environment? At the centre of Henry Jenkins’ theory of convergence culture lie in the transforming links between active, participative audiences, media content and... more
Why and on what bases do people choose content and share it in an online environment? At the centre of Henry Jenkins’ theory of convergence culture lie in the transforming links between active, participative audiences, media content and media corporations. However, the ‘textually motivated’ desire to participate in the circulation of and control over texts is just one among other key motives for the dissemination and recirculation of content. Ethnography-based research con- ducted at Masaryk University in the Czech Republic suggests that when exploring participation in textuality, performative self-exposure and self-presentation must be taken into account as well as the context of audiences’ everyday life. Thus, I propose to approach participation as based not only on a ‘will to text’ but also on a dialectical relationship between a ‘will to self-performance’ and a ‘will to conformity’. These three factors then impact on the social curation of content – a reflex- ive process in which members of the audience construct texts for consumption and recirculation.
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The paper deals with new media studies and focuses on critical debate about novelty sublime. The fascination by novelty and rhetoric of profound social change caused by emerging internet and new media significantly shaped new media... more
The paper deals with new media studies and focuses on critical debate about novelty sublime. The fascination by novelty and rhetoric of profound social change caused by emerging internet and new media significantly shaped new media studies in their early period. However, on the beginning of 21st century new media studies became quite critical to these hyped (utopian and dystopian) discourses and the debate about reasons and nature of these early “extreme” framing of social change became one of the key elements of academic normalization of new media studies.
"Kapitola se zabývá vzájemným vztahem mezi veřejným a soukromým prostorem a úlohou komunikačních technologií při utváření těchto distinktivních sociálních sfér. The chapter deals with mutual relations between public and private social... more
"Kapitola se zabývá vzájemným vztahem mezi veřejným a soukromým prostorem a úlohou komunikačních technologií při utváření těchto distinktivních sociálních sfér.
The chapter deals with mutual relations between public and private social spaces and with the role of communication technologies in constitution of these distinctive social spheres."
The chapter deals with mutual relations between public and private social spaces and with the role of communication technologies in constitution of these distinctive social spheres."
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The cultural impact of media and ICTs on public and private space was often analyzed without a more complex emphasis on historical aspects of these phenomena. This paper put limits of these approaches in question by employing wider... more
The cultural impact of media and ICTs on public and private space was often analyzed without a more complex emphasis on historical aspects of these phenomena. This paper put limits of these approaches in question by employing wider historical and theoretical perspective - this text deals with ICTs in a context of ‘older’ technologies and in a context of development of modernity and it shows that mentioned ‘uniqueness’ has rather different quality than it was expected. The basic assumption is that communication technologies shaped the configuration or relation between private and public cultural spaces - the two dialogically formed spaces significantly describing the inner metaphorically ‘spatial’ character of modernity.
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"Stať se zabývá vývojem studií nových médií a jejich vztahem k mediálním studiím. Studia nových médií jsou zde nahlížena jako interdisciplinární akademické metapole, v němž se sociální vědy a humanitní obory setkávají ve výzkumu a... more
"Stať se zabývá vývojem studií nových médií a jejich vztahem k mediálním studiím. Studia nových médií jsou zde nahlížena jako interdisciplinární akademické metapole, v němž se sociální vědy a humanitní obory setkávají ve výzkumu a teoretizování nových informačních a komunikačních technologiích založených na digitálním kódování obsahů a v jehož rámci je k těmto technologiím přistupováno jako k sociálním a kulturním fenoménům. Vzhledem k tomu, že mediální studia jsou jen jedním z oborů, jež tematickou oblast nových médií kolonizují, identifikuje studie v první řadě ta témata, která tato jsou v oblasti zájmu právě této disciplíny. Následně pak stať rekonstruuje vývoj studií nových médií od 60. let 20. století po první desetiletí 21. století, a to s důrazem na ty klíčové vlivy, které metapole studií nových médií a jeho teoretickou a empirickou výbavu formovaly.
The paper deals with new media studies and focuses on their historical development and their relationship to media studies. New media studies are conceived as a interdisciplinary metafield of shared interest where social sciences and humanities meet in their need to research and theorize new ICT based on digital coding of contents as social and cultural phenomena. Since media studies play role of one of several disciplines colonizing the thematic field of new media, the paper at the first place aims to identify set of new media issues being solved specifically by this discipline. Consequently, the paper reconstructs history of new media studies since 1960s until 2000s, with an emphasis on key influences that shaped the metafield of new media studies and formed their theoretical and empirical body."
The paper deals with new media studies and focuses on their historical development and their relationship to media studies. New media studies are conceived as a interdisciplinary metafield of shared interest where social sciences and humanities meet in their need to research and theorize new ICT based on digital coding of contents as social and cultural phenomena. Since media studies play role of one of several disciplines colonizing the thematic field of new media, the paper at the first place aims to identify set of new media issues being solved specifically by this discipline. Consequently, the paper reconstructs history of new media studies since 1960s until 2000s, with an emphasis on key influences that shaped the metafield of new media studies and formed their theoretical and empirical body."
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Anotace – Kyborg – teoretický koncept, který se vyvinul v oblasti kybernetiky – silně formoval diskurzy obklopující nová média. Od raných šedesátých let žil koncept kyborga svůj symbolický život, který může sloužit jako symptomatická... more
Anotace – Kyborg – teoretický koncept, který se vyvinul v oblasti kybernetiky – silně formoval diskurzy obklopující nová média. Od raných šedesátých let žil koncept kyborga svůj symbolický život, který může sloužit jako symptomatická paralela kulturního vývoje nových, digitálních komunikačních technologií. Kyborg se proměnil z přesného kybernetického konceptu v popkulturní, fiktivní fenomén, postrukturalistický a feministický mikroprojekt nové, hybridní identity i symptom entuziastického technooptimismu raných devadesátých let. Kapitola je věnována vzájemnému vztahu mezi příběhem nových médií, příběhem kyborga – a historií studií nových médií. Je koncipována jako jakási poznámka pod čarou ilustrující způsoby, jakými se v posledních čtyřiceti letech proměnily naše kulturní vztahy k novým komunikačním technologiím.
Cyborg - a theoretical concept developed within the field of cybernetics - profoundly shaped discourses surrounding new media. Since early 1960, the concept of cyborg has lived its symbolic life that could serve as a symptomatic parallel to the cultural development of new, digital communication technologies. Cyborg has changed from strictly cybernetic concept to a popcultural, fictional phenomenon, poststructuralist and feminist micropolitical project of new, hybrid identity as well as to a symptom of enthusiastic technooptismism of the early 1990s. The text deals with the mutual relation between the story of new media, the story of cyborg – and history of new media studies. The chapter is conceived as a kind of a footnote illustrating the ways in which our cultural relation to the new communication technologies has been transforming during last 40 years.
Cyborg - a theoretical concept developed within the field of cybernetics - profoundly shaped discourses surrounding new media. Since early 1960, the concept of cyborg has lived its symbolic life that could serve as a symptomatic parallel to the cultural development of new, digital communication technologies. Cyborg has changed from strictly cybernetic concept to a popcultural, fictional phenomenon, poststructuralist and feminist micropolitical project of new, hybrid identity as well as to a symptom of enthusiastic technooptismism of the early 1990s. The text deals with the mutual relation between the story of new media, the story of cyborg – and history of new media studies. The chapter is conceived as a kind of a footnote illustrating the ways in which our cultural relation to the new communication technologies has been transforming during last 40 years.
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The article presents a discourse analysis of media coverage of an unsuccessful foreign investor, the case of LG.Philips Displays Holding v. the Czech state. We analyze media coverage of the case from 2000 when the investor decided to... more
The article presents a discourse analysis of media coverage of an unsuccessful foreign investor, the case of LG.Philips Displays Holding v. the Czech state. We analyze media coverage of the case from 2000 when the investor decided to start production in the Czech Republic until 2006 when the investor went bankrupt. Our method of analysis is based on Foucault’s understanding of dis- course and his theoretical conceptualization of discourse analysis. It emphasizes the structural rather than the linguistic level of discourse and also draws on Gerbner’s message system analysis and de Gruyter’s method of tracking discourse. We analyzed almost 700 articles published in two Czech print dailies and two weeklies and found a significant bias in the Czech print media since a very strong politicization of the case was typical of its media coverage. The discourse of party politics emerged in connection with the government’s investment incentive policy. The arrival of Philips was presented as a result of successful government policy while other important factors were underestimated. Moreover, media uncritically replicated the government’s official discour- se. This applies particularly to the first years when party political themes and an uncritical view of the investor forced out the economic/analytical discourse. The media rarely took into account risks associated with foreign investment or the decline of the traditional (CRT) TV screen mar- ket. In addition, the media stereotypically labelled actors involved in disputes with LG.Philips Displays.
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Studie předkládá diskurzní analýzu mediálního obrazu kauzy neúspěšného zahraničního investora, a to konkrétně případu holdingu LG.Philips Displays a českého státu. Studie případ pokrývá od investorova rozhodnutí vstoupit do České... more
Studie předkládá diskurzní analýzu mediálního obrazu kauzy neúspěšného zahraničního investora, a to konkrétně případu holdingu LG.Philips Displays a českého státu. Studie případ pokrývá od investorova rozhodnutí vstoupit do České republiky v roce 2000 až po investorův bankrot v roce 2006. Využitá výzkumná metoda je založena na Foucaultově pojetí diskurtu a je odvozena od jeho teoretického konceptu diskurzní analýzy. Metoda, jež se spíše než na lingvistickou rovinu diskurzu zaměřuje na rovinu strukturální, je inspirována rovněž Gerbnerovou analýzou systému zpráv a de Gruyterovou technickou stopování diskurzu.
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The article offers an overview of theoretical and empirical reflection on so called virtual communities – the paper covers early utopian and dystopian speculations about possible impacts of new media on social relationships, as well as... more
The article offers an overview of theoretical and empirical reflection on so called virtual communities – the paper covers early utopian and dystopian speculations about possible impacts of new media on social relationships, as well as later realistic conceptualizations of virtual communities and social network sites. On the basis of the overview, the text consequently formulates a framework for empirical examination of virtual communities derived from Nancy K. Baym’s emergent model of online community and Barry Wellman’s notion of virtual communities as technologically mediated networked social ties. The framework emphasizes a poly-hybrid, diversified and erratic nature of virtual communities.
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This article offers a new concept of cyberculture based on an analysis of structures of cybercultural narrations. The author sums up previous concepts of cyberculture and offers an account of the distinction between early and current... more
This article offers a new concept of cyberculture based on an analysis of structures of cybercultural narrations. The author sums up previous concepts of cyberculture and offers an account of the distinction between early and current cyberculture. Thereafter he focuses solely on early cyberculture and offers its definition and historical periodization. The thesis deals with early cyberculture as a wide social and cultural movement closely linked to advanced information and communication technologies (ICT), their emergence and development and their cultural colonization.
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Článek předkládá nový koncept kyberkultury, založený na analýze struktury kyberkulturních narací. V úvodu shrnuje stávající koncepty kyberkultury a definuje rozdíl mezi ranou a současnou kyberkulturou, aby se dále věnoval pouze... more
Článek předkládá nový koncept kyberkultury, založený na analýze struktury kyberkulturních narací. V úvodu shrnuje stávající koncepty kyberkultury a definuje rozdíl mezi ranou a současnou kyberkulturou, aby se dále věnoval pouze kyberkultuře rané, kterou definuje a periodizuje. Práce pojímá ranou kyberkulturu jako široké sociální a kulturní hnutí, úzce propojené se vznikem a rozvojem pokročilých informačních a komunikačních technologií (ICT) a jejich kulturní kolonizací.
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... Basic information. Original title: Postčlověk aneb Tak pravili kybernetici. Title in English: Posthuman or Thus Spake Cybernetics. Author: Jakub Macek. Edition: Revue pro média 09, Brno, Spolek přátel pro vydávání Hosta. Volume 9,... more
... Basic information. Original title: Postčlověk aneb Tak pravili kybernetici. Title in English: Posthuman or Thus Spake Cybernetics. Author: Jakub Macek. Edition: Revue pro média 09, Brno, Spolek přátel pro vydávání Hosta. Volume 9, number 2004. 2004. Further information. ...
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Cílem této výzkumné zprávy je analyticky shrnout základní zjištění kvalitativního výzkumu českých post-televizních publik, a to s důrazem na motivy, jež respondenty zahrnuté do výzkumného vzorku vedou k volbě mezi jednotlivými aktuálně... more
Cílem této výzkumné zprávy je analyticky shrnout základní zjištění kvalitativního výzkumu českých post-televizních publik, a to s důrazem na motivy, jež respondenty zahrnuté do výzkumného vzorku vedou k volbě mezi jednotlivými aktuálně dostupnými zdroji audiovizuálních obsahů. Výzkum vedený týmem z Fakulty sociálních studií Masarykovy univerzity v letech 2018 a 2019 navazuje na letitou diskuzi o probíhající transformaci mediálních publik, o digitalizaci médií a mediální konvergenci a o související tenzi mezi producenty a legálními distributory obsahů na jedné straně a nelegálními distributory na straně druhé. Výzkumné závěry, jež jsou v této zprávě stručně shrnuty, se přitom obracejí ke dvěma klíčovým otázkám této diskuze: Za jakých podmínek a z jakých důvodů současní konzumenti televizních obsahů volí jako zdroje těchto obsahů zdroje nelegální? A co je naopak vede k tomu, aby dali přednost zdrojům legálním?
Dále reportovaná analýza ukazuje, že odpovědi na tyto dvě zdánlivě triviální otázky jsou nepřekvapivě složitější a barvitější, než aby dovolily – jak je stále vcelku obvyklé – tento problém zúžit na téma morálně-ekonomické. Současně je ale, i s přihlédnutím k výsledkům výzkumů starších, zjevné, že praxe současných konzumentů televizních obsahů i jejich motivace pro jednotlivé typy těchto praxí mají poměrně stabilizovanou a analyticky čitelnou povahu.
Dále reportovaná analýza ukazuje, že odpovědi na tyto dvě zdánlivě triviální otázky jsou nepřekvapivě složitější a barvitější, než aby dovolily – jak je stále vcelku obvyklé – tento problém zúžit na téma morálně-ekonomické. Současně je ale, i s přihlédnutím k výsledkům výzkumů starších, zjevné, že praxe současných konzumentů televizních obsahů i jejich motivace pro jednotlivé typy těchto praxí mají poměrně stabilizovanou a analyticky čitelnou povahu.
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Výzkumná zpráva z analýzy pokrytí uprchlické krize hlavních zpravodajských relací České televize a TV Nova.
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The report concludes descriptive findings of survey in Czech media audiences. The data from 1998 respondents was collected in October and December 2014 by Median; the collection employed quota sampling and computer-assisted personal... more
The report concludes descriptive findings of survey in Czech media audiences. The data from 1998 respondents was collected in October and December 2014 by Median; the collection employed quota sampling and computer-assisted personal interviewing. Besides the standard socio-demographic indicators, the questionnaire included questions regarding the full range of possible media-related practices including obtaining and reception of films, TV series and other TV content, news, sports, music, books, magazines and spoken word; online activities and use of social networking sites; playing computer- and videogames; ownership of media and computer technologies and access to the Internet; respondents' political and public activities. The report is published in Czech and English version.
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The report concludes descriptive findings of the 2014 survey in new and old media uses and civic and political engagement and participatory practices of the Czech society. The data from 1998 respondents was collected in October and... more
The report concludes descriptive findings of the 2014 survey in new and old media uses and civic and political engagement and participatory practices of the Czech society. The data from 1998 respondents was collected in October and December 2014 by Median; the collection employed quota sampling and computer-assisted personal interviewing. The report is published in English and Czech version.
Research Interests: Sociology, Media Sociology, Political Sociology, Media Studies, New Media, and 10 moreMedia and Cultural Studies, Political Participation, Digital Media, Community Engagement & Participation, Political Science, Computer-Mediated Communication, Political communication, Social Media, Media, and Community participation and engagement
Výzkumná zpráva shrnuje deskriptivní zjištění kvantitativního šetření českých mediálních publik. Sběr dat, který formou CAPI zajistila společnost Median, proběhl v říjnu a listopadu 2014 a zahrnul 1998 respondentů starších 18 let.... more
Výzkumná zpráva shrnuje deskriptivní zjištění kvantitativního šetření českých mediálních publik. Sběr dat, který formou CAPI zajistila společnost Median, proběhl v říjnu a listopadu 2014 a zahrnul 1998 respondentů starších 18 let. Dotazník vedle standardních sociodemografických ukazatelů pokryl pokud možno úplné spektrum praxí zahrnujících příjem, konzumaci a sdílení filmů, seriálů, pravodajství, hudby, knih a časopisů, mluveného slova a sportovních obsahů; online aktivity a užívání online sociálních sítí; hraní počítačových her a videoher; vlastnění mediálních technologií a přístup k internetu; indikátory politické a veřejné aktivity respondentů. Zpráva je publikována současně v české a anglické verzi.
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Výzkumná zpráva shrnuje deskriptivní zjištění kvantitativního šetření toho, jak jsou českou společností užívána nová a stará média v rámci politické a veřejné participace. Sběr dat, který formou CAPI zajistila společnost Median, proběhl v... more
Výzkumná zpráva shrnuje deskriptivní zjištění kvantitativního šetření toho, jak jsou českou společností užívána nová a stará média v rámci politické a veřejné participace. Sběr dat, který formou CAPI zajistila společnost Median, proběhl v říjnu a listopadu 2014 a zahrnul 1998 respondentů starších 18 let. Zpráva je publikována současně v české a anglické verzi.
Research Interests: Media Studies, New Media, Media and Cultural Studies, Political Participation, Digital Media, and 10 moreCommunity Engagement & Participation, Political Science, Mass Communication, Political communication, Social Media, Civic Engagement, New Media Studies, Mass media, Mass Communication and New Media, and Community participation and engagement
Přehledová zpráva z terénního kvantitativní výzkumu účastníků blokády pochodu krajní pravice (Brno, 1. 5. 2015) shrnuje vybrané deskriptivní ukazatele charakterizující respondenty výzkumu. Šetření vedli Alena Macková a Jakub Macek z... more
Přehledová zpráva z terénního kvantitativní výzkumu účastníků blokády pochodu krajní pravice (Brno, 1. 5. 2015) shrnuje vybrané deskriptivní ukazatele charakterizující respondenty výzkumu.
Šetření vedli Alena Macková a Jakub Macek z Fakulty sociálních studií. Výzkum je součástí série studií, v nichž se autoři zabývají rolí nových a tradičních médií v občanské a politické participaci.
Šetření vedli Alena Macková a Jakub Macek z Fakulty sociálních studií. Výzkum je součástí série studií, v nichž se autoři zabývají rolí nových a tradičních médií v občanské a politické participaci.
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An introductory part of an extensive industry report about screenplay and project development practices in the Czech feature film production between 2009 and 2013. Based on qualitative analysis of 67 interviews with producers, directors,... more
An introductory part of an extensive industry report about screenplay and project development practices in the Czech feature film production between 2009 and 2013. Based on qualitative analysis of 67 interviews with producers, directors, screenwriters, script editors and other media professionals.
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An industry report about screenplay and project development practice in Czech cinema of the last five years. Based on qualitative analysis of 67 interviews with producers, directors, screenwriters and other media professionals.
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The presentation overviews the main research findings and theoretical conclusion from a three-year research project entitled “New and Old Media in Everyday Life: Media audiences in the time of transformational media usage” (2013-2015).... more
The presentation overviews the main research findings and theoretical conclusion from a three-year research project entitled “New and Old Media in Everyday Life: Media audiences in the time of transformational media usage” (2013-2015). The research, drawing upon Anthony Giddens’ Theory of Structuration and upon the tradition of domestication research, utilized qualitative and quantitative insights – more than 100 qualitative interviews and representative survey of the Czech population (N=1998). On this basis, the paper identifies four primary dimensions to the evolving transformation of current Czech media audiences: (1) the dematerialization of media content linked with the increased fragmentation of media-related practices as well as transforming relations between audiences and media producers, (2) the increasing mediatization of everyday life and social interactions, (3) notable shifts in audiences' attitude towards shared public and political spheres and (4) a spatiotemporal transformation of everyday life.
Research Interests: Media Studies, New Media, Social Sciences, Audience Studies, Mobile Technology, and 11 moreMass Communication, Audience and Reception Studies, Social Media, Convergence, Mobile Communication, Media Convergence, Mass media, Audience Participation, Mass Communication and New Media, Audience Research, and Media Audiences
The paper presents a research project focused on the role of audiences’ trust in news and information sources in radicalization and polarization of the Czech public discourses and politics. This shift in the public and political sphere... more
The paper presents a research project focused on the role of audiences’ trust in news and information sources in radicalization and polarization of the Czech public discourses and politics. This shift in the public and political sphere revives important questions about the democratic role of media as sources of a shared agenda, trustworthy content and public knowledge and as platforms for public negotiations of societal and political consent: Namely it remains apparent that new as well as broadcasting and print media – as communication platforms and institutions – can yet play their part in moderating the radicalization of public opinion. However, a topical, detailed, evidence-based and theoretically rich understanding of the situation is thus far missing. The situation can be partly explained as a result of a long-term crisis of democracy linked with a distrust in democratic institutions accompanied by a decrease in traditional forms of political participation (elections, political party membership, etc.) and an increase in alternative forms of political and public participation, often linked with various uses of new media. At the same time, the crisis is usually linked with economic situation of the country and with individuals’ economic insecurities. Nevertheless, such explanations do not provide the full picture. Therefore, we employ "ontological security thesis": rather than just economic insecurity, an overall sense of an anomic insecurity - or, more specifically, a lack of sense of Giddensian ontological security - has to be considered as one of the key sources of the polarization and radicalization. And, at the same time, we consider important the way it is linked with reception of media agendas as well as the way it is amplified by discourses on social networking sites and by so-called alternative information sources. In other words, in the project we focus on the relation between (a) the social actors’ trust/distrust in particular information/news sources, (b) their attitude towards the political sphere and (c) their experience of the locus of control (expressed in external and internal efficacy and in the sense of ontological security).
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Jakým způsobem se po nástupu nových médií změnil vztah českých mediálních publik k televizi? Nikoli málo – a to přesto, že televizní i nadále zůstává hlavním zdrojem nejen zpravodajství, ale i filmů a televizních seriálů. Klíčovou změnou,... more
Jakým způsobem se po nástupu nových médií změnil vztah českých mediálních publik k televizi? Nikoli málo – a to přesto, že televizní i nadále zůstává hlavním zdrojem nejen zpravodajství, ale i filmů a televizních seriálů. Klíčovou změnou, která charakterizuje především praxe mladších diváků, je příklon ke konvergentní recepci reprezentované v Česku především konzumací obsahů stahovaných z neautorizovaných zdrojů. Jak vlastně tyto praxe vypadají? Co k nim členy mediálních publik vede? A jak jsou tyto praxe v české populaci rozšířené?
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The presentation introduces The Project 3000: a project of a longitudinal case study focusing on detailed inquiry to media-related and public and political practices of people living in a small village with 3000 inhabitants. The... more
The presentation introduces The Project 3000: a project of a longitudinal case study focusing on detailed inquiry to media-related and public and political practices of people living in a small village with 3000 inhabitants. The interdisciplinary project employing variety of methods aims to provide contextually rich research terrain enabling particular case studies in media studies, sociology, media and political psychology a political science.
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The presentation delivers selected conclusions from 2014 survey (N=1998) into media-related practices and political engagement and participation of Czech society.
Research Interests: Political Sociology, Media Studies, New Media, Political Participation, Community Engagement & Participation, and 9 morePolitical Science, Mass Communication, Social Media, Elections, Civic Engagement, New Media Studies, Mass media, Mass Communication and New Media, and Community participation and engagement
S nástupem nových médií se během poslední půl druhé dekády proměnily praxe mediálních publik – tu takřka nárazově, tu pozvola a nenápadně. Společným jmenovatelem probíhajících změn je přitom jednak zmnožení komunikačních technologií... more
S nástupem nových médií se během poslední půl druhé dekády proměnily praxe mediálních publik – tu takřka nárazově, tu pozvola a nenápadně. Společným jmenovatelem probíhajících změn je přitom jednak zmnožení komunikačních technologií zabydlujících naše životy a současně mnohovrstevnatá konvergence zasahující nejen technologie a texty, ale i nakládání s nimi a v důsledku i časoprostorovou strukturu každodenního života. Jakub Macek – vycházející z průběžných průběžných výsledků svého aktuálního výzkumu – se v přednášce bude věnovat tomu, proč analýza těchto proměn vyžaduje komplexní a současně teoreticky podepřený přístup. A na příkladech užívání mobilních technologií a online sociálních sítí českou populací bude ilustrovat vybrané klíčové tendence, které tyto proměny charakterizují.
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The television homes and domestic audiences have changed – with multiplication of media we witness significant shifts in audiences’ practices. The shifts are mainly described with emphasize on convergent and fragmented character of media... more
The television homes and domestic audiences have changed – with multiplication of media we witness significant shifts in audiences’ practices. The shifts are mainly described with emphasize on convergent and fragmented character of media practices and are usually captured with focus on particular media objects / platforms / agency. However, how to approach the audiences’ practices as a complex phenomena, not reduced to one particular facet? I follow this question and present an outcome from the research project ‘New and old media in everyday life: media audiences at the time of transforming media uses’: a concept of ‘media ensembles’. The concept is based on Giddens’ theory of structuration and develops the tradition of domestication research with its accent on the double articulation of media and dialectic relation between public and domestic contexts: it is based on a notion that audiences construct their media-related practices as changeable and negotiated system that fulfills their socially / culturally conditioned needs and that re-creates boundaries between public and private spaces. I will explicate the concept on an analysis of transformation of TV viewership of current Czech viewers. When approached as part of media ensembles, their TV related practices can be analysed both in relation to the content curation / reception and uses of media objects. The analysis suggests that role of TV is strongly influenced by position of other domestic media and that the viewership in studied homes (1) is increasingly decentralized in terms of used objects, (2) experienced as fragmented in terms of particular practices (‘watching TV’ is replaced by ‘watching TV shows’, ‘watching news’ etc.), and (3) interestingly de-nationalized (e.g. nation-wide TV as the source of content is being substituted by international online sources). The paper is based on qualitative, ethnographically oriented research conducted in 2012–2013 on sample of 20 homes.
How do people construct the set of media technologies they use in everyday life? Such question seemed to have rather obvious answer in days of "television home". However, a domestication of a variety of new media technologies has changed... more
How do people construct the set of media technologies they use in everyday life? Such question seemed to have rather obvious answer in days of "television home". However, a domestication of a variety of new media technologies has changed the "simplicity" of the answer. The multiplicity of media artifacts reveals the fact that people construct a "media ensemble" - a more or less reflexively created, changeable and negotiated structure of media artifacts and communication channels that fulfill their needs and which reflects the moral economy of the family. The presentation introduces the concept "media ensemble" based on Giddens' structuration theory and Silverstone's notion of domestication. The concept and its analytical usefulness is illustrated on data collected in ethnographic research.
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Why and on what basis do people choose contents and share them in online environments? Henry Jenkins' convergence culture theory inspirationally explains it with link to de Certeau's work and in relation to transforming relations between... more
Why and on what basis do people choose contents and share them in online environments? Henry Jenkins' convergence culture theory inspirationally explains it with link to de Certeau's work and in relation to transforming relations between active, participative audiences, media contents and media corporations. However, as our qualitative pilot studies of new media users and audiences indicate, the "textually motivated" desire to participate on distribution of and control over texts is just one among other key motives of spreading and re-distributing of contents. Ethnographically oriented inquiries conducted at Masaryk University suggest that in case of participation, we laso have to take into account the dimensions of performative self-exposure and self-presentation and the fact that it is situated in context of everyday life of the audiences. In other words, members of participatory audiences share, re-narrate and re-distribute not only contents but also themselves and the representations of the worlds as they experience it. Thus, following Jenkins' convergence culture theory, Abercrombie's and Longhurst's theory of diffused audiences, Bourdieu's theory of social and cultural capital and theories related to the issue of media and everyday life, I suggest to approach participation as based not only on a "will to text" but also on a dialectical relation between a "will to self-perform" and a "will to conformity". These three sources of motivation then constitute practices of social curation -- a reflexive process in which audience members construct their textual agenda that is consumed and re-distributed by them.
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Takzvaná nová média – tedy digitální síťové technologie spojené především s internetem a jím nesenými službami – jsou od devadesátých let minulého století nazírána jako fenomén narušující tradiční postavení médií masových. Tedy fenomén... more
Takzvaná nová média – tedy digitální síťové technologie spojené především s internetem a jím nesenými službami – jsou od devadesátých let minulého století nazírána jako fenomén narušující tradiční postavení médií masových. Tedy fenomén relativizující postavení masových médií coby klíčového kanálu umožňujícího přístup soukromých individuí k veřejnému prostoru a současně jejich roli komunikační platformy, jež veřejný prostor ztělesňuje.
Proměna mediální krajiny, která s novými médii přichází, se nutně promítá i do promýšlení médií veřejné služby. Odpověď na bezpochyby sugestivní otázku, zda nová média ohrožují média veřejné služby, lze hledat ze dvou protichůdných pozic akcentujících dvě různá chápání toho, čemu média veřejné služby slouží a proč. Oba typy argumentací přitom mohou být využity pro legitimizaci či naopak delegitimizace postavení veřejné služby. Klíčové ohrožení či naopak potvrzení či posílení pozice veřejné služby totiž primárně leží v politické rovině, ne ve vztahu médií veřejné služby a nových médií.
Proměna mediální krajiny, která s novými médii přichází, se nutně promítá i do promýšlení médií veřejné služby. Odpověď na bezpochyby sugestivní otázku, zda nová média ohrožují média veřejné služby, lze hledat ze dvou protichůdných pozic akcentujících dvě různá chápání toho, čemu média veřejné služby slouží a proč. Oba typy argumentací přitom mohou být využity pro legitimizaci či naopak delegitimizace postavení veřejné služby. Klíčové ohrožení či naopak potvrzení či posílení pozice veřejné služby totiž primárně leží v politické rovině, ne ve vztahu médií veřejné služby a nových médií.
New media studies have undergone a significant development during last two decades. From mostly hyped, futurologist, techno-deterministic and obviously ideologically oriented discourses they have turned to normalized, multidisciplinary... more
New media studies have undergone a significant development during last two decades. From mostly hyped, futurologist, techno-deterministic and obviously ideologically oriented discourses they have turned to normalized, multidisciplinary field of research, which is significantly and closely related to the theoretical and methodological heritage of media studies. New media studies have employed very critical relation to theoretical reductionism, they accepted multicausal, symbolically oriented approach to media technologies as social phenomena and they also opened themselves to a historicizing view of new media. However, ongoing criticism within new media studies repeatedly reveals and underlines the fact that the field still lacks a basic conceptual kernel. That theoretical core is necessary for many reasons – mainly because it 1) offers an answer to still “open” question what new media “are”, 2) consequently, it has significant theoretical and methodological implications, 3) and, finally, it gives us a comprehensive view of the terrain of actual and possible research agenda. This paper contributes to the debate about the issue – it offers three-dimensional theoretical model of new media. The model is based on non-deterministic, multi-causal approach to new media as socially constructed phenomena and evolves discussion about holistic conception of media technologies. New media are thus conceived as complex of mutual relations between technological artifact, social actions and institutions (uses) and surrounding sociocultural, political and economic contexts.
The talk based on part of authors’ doctoral thesis focuses on the problem of novelty of new media. In its early phase, the meta-field of new media studies was significantly influenced by rhetoric of “digital sublime” – by highly... more
The talk based on part of authors’ doctoral thesis focuses on the problem of novelty of new media. In its early phase, the meta-field of new media studies was significantly influenced by rhetoric of “digital sublime” – by highly speculative, future oriented utopian and dystopian assumptions about general implications of new information and communication technologies. Residues of this inappropriate excitement implicitly still inform theoretical assumptions about new media, as so-called web 2.0 debate has shown. The paper reviews several critical analytical explanations of the “novelty discourses” as mythological and ideological strategies and applies their conclusions on the phenomenon of (mentioned) web 2.0 debate. The point here is to draw probably still blurred, but readable line between “sober” theoretical statements about new media and rather vernacular theories rooted outside of the scientific field of reflection.
Do we live in a radically new media environment where old practices of mass media consumption are going to be definitely replaced by new, interactive media experience? The optimistic proponents of new media are prophesying the brave new... more
Do we live in a radically new media environment where old practices of mass media consumption are going to be definitely replaced by new, interactive media experience? The optimistic proponents of new media are prophesying the brave new world of active media consumption since late 1980s and the discourses of user-controlled and user-co-produced contents shape the field of new media studies very powerfully. This paper confronts the theoretical optimism – represented here by Henry Jenkins’ work on convergence culture – with the latest empirical data collected and interpreted by my two of my students, Nela Studýnková and Martin Čepička. When putting their conclusion into the wider context, we can ask questions that partly undermine the optimism about new media consumption. Henry Jenkins insightfully announced a shift in media consumption – shift to culture where contents are spread and shared over various media, from traditional mass media to a wide range of digital media. However, from data collected by Studýnková and Čepička there appear two different types of audiences, two types of consumption, two different ways of control over mediated contents – the one based on practices of convergence culture as depicted by Jenkins; the other is based on strict division of use of media channels where particular channels are strictly used for particular activity and where where not only work and leisure, but even specific types of media consumption (such as consuming news, movies and TV shows, music) are separated. The questions we have to ask are: Can we really speak about prevailing convergence culture, or should we regulate the optimism by more realistic approach? Are the convergence / divergence modes of consumption strictly separated on the line of generation and social status, as it appears, or are we just focused to narrowly? And, finally, is the normative approach – the on that prefers the “good activity” – really adequate? Or does the “digital-centrism” make us blind in some ways?
Stať vznikla v rámci stipendijního pobytu na Pennsylvania State University podpořeného Fulbrightovou komisí. Inspirována byla Hnutím Duha a jeho potřebou podkladů pro strategické plánování mediální komunikace ekologických témat v letech... more
Stať vznikla v rámci stipendijního pobytu na Pennsylvania State University podpořeného Fulbrightovou komisí. Inspirována byla Hnutím Duha a jeho potřebou podkladů pro strategické plánování mediální komunikace ekologických témat v letech 2018-2021.
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The journal Social Studies is announcing a call for papers for a monothematic issue with a working title Youth, Public and Political: Young People as (Ir)Relevant Actors in the Realm of Citizenship. The editors of the issue are Jakub... more
The journal Social Studies is announcing a call for papers for a monothematic issue with a working title Youth, Public and Political: Young People as (Ir)Relevant Actors in the Realm of Citizenship. The editors of the issue are Jakub Macek, Alena Macková & Jan Šerek (Masaryk University). We invite empirical, theoretical and methodological papers and meta-studies addressing the topic of contemporary young people as political and public actors. The existing knowledge on the topic produced within a variety of disciplines is fragmented by their wide range of topical and conceptual focuses, methodologies and normative assumptions. As such, the aim of this issue is to provide an integrated, interdisciplinary platform for reconciling these disciplinary emphases and findings. In doing so, we seek submissions addressing the topic from the perspectives found in the fields of sociology, political science, media studies, developmental and social psychology and related disciplines. The deadline for abstract submission is 30th June 2017, full papers are expected by 15th November 2017.
Research Interests: Sociology, Political Sociology, Social Psychology, Developmental Psychology, Social Sciences, and 10 moreCommunity Engagement & Participation, Political Science, Student Engagement, Media Activism, Social Activism, Youth Civic Engagement, Civic Engagement, Activism, Public Engagement, and Community participation and engagement
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Research Interests: Sociology, Media Sociology, Political Sociology, Media Studies, New Media, and 15 moreMedia and Cultural Studies, Political Participation, Digital Media, Community Engagement & Participation, Political Science, Czech, Citizen Journalism, Political communication, Social Media, Computer Mediated Communication, Media, Interview, Masaryk University, Community participation and engagement, and MEDIA SOCIOLOGY
Přehledova zprava z terenniho kvantitativni výzkumu ucastniků blokady pochodu krajni pravice (Brno, 1. 5. 2015) shrnuje vybrane deskriptivni ukazatele charakterizujici respondenty výzkumu.
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Current young audiences receive news content under challenging circumstances – increasing preference of online media, multiplication of available and consumed news and information sources as well as polarization of opinion climate create... more
Current young audiences receive news content under challenging circumstances – increasing preference of online media, multiplication of available and consumed news and information sources as well as polarization of opinion climate create a specific, novel conditions under which young people construct and experience news media as trustworthy. Among others, this puts in question the usual, for decades used methods of survey-based measuring of trust in media – with fragmentation of the online news environment, it appears that indicating media trustworthiness through addressing media types (TV, press, radio, internet) as monolithic entities turns to be problematic both in terms of validity and sensitivity. This presentation – drawing on research supported by Fulbright Commission and, in particular, on qualitative data from a pilot study into the topic – reviews existing recent studies on the topic and findings from our qualitative inquiry that included 30 respondents (with half of them aged 18-30). On this basis, the presentation proposes theoretically and methodologically revisited approach to trust in media aiming to fit more accurately the experience and practices of current (and specifically young) news audiences.
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Research Interests: Physics, Media Studies, New Media, Media and Cultural Studies, Humanities, and 13 morePolitical Participation, Digital Media, Community Engagement & Participation, Political Science, Mass Communication, Political communication, Social Media, Civic Engagement, New Media Studies, Mass media, Mass Communication and New Media, Community participation and engagement, and Masarykova univerzita
The presentation draws on survey of the uses of old and new media of the Czech 18+ population (N=1998). The data collected in November and December 2014 enable detailed analyses of wide range of media-related practices. Instead of... more
The presentation draws on survey of the uses of old and new media of the Czech 18+ population (N=1998). The data collected in November and December 2014 enable detailed analyses of wide range of media-related practices. Instead of focusing predominantly on the media objects or platforms, the research has employed perspective underlining connection of particular practices, types of textualities and objects. Therefore, it enables more detailed inquiry into the media ensembles, i.e. reflexively constructed sets of individuals’ practices. On that basis, we compare media-related practices of the Czech young adults (18-25) and generation of their parents (45-55) looking for symptomatic differences of their routine mundane media-related activities. The general hypothesis is that the practices differ in degree of convergent forms of practices.
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Current upheaval of participatory audiences using for their political, cultural and generally public engagement so called social media is usually covered by concepts of civic journalism and online activism. More than anything else these... more
Current upheaval of participatory audiences using for their political, cultural and generally public engagement so called social media is usually covered by concepts of civic journalism and online activism. More than anything else these concepts reflect thematic standpoints of the academic disciplines of media studies on the one hand political science on the other - with their emphasize on production and circulation of content (in case of media studies and the concept of civic journalism) or on political action (in case of political science and the concept of online activism). In the evidence-based presentation, we intend to suggest (1) that the field of audiences' agency covered by these concepts is more complex than these concepts imply and draws on more motivations than 'doing journalism' or 'doing democracy', (2) that these two concepts do not exclude each other since they in many cases describe the same agency from different theoretical position and (3) that...
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The relationship between news audiences to local media, more specifically local news, is presumed as intensive, and news audiences used to be described as highly interested in local news. This presumption is concurrently criticized as an... more
The relationship between news audiences to local media, more specifically local news, is presumed as intensive, and news audiences used to be described as highly interested in local news. This presumption is concurrently criticized as an inaccurate myth of the local, which draws mainly upon U.S. or U.K. experiences, inapplicable to other media systems. This exploratory study focuses on Czech local audiences and provides evidence-based reconsideration of the myth. Employing data from quantitative survey of the Czech adult population and qualitative interviews,this study demonstrates local news consumption by Czech audiences. [read more=”Read More” less=”Read Less”]Findings suggest that the audiences of local news—typical for their relatively low interest in local news—constitute a serious challenge for the prevailing optimistic notion of local news audiences. The study employs cluster analysis of Czech audiences of local news and qualitative interviews to assess a more nuanced unders...
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This dataset was created within the research project Constructing AcTive CitizensHip with European Youth: Policies, Practices, Challenges and Solutions (CATCH-EyoU) funded by European Union, Horizon 2020 Programme, Grant Agreement No... more
This dataset was created within the research project Constructing AcTive CitizensHip with European Youth: Policies, Practices, Challenges and Solutions (CATCH-EyoU) funded by European Union, Horizon 2020 Programme, Grant Agreement No 649538. Work Package 5 of this project (Representation of the EU and Youth Active EU Citizenship in the Media Environment) is focused in collecting and analyzing data on how the media represent the EU and youth engagement, in national and EU mainstream and progressive/alternative media, in order to deliver a framework on the media environment in 7 countries (Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Sweden, Estonia and United Kingdom). In particular this dataset contains data from the monitoring of newspapers, radio and TV during four specific periods of time: (1) May 7-21, 2014; (2) September 16-30, 2014; (3) May 7-21, 2015; (4) September 16-30, 2015.
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New media became one of the best-selling topics in research of civic and political participation and political communication. However, the more detailed inquiry into the relation between the civic participation and the whole complex of... more
New media became one of the best-selling topics in research of civic and political participation and political communication. However, the more detailed inquiry into the relation between the civic participation and the whole complex of media-related practices (including both old and new media) is rather missing yet. Therefore, after several qualitative pilot studies, we have decided to use survey techniques to map both the full range of media-related practices of the Czech society and the participatory practices of the Czech citizens. Our aim was to get the map of whole population and, at the same time, to test our assumptions based on conclusions from the qualitative inquiries. The paper, based on our 2014 survey of the general Czech population (N=1998) and employing a concept of media ensembles (clusters of media-related practices typical for specific segments of the population), uncovers relations between participatory practices and styles of media consumption / uses. The researc...
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Tuto studii zadal týmu Masarykovy univerzity Statni fond kinematografie s cilem "prozkoumat aspekty vývoje literarniho scenaře i vývoje (tzv. developmentu) z ekonomických a kulturnich perspektiv", a zajistit tak empiricke... more
Tuto studii zadal týmu Masarykovy univerzity Statni fond kinematografie s cilem "prozkoumat aspekty vývoje literarniho scenaře i vývoje (tzv. developmentu) z ekonomických a kulturnich perspektiv", a zajistit tak empiricke podklady pro hlubsi poznani realne praxe vývoje kinematografickeho dila a pro optimalizaci systemu veřejne podpory v teto oblasti filmove praxe. Fond vychazel z předpokladu, že praxe vývoje je nejmeně zmapovanou fazi vzniku kinematografickeho dila, ktera ovsem zasadně ovlivňuje jeho výslednou kvalitu.
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The presentation introduces The Project 3000: a project of a longitudinal case study focusing on detailed inquiry to media-related and public and political practices of people living in a small village with 3000 inhabitants. The... more
The presentation introduces The Project 3000: a project of a longitudinal case study focusing on detailed inquiry to media-related and public and political practices of people living in a small village with 3000 inhabitants. The interdisciplinary project employing variety of methods aims to provide contextually rich research terrain enabling particular case studies in media studies, sociology, media and political psychology a political science.
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Výzkumna zprava popisuje stav audiovizualniho pole v CR, tj. zakladni struktury, klicove aktery a praxe v produkci, distribuci a spotřebu audiovizualnich děl. Mezi struktury audiovizualniho pole řadime technickou infrastrukturu, pravni... more
Výzkumna zprava popisuje stav audiovizualniho pole v CR, tj. zakladni struktury, klicove aktery a praxe v produkci, distribuci a spotřebu audiovizualnich děl. Mezi struktury audiovizualniho pole řadime technickou infrastrukturu, pravni normy, obchodni (tj. produkcni a distribucni) modely, zakladni socioekonomicke parametry pracovniho trhu v audiovizualnim průmyslu, statni kul- turni politiku a sirsi sociokulturni kontext. Mezi aktery audiovizualniho pole zahrnujeme jednak aktery hodnotoveho řetězce, kteři se podileji na vývoji, výrobě a siřeni audiovizualniho dila, a jednak samotne spotřebitele.
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The paper presents findings from exploratory qualitative inquiry to the engagement and participation of the selected Czech citizens and from consequent quantitative survey of the Czech population. In general we are interested in how... more
The paper presents findings from exploratory qualitative inquiry to the engagement and participation of the selected Czech citizens and from consequent quantitative survey of the Czech population. In general we are interested in how political and civic engagement and participation are experienced by post-socialist citizens and, in particular, what is the role of new media in the participatory practices. We employ context-oriented approach avoiding media-centric logic, building upon Nico Carpentier’s and Peter Dahlgren’s notion of participation and Maria Bakardjieva’s notion of subactivism connecting political participation with everyday life. The qualitative inquiry is based on 22 semi-structured qualitative interviews where one half of the interviewees are residents of small towns and villages and the other half are residents of large cities. The politically and publicly active middle-class respondents were interviewed in April 2014 and the findings indicate that (1) the Czech resp...
Research Interests: Sociology, Media Studies, New Media, Political Participation, Political Science, and 13 moreMass Communication, Politics, Czech, Citizen Journalism, Civic Engagement, New Media Studies, Everyday Life, Citizenship, Mass media, Mass Communication and New Media, Population, Political Engagement, and Community participation and engagement
New media studies have undergone a significant development during last two decades. From mostly hyped, futurologist, techno-deterministic and obviously ideologically oriented discourses they have turned to normalized, multidisciplinary... more
New media studies have undergone a significant development during last two decades. From mostly hyped, futurologist, techno-deterministic and obviously ideologically oriented discourses they have turned to normalized, multidisciplinary field of research, which is significantly and closely related to the theoretical and methodological heritage of media studies. New media studies have employed very critical relation to theoretical reductionism, they accepted multicausal, symbolically oriented approach to media technologies as social phenomena and they also opened themselves to a historicizing view of new media. However, ongoing criticism within new media studies repeatedly reveals and underlines the fact that the field still lacks a basic conceptual kernel. That theoretical core is necessary for many reasons – mainly because it 1) offers an answer to still “open” question what new media “are”, 2) consequently, it has significant theoretical and methodological implications, 3) and, fin...
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This empirical-research-based chapter focuses on the Czech post-TV audiences and their uses of alternative and non-authorized online sources of films and TV series. The chapter draws on descriptive data from a representative survey of the... more
This empirical-research-based chapter focuses on the Czech post-TV audiences and their uses of alternative and non-authorized online sources of films and TV series. The chapter draws on descriptive data from a representative survey of the Czech population (2014) and on two distinct qualitative inquiries into the everyday practices of Czech audiences (2012-2015). In the text we reconstruct the general picture of the post-TV practices related to the consumption of "pirated" content and we map the audiences' motivations for such practices as well as the audiences' ethical reflexivity regarding the phenomenon. At the same time, we focus on the ways that members of the post-TV audiences choose particular technological interfaces and sources of content as well as the particular content they consume. In this regard, we identify three major distinct modes of content choice: expert curation, social curation and data-consultation curation. The survey data plausibly show that post-TV audiences significantly differ in these practices from the audiences relying on reception from TV broadcasting. Theoretically we address the topic drawing on Anthony Giddens' theory of structuration: we employ the structuration model of media, a theoretical model applying Giddens' notion of social agency on media-related practices and emphasising the position of media-related practices within the contexts of everyday life. In this regard, we avoid both media-centric and normative approach to the topic. Instead, we employ the context-oriented approach taking into the account the fact that the reception of content from illegal online sources is part of a broader set of practices and that it is subordinated to particular moral economies. Our conclusion is that the post-TV audience could hardly be seen as "pirates" or immoral pragmatists on the one hand, or, on the other, as highly reflexive and empowered actors intentionally challenging the media industries. Instead, our respondents could be seen as common viewers aiming to "reasonably" fulfil their textual needs - viewers that are mostly aware of their possible conflict with the Czech legal regulation but that are, regarding Czech specifics of online content distribution, conceiving their practices as ethically more or less non-problematic.
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The presentation overviews the main research findings and theoretical conclusion from a three-year research project entitled “New and Old Media in Everyday Life: Media audiences in the time of transformational media usage” (2013-2015).... more
The presentation overviews the main research findings and theoretical conclusion from a three-year research project entitled “New and Old Media in Everyday Life: Media audiences in the time of transformational media usage” (2013-2015). The research, drawing upon Anthony Giddens’ Theory of Structuration and upon the tradition of domestication research, utilized qualitative and quantitative insights – more than 100 qualitative interviews and representative survey of the Czech population (N=1998). On this basis, the paper identifies four primary dimensions to the evolving transformation of current Czech media audiences: (1) the dematerialization of media content linked with the increased fragmentation of media-related practices as well as transforming relations between audiences and media producers, (2) the increasing mediatization of everyday life and social interactions, (3) notable shifts in audiences' attitude towards shared public and political spheres and (4) a spatiotemporal transformation of everyday life.
Research Interests: Media Studies, New Media, Social Sciences, Audience Studies, Mobile Technology, and 11 moreMass Communication, Audience and Reception Studies, Social Media, Convergence, Mobile Communication, Media Convergence, Mass media, Audience Participation, Mass Communication and New Media, Audience Research, and Media Audiences
The paper presents a research project focused on the role of audiences’ trust in news and information sources in radicalization and polarization of the Czech public discourses and politics. This shift in the public and political sphere... more
The paper presents a research project focused on the role of audiences’ trust in news and information sources in radicalization and polarization of the Czech public discourses and politics. This shift in the public and political sphere revives important questions about the democratic role of media as sources of a shared agenda, trustworthy content and public knowledge and as platforms for public negotiations of societal and political consent: Namely it remains apparent that new as well as broadcasting and print media – as communication platforms and institutions – can yet play their part in moderating the radicalization of public opinion. However, a topical, detailed, evidence-based and theoretically rich understanding of the situation is thus far missing. The situation can be partly explained as a result of a long-term crisis of democracy linked with a distrust in democratic institutions accompanied by a decrease in traditional forms of political participation (elections, political party membership, etc.) and an increase in alternative forms of political and public participation, often linked with various uses of new media. At the same time, the crisis is usually linked with economic situation of the country and with individuals’ economic insecurities. Nevertheless, such explanations do not provide the full picture. Therefore, we employ "ontological security thesis": rather than just economic insecurity, an overall sense of an anomic insecurity - or, more specifically, a lack of sense of Giddensian ontological security - has to be considered as one of the key sources of the polarization and radicalization. And, at the same time, we consider important the way it is linked with reception of media agendas as well as the way it is amplified by discourses on social networking sites and by so-called alternative information sources. In other words, in the project we focus on the relation between (a) the social actors’ trust/distrust in particular information/news sources, (b) their attitude towards the political sphere and (c) their experience of the locus of control (expressed in external and internal efficacy and in the sense of ontological security).
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Výzkumna zprava z analýzy pokryti uprchlicke krize hlavnich zpravodajských relaci Ceske televize a TV Nova.
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The television homes and domestic audiences have changed – with multiplication of media we witness significant shifts in audiences’ practices. The shifts are mainly described with emphasize on convergent and fragmented character of media... more
The television homes and domestic audiences have changed – with multiplication of media we witness significant shifts in audiences’ practices. The shifts are mainly described with emphasize on convergent and fragmented character of media practices and are usually captured with focus on particular media objects / platforms / agency. However, how to approach the audiences’ practices as a complex phenomena, not reduced to one particular facet? I follow this question and present an outcome from the research project ‘New and old media in everyday life: media audiences at the time of transforming media uses’: a concept of ‘media ensembles’. The concept is based on Giddens’ theory of structuration and develops the tradition of domestication research with its accent on the double articulation of media and dialectic relation between public and domestic contexts: it is based on a notion that audiences construct their media-related practices as changeable and negotiated system that fulfills their socially / culturally conditioned needs and that re-creates boundaries between public and private spaces. I will explicate the concept on an analysis of transformation of TV viewership of current Czech viewers. When approached as part of media ensembles, their TV related practices can be analysed both in relation to the content curation / reception and uses of media objects. The analysis suggests that role of TV is strongly influenced by position of other domestic media and that the viewership in studied homes (1) is increasingly decentralized in terms of used objects, (2) experienced as fragmented in terms of particular practices (‘watching TV’ is replaced by ‘watching TV shows’, ‘watching news’ etc.), and (3) interestingly de-nationalized (e.g. nation-wide TV as the source of content is being substituted by international online sources). The paper is based on qualitative, ethnographically oriented research conducted in 2012–2013 on sample of 20 homes.
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Stať vznikla v rámci stipendijního pobytu na Pennsylvania State University podpořeného Fulbrightovou komisí. Inspirována byla Hnutím Duha a jeho potřebou podkladů pro strategické plánování mediální komunikace ekologických témat v letech... more
Stať vznikla v rámci stipendijního pobytu na Pennsylvania State University podpořeného Fulbrightovou komisí. Inspirována byla Hnutím Duha a jeho potřebou podkladů pro strategické plánování mediální komunikace ekologických témat v letech 2018-2021.
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This is the editorial of "Sociální studia / Social Studies" special issue focused on CATCH-EyoU project, funded by the European Union, Horizon 2020 Programme, Grant Agreement No 649538
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There are media whose main value is simply the close relationship their proximity provides for and with their audiences. Local and community media are often praised for giving voice to the voiceless, namely invisible local community... more
There are media whose main value is simply the close relationship their proximity provides for and with their audiences. Local and community media are often praised for giving voice to the voiceless, namely invisible local community members. Although being largely ignored by communication researchers, these small-scale media are undoubtedly an irreplaceable part of all media systems and fulfil important functions in society (e.g. the construction of community). Compared to other types of media, they have certain distinctive features, which always made them – as existing research shows – remarkably viable and vulnerable. Despite recent studies on local journalism, community media, audience participation in public communication and the relationship between local media and local politics, much research remains to be done with regard to the fundamental questions regarding media and closeness. These include: What are the contemporary local and community media functions in society? How ha...
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Kniha shrnuje zjistěni autorova třileteho výzkumneho projektu "Nova a stara media v každodennim životě: medialni publika v case proměny medialnich praxi". V navaznosti na kvalitativni a kvantitativni setřeni a s oporou... more
Kniha shrnuje zjistěni autorova třileteho výzkumneho projektu "Nova a stara media v každodennim životě: medialni publika v case proměny medialnich praxi". V navaznosti na kvalitativni a kvantitativni setřeni a s oporou v Giddensově teorii strukturace se věnuje ctyřem zakladnim dimenzim transformace soucasných ceských medialnich publik: (1) dematerializaci medialnich obsahů a s ni souvisejici fragmentaci medialnich praxi a změně vztahů mezi cleny medialnich publik a producenty medialnich obsahů, (2) silici mediatizaci každodennosti a socialnich interakci, (3) proměnam ve vztahu clenů publika ke sdilenemu veřejnemu a politickemu prostoru a (4) casoprostorove proměně každodenniho života.
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is exploratory study draws upon data from a 2014 survey of the Czech adult population, focusing on di erences between traditional and convergent domestic audiences of lm and TV. Employing statistical methods of hierarchical cluster... more
is exploratory study draws upon data from a 2014 survey of the Czech adult population, focusing on di erences between traditional and convergent domestic audiences of lm and TV. Employing statistical methods of hierarchical cluster analysis and multinomial logistic regression, this empiri- cal paper considers traditional and convergent modes of content consumption, various forms of the curation of content, the viewers’ attitudes to content, socio-demographic variables, and culture in general. On this basis, an evidence-based typology of Czech domestic audiences is formulated, sug- gesting four types of lm and TV viewers: traditional passive audiences, traditional engaged audi- ences, convergent passive audiences and convergent engaged audiences. Consequently, the study looks for cultural and socio-demographic predictors of the resulting types of audiences.
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Shattering the myth? Audiences’ relationship to local media and local news revisited Lenka Waschková Císařová Jakub Macek Alena Macková Masaryk University Abstract The relationship between news audiences to local media, more specifically... more
Shattering the myth? Audiences’ relationship to local media and local news revisited Lenka Waschková Císařová Jakub Macek Alena Macková Masaryk University Abstract The relationship between news audiences to local media, more specifically local news, is presumed as intensive, and news audiences used to be described as highly interested in local news. This presumption is concurrently criticized as an inaccurate myth of the local, which draws mainly upon U.S. or U.K. experiences, inapplicable to other media systems. This exploratory study focuses on Czech local audiences and provides evidence-based reconsideration of the myth. Employing data from quantitative survey of the Czech adult population and qualitative interviews, this study demonstrates local news consumption by Czech audiences. Findings suggest that the audiences of local news—typical for their relatively low interest in local news—constitute a serious challenge for the prevailing optimistic notion of local news audiences. T...
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The global reach of online platforms and services as well as the globally synchronized flows of audiovisual content might suggest that the global media market is now fully integrated. This book argues contrariwise that the global digital... more
The global reach of online platforms and services as well as the globally synchronized flows of audiovisual content might suggest that the global media market is now fully integrated. This book argues contrariwise that the global digital market is far from united and that national borders, center-periphery hierarchies and differences in scale still matter, and perhaps they matter even more than in the analog broadcast era.
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The article discusses qualitative research on the mundane civic practices of some Czechs, with a specific focus on the role of new media. It works with a context-oriented approach in order to avoid media-centrism. Our research is focussed... more
The article discusses qualitative research on the mundane civic practices of some Czechs, with a specific focus on the role of new media. It works with a context-oriented approach in order to avoid media-centrism. Our research is focussed on the ways in which civic practices are structured by immediate and wider social and political contexts and how they are experienced by post-socialist citizens from villages and large cities. The role of new media and the place of civic practices in everyday life is analysed with respect to these contexts. The research based on semi-structured in-depth interviews with 22 politically and publicly active citizens indicates that Czechs experience a similar crisis in relation to institutional politics as their counterparts in long established democracies and it reveals tell-tale differences between the social spaces of villages and cities both in participatory practices and in civic uses of new media. However, the study does not indicate a radical, ne...
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The chapter deals with diffused participation and the role of social media in mundane civic and political practices. Drawing on previous research and employing a structuration model of media for its theoretical framework, the chapter aims... more
The chapter deals with diffused participation and the role of social media in mundane civic and political practices. Drawing on previous research and employing a structuration model of media for its theoretical framework, the chapter aims to illustrate that the uses of social media are structured by affordances of the media as well as by the immediate and broader social, cultural, and political contexts in which political and civic practices are embedded. Three distinct perspectives have emerged in the course of ongoing research – the first emphasizes the role of collective membership and the pressure to conform; the second focuses on being a member of a performative audience; and the third takes political contexts into account.
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Text shrnuje diskuzi o tzv. medialnich studiich 2.0 a rozebira argumenty jejich proponentů i kritiků. Dospiva při tom ke stanovisku, že medialni studia 2.0 jsou spise pokusem o rozpoutani vnitrooborove diskuze o neschopnosti medialnich... more
Text shrnuje diskuzi o tzv. medialnich studiich 2.0 a rozebira argumenty jejich proponentů i kritiků. Dospiva při tom ke stanovisku, že medialni studia 2.0 jsou spise pokusem o rozpoutani vnitrooborove diskuze o neschopnosti medialnich studii adekvatně reflektovat nova media, nežli legitimnim manifestem nove discipliny.
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The article presents a discourse analysis of media coverage of an unsuccessful foreign investor, the case of LG.Philips Displays Holding v. the Czech state. We analyze media coverage of the case from 2000 when the investor decided to... more
The article presents a discourse analysis of media coverage of an unsuccessful foreign investor, the case of LG.Philips Displays Holding v. the Czech state. We analyze media coverage of the case from 2000 when the investor decided to start production in the Czech Republic until 2006 when the investor went bankrupt. Our method of analysis is based on Foucault’s understanding of discourse and his theoretical conceptualization of discourse analysis. It emphasizes the structural rather than the linguistic level of discourse and also draws on Gerbner’s message system analysis and de Gruyter’s method of tracking discourse. We analyzed almost 700 articles published in two Czech print dailies and two weeklies and found a significant bias in the Czech print media since a very strong politicization of the case was typical of its media coverage. The discourse of party politics emerged in connection with the government’s investment incentive policy. The arrival of Philips was presented as a res...
Research Interests:
After a long history, research on the relation between participative and communicative practices was revived in the late 1990s because of the proliferation of new media. New studies have taken into account both online and offline... more
After a long history, research on the relation between participative and communicative practices was revived in the late 1990s because of the proliferation of new media. New studies have taken into account both online and offline participation and the ability of new media to provide citizens with easier access to information and a broader repertoire of actions. In this article, which is based on a representative survey of the adult Czech population and a survey of Czech adolescents, we address participative and communicative practices as intertwined sets that are typically preferred by certain groups of citizens. As media-related and political practices usually vary due to generational and historical experience, the aim is to discover whether people with similar generational backgrounds and with similar repertoires of action manifest similar sets of commu- nication practices, i.e. similar media ensembles. Hence, we build this study on the assumption that the politi- cal- and media-r...