Heike Graf
Södertörn University, MKV, Faculty Member
Research Interests:
Journalistische Produktion und ethnische Diversitat : Journalisten mit Migrationshintergrund in Deutschland und Schweden
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This volume is situated at the intersection of communication, environment, and media. Communication here is not understood as the pure exchange of information, or as dialogue, but instead in a more general sense, as the core element that... more
This volume is situated at the intersection of communication, environment, and media. Communication here is not understood as the pure exchange of information, or as dialogue, but instead in a more general sense, as the core element that constitutes society. Without communicating about our environment, meaning here especially the non-human environment, we have no knowledge about dangers such as climate change, pollution, deforestation, etc., and therefore cannot react to them. German sociolog..
Research Interests:
How do we talk about the environment? Does this communication reveal and construct meaning? Is the environment expressed and foregrounded in the new landscape of digital media? The Environment in the Age of the Internet is an... more
How do we talk about the environment? Does this communication reveal and construct meaning? Is the environment expressed and foregrounded in the new landscape of digital media? The Environment in the Age of the Internet is an interdisciplinary collection that draws together research and answers from media and communication studies, social sciences, modern history, and folklore studies. Edited by Heike Graf, its focus is on the communicative approaches taken by different groups to ecological issues, shedding light on how these groups tell their distinctive stories of ‘the environment.’ This book draws on case studies from around the world and focuses on activists of radically different kinds: protestors against pulp mills in South America, resistance to mining in the Sámi region of Sweden, the struggles of indigenous peoples from the Arctic to the Amazon, gardening bloggers in northern Europe, and neo-Nazi environmentalists in Germany. Each case is examined in relation to its multifa...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
The focus of this article is on the use of Niklas Luhmann’s systems theoretical approach in order to analyse interviews conducted with media workers concerning their experiences of ethnic diversity in newsrooms. Applying systems theory... more
The focus of this article is on the use of Niklas Luhmann’s systems theoretical approach in order to analyse interviews conducted with media workers concerning their experiences of ethnic diversity in newsrooms. Applying systems theory means constructing the interview as a social system and seeing the “data” as observations produced by the observer and not as representations of a reality. The first part of the article describes the interview methodology and the second part provides examples, from the current study, of how systems theory can be applied in order to analyse interviews. Using a difference-theoretical approach means looking at the distinctions the informants make when talking about their experiences. These main guiding distinctions can be summarised as immigrant background/competence as well as advantage/competence. Using the guiding distinction of inclusion/exclusion when interpreting the interviewees’ statements, the interdependencies of mechanisms of inclusion and exc...
Research Interests:
The goal of this article is to explore the website communication of urban activist gardeners by focusing on the concept of ritual as a heuristic category. In contrast to the majority of those doing research on ritual, I use a... more
The goal of this article is to explore the website communication of urban activist gardeners by focusing on the concept of ritual as a heuristic category. In contrast to the majority of those doing research on ritual, I use a systems-theoretical approach in applying the concept of ritual to communication processes. I explore the role played by ritual in communication in order to answer questions such as, “What is specifically unique about the ritual mode of communicating?” and, following from this, “What function do these rituals serve in communication?” My subject, urban garden activism, is thus addressed from the perspective of media- and communication research. First, I briefly describe urban activist gardening and how communication is usually structured on their websites. Second, I present an outline of some theories and concepts of communication and ritual within media studies, and give a brief account of the systems-theoretical approach that I use. Third, I define some areas o...
Research Interests:
sh.se. Publications. ...
Research Interests:
The blogosphere supports an interpersonal meaning production process by providing the space and opportunities for communication through the circulation and discussion oftopics. Using systems theory ...
Research Interests:
Abstract: This book examines how cultural diverse newsrooms are. It thereby does not just focus on media content like many other studies do, but concentrates on the media workers themselves and the media organisations. Field studies were... more
Abstract: This book examines how cultural diverse newsrooms are. It thereby does not just focus on media content like many other studies do, but concentrates on the media workers themselves and the media organisations. Field studies were conducted in both Swedish ...
Research Interests:
Rezension: Edstrom, Maria & Molster, Ragnhild (red.) (2014). Making change: Nordic examples of working towards gender equality in the media.
Research Interests:
„‘I allmanhetens tjanst' : Krise einer gesellschaftlichen Kommunikation am Beispiel von Sveriges Radio
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
sh.se. Publications. ...
Research Interests:
What is necessary for minority media to be picked up on the radar of mainstream media? This report analyses Swedish media coverage of the Stockholm-based Radio Islam, and German media coverage of t ...
Research Interests:
sh.se. Publications. ...
Research Interests:
Research Interests: Humanities and Art
This paper examines ‘ordinary’ people’s media communication about environmental issues. I choose the example of garden blogs. They fall under the category of topic-centered blogs; themes concerning ...
Research Interests:
In contrast to other branches, media companies are criticized as ‘lagging behind’ in becoming ethnically diverse, and they are too slow in making progress of diversity efforts (e.g. Horsti & Hulten, 2011; Graf, 2011; Markova & McKay,... more
In contrast to other branches, media companies are criticized as ‘lagging behind’ in becoming ethnically diverse, and they are too slow in making progress of diversity efforts (e.g. Horsti & Hulten, 2011; Graf, 2011; Markova & McKay, 2013, Horsti et al 2014). For example, when it comes to media professionals with migrant backgrounds, the numbers are very low: Only three percent of journalists have a migrant background according to a survey of the German Journalist Association in 2007 (Poettker 2013). Especially, black television journalists in Germany are rare. There are no news anchors of African origin, and there are only a few isolated cases of entertainment programs, where black journalists are in front of a camera.This paper examines how media companies assess the importance of this issue of diverse workforce. As I am especially interested in the workforce (and not in programming), I have mainly interviewed 10 HR managers and staff who are responsible for personnel development ...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Vom Schmelztiegel zur Salatschussel : Einige Betrachtungen zum Einflus moderner elektronischer Medien auf die Identitat
Research Interests: Humanities and Art
sh.se. Publications. ...
Research Interests:
In diesem Band sind zwolf kultur-, literatur- und geschichtswissenschaftliche Beitrage versammelt, die das Thema Stadt in unterschiedlichen Kontexten zum Inhalt haben. Der Schwierpunkt liegt auf No ...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
... practice: news journalists in Sweden and Germany. Editor: Heike Graf. Place of publ.: Göteborg Publisher: Nordicom. Pages: 121-148. Year of publ.: 2011. URI: urn:nbn:se:sh:diva-7917. Permanent link: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn ...
Det har kapitlet behandlar journalistik och etnisk mangfald ur ett medietext-och produktionsperspektiv. Kapitlet inkluderar inte receptionen av olika sorters medietexter som adresserar mangfaldspe ...
Research Interests:
We know from research that news media create their preferred meanings of environmental issues, from the angle of problems and dangers (e.g. Roll-Hansen 2014, Foust, C. R. & O'Shannon Murphy, W., 2009). While some environmental events... more
We know from research that news media create their preferred meanings of environmental issues, from the angle of problems and dangers (e.g. Roll-Hansen 2014, Foust, C. R. & O'Shannon Murphy, W., 2009). While some environmental events are associated with drama such as earthquakes, most of environmental phenomena are rather invisible such as the thinning of Earth’s protective ozone layer (Hansen 2010, 95). Also the time scale of most environmental issues does not fit to 24-hours news making such as climate change. It needs a great deal of journalistic work to make such phenomena visible. Hence, to fit in to conventional news format, mainstream media “over-report the risks generating by acute crises” (Allan de. 2000, in Cox 2013, 167).This paper discusses the consequences of news media’s coverage of environmental issues as threats and dangers. Fear has emerged as a framework for engaging in ecological issues. Danger and fear are perceived as a central feature of our environment. We...
Research Interests:
Urban activist gardening can take many forms and is practiced in cities all over the world from community gardens on vacant lots, that is, the cultivation of what is considered to be neglected land ...