An Ardent Flame: Witness to Distant Suffering, Human Rights and Unworthy Victims in the Coverage by The New York Times and Two Journals of the Religious Left of the 1980s Civil Wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua

Scholars have investigated witness to distant suffering (WTDS) almost entirely in visual media. This study examines it in print. This form of reporting will be examined in two publications of the religious left as contrasted with the New York Times. The thesis is that, more than any technology, WTDS consists of the journalist’s moral commitment and narrative skills and the audience’s analytical resources and trust. In the religious journals, liberation theology provides the moral commitment, the writers and editors the narrative skills and trust and the special vision of the newly empowered poor the analytical foundation. In bearing witness to those who have suffered state or guerilla terrorism in El Salvador and Nicaragua during the 1980s, we will investigate a distinction between “worthy” and “unworthy victims.” This last issue has a special ethical and political significance. Media witnessing to the suffering of strangers can help them become known, and so “worthy.” It can help them, and their plight and cause, become better recognized. This is the power of the media.

La comunicazione della cooperazione allo sviluppo: gli Enti Pubblici. Analisi discorsive dei Siti Web

Our research takes place in the context of a discipline kwown as Communication for Development, sited inside the field of Communication for Social Change, characterized by the use of interpersonal ad mass communication theories and tools, applyied to international development cooperation. Our study aims at pointing out a change of paradigm in this field: our object is Public Administration’s communication, therefore, what we suggest is a shift from Communication for Development, to Development Communication. The object of our study, hence, becomes the discourse itself, in its double action of representation and construction of reality. In particular, we are interested in the discourse’s tribute to the creation of a collective immagination, wich is the perspective towards which we have oriented the analysis, through a structuralist semoitics-based methodology integrated with a socio-semiotic approach. Taking into consideartion the fact that in our contemporary society (that is to say a ‘Western’ and ‘First World’ society), the internet is a crucial public space for the mediation and the management of collective immagination, we chose the web sites of Public Bodies which are dedicated to International Cooperation has our analysis corpus. This, due to their symbolic and ideologic significance, as well as for the actual political responsibility we think these web sites should have. The result of our analysis allows us to suggest some discoursive strategies used in the web sites of Public Bodies. In these sites, there is a tendency to shift the discourses around international cooperation from the ideological axis - avoiding in so doing to explicit a political statement about the causes of injustices and un-balances which lead to the necessity of a support in development (i.e. avoiding to mention values such as social justice and democracy while acknowledging socio-economical institutions which contribute to foster underdevelopment on a global scale) -, to the ethical axis, hence referring to moral values concerning the private sphere (human solidarity and charity), which is delegated mainly to non governamental associations.

Il linguaggio degli ambienti virtuali culturali: comunicare la storia di Bologna attraverso il progetto Nu.M.E.

The contemporary media landscape is characterized by the emergence of hybrid forms of digital communication that contribute to the ongoing redefinition of our societies cultural context. An incontrovertible consequence of this phenomenon is the new public dimension that characterizes the transmission of historical knowledge in the twenty-first century. Awareness of this new epistemic scenario has led us to reflect on the following methodological questions: what strategies should be created to establish a communication system, based on new technology, that is scientifically rigorous, but at the same time engaging for the visitors of museums and Internet users? How does a comparative analysis of ancient documentary sources form a solid base of information for the virtual reconstruction of thirteenth century Bologna in the Metaverse? What benefits can the phenomenon of cross-mediality give to the virtual heritage? The implementation of a new version of the Nu.M.E. project allowed for answering many of these instances. The investigation carried out between 2008 and 2010 has shown that, indeed, real-time 3D graphics and collaborative virtual environments can be feasible tools for representing philologically the urban medieval landscape and for communicating properly validated historical data to the general public. This research is focused on the study and implementation of a pipeline that permits mass communication of historical information about an area of vital importance in late medieval Bologna: Piazza di Porta Ravegnana. The originality of the developed project is not limited solely to the methodological dimension of historical research. Adopted technological perspective is an excellent example of innovation that digital technologies can bring to the cultural heritage. The main result of this research is the creation of Nu.ME 2010, a cross-media system of 3D real-time visualization based on some of the most advanced free software and open source technologies available today free of charge.

Tra società informazionale e prosumerismo: il citizen journalism e la partecipazione on line

I temi della ricerca riguardano il rapporto fra avvento del web e la modificazione dei processi di formazione di identità personale e sociale, della percezione dello spazio e del tempo, del prosumerismo digitale e delle varie forme di partecipazione ed associazione. Centrale è stata l’analisi del rapporto fra il Web 2.0 e la trasformazione delle forme di comunicazione a vari livelli, sia personali che sociali. Partendo da una analisi dei contesti socio-economici globali che hanno trasformato la società moderna nella società informazionale, è stato impostato un percorso di ricerca che approfondisse gli attuali criteri di strutturazione della propria identità, alla luce dell’avvento dei social network e delle reti virtuali di comunicazione come strumento preferenziale di socializzazione. La realtà delle reti sociali è stata analizzata in un’ottica di aggregazione spontanea mirata tanto alla comunicazione quanto alla tutela dei consumatori, e le trasformazioni portate dal Web 2.0 sono state la chiave di lettura per ridefinire i parametri della partecipazione dal basso generata dalla rete. Per comprendere la portata di tali trasformazioni nel contesto italiano è stato impostato un paragone tra l’uso del web negli Stati Uniti e in Italia, avendo le recente campagne elettorali dimostrato l’importanza del web nella partecipazione politica bottom-up; il percorso di ricerca ha dunque affrontato una comparazione di due casi, quello italiano e quello statunitense, finalizzato a comprendere l’attuale ruolo dell’utente nelle dinamiche di comunicazione mediatica. Per focalizzare al meglio le trasformazioni sociali generate dalla partecipazione on line è stato infine analizzato il caso del citizen journalism, per misurare, attraverso la metodologia dell’etnografia digitale, l’entità delle trasformazioni in corso. Il portale di giornalismo partecipativo YouReporter è stato il contesto privilegiato dove poter verificare le ipotesi iniziali circa le dinamiche di partecipazione, e il supporto di programmi di elaborazione statistica netnografica ha permesso di destrutturare al meglio tali dinamiche.

Revisioning a Japanese Spiritual Recovery Through Manga: Kobayashi Yoshinori’s ‘Gōmanism’ as Aesthetics and Ideology

This essay provides a critical analysis of the aesthetic ideology of “Gomanism” in the manga of Kobayashi Yoshinori (b. 1953), particularly Yasukuniron (On Yasukuni, 2005) and Tennōron (On the Emperor, 2009), in order to flesh out the implications of the author’s “revisionist” approach to Japanese religion, politics and history.

From Books to the Web: A Comparative Analysis of Holocaust Denial in the Internet Age

An analysis of print Holocaust denial literature as it compares to internet Holocaust denial, with a focus on how the transition from print literature to the internet has affected Holocaust denial.

The Right to Die Debate: The Demonization of Dr. Kevorkian and the Creation of a Moral Panic Surrounding Physician-Assisted Suicide in the United States

The Right to Die Debate is a recent but highly controversial moral matter. In particular, physician-assisted suicide (PAS) is an issue that has been evaded by the medical community for years. As of 1990, most states had never encountered the issue before and therefore did not have any laws in place to prohibit PAS (Strate et. al, 2005). Dr. Jack Kevorkian, a retired pathologist from Royal Oak Michigan was the first to publicly address PAS. He brought the issue into the limelight through a bizarre and crude series of assisted deaths that had a lasting impact on not only the Right to Die Debate as whole, but on public policy and both federal and state governmental agendas. This study focuses on the way in which the media, in particular the New York Times (NYT) has portrayed Dr. Jack Kevorkian as incompetent, morally culpable and in an overall negative light in the past twenty years. Applying Stanley Cohen’s 1972 theory of moral panic, a content analysis of NYT media publications between 1990 and 1999 supports Cohen’s theory and reveals that the media has created a moral panic surrounding Kevorkian. This has in turn led to public policy that prevents both terminally ill individuals and their doctors from having a desirable choice; that of voluntary euthanasia and PAS.

The Sweet Script: A Critical Analysis of American Sportswriting

This thesis analyzes the sportswriting genre as a form of personal essay. It explores the art over time through writers Red Smith, A.J. Liebling, Roger Angell, George Plimpton, Bart Giamatti, Frank Deford, and Rick Reilly, as well as anthologized writers from 2008 and blogs.

Children's Perceptions of Male and Female Athletes as Presented in Sports Illustrated for Kids

Despite gains made by Title IX in the past 36 years, including increased female participation in high school and collegiate sport, there is evidence that gender equity in sport is not fully achieved. Researchers target the media because they tend to shape social values and disseminate information to the masses (Kane, 1978, in Fink & Kensicki, 2002). As sports become more pervasive, framing theory has become particularly relevant. The purpose of this study is to build on the Hardin et al. (2002) study by examining the relationship among media sports coverage, gender equity in sport and the perceptions young sports fans begin to form about gender and sport based on media consumption. The researcher hypothesized that since women face discrimination in sport starting from the time that they choose to participate, children will perceive male athletes and their sports as more legitimate. Additionally, the media play a major role in shaping the views of audiences, so the way that they represent male and female athletes, including juxtaposing them, may have an impact on children. The researcher conducted a content analysis of 24 Sports Illustrated for Kids issues from 1996 to 1999 and 24 issues from 2006 to 2007. The researcher analyzed the content of photographs (N=3219) and of headlines (N=762) by using the definitions determined by Hardin et al. (2002). We found that there is a disproportionate amount of coverage devoted to male athletes and that the discrepancy between media representation between men and women in sport has grown since the mid-1990s. This study also includes a focus group conducted with three children from a community swimming program in a northeastern town and found that those children were acutely aware of the differences between men and women in sport based on the discussion. The researcher does not attempt to find a causal relationship between these children’s perceptions and the way media represents them, but rather uses the focus group to complement the content analysis. As children become sports consumers in later life, future research exploring the relationship between children’s perceptions and the media’s representations need to be done before causality and the significance of media effects are determined.

La interactividad interpretativa : dispositivos y narrativas

El presente trabajo tiene como objetivo aportar reflexiones a los cambios y mutaciones producidos por las nuevas Tecnologías de la Comunicación y el Conocimiento (TIC), en los productos paradigmáticos de la “comunicación intencional", desde una mirada que abarca las transformaciones de los relatos y las competencias de un nuevo modelo de destinatario. Antes de la aparición de las tecnologías de reproducción y comunicación pública, (anteriormente llamada “comunicación de masas"), existieron dispositivos, fuera del circuito de la cultura escrita, que apelaban a emisores y destinatarios con competencias que excedían la interpretación del escrito.

A EVOLUÇÃO DO MARKETING POLÍTICO NA TELEVISÃO BRASILEIRA: 1989 2002.

Esta tese baseia-se na análise das campanhas políticas presidenciais, especificamente nos programas de Horário Gratuito de Propaganda Eleitoral veiculados na televisão brasileira de 1989 a 2002. Discorremos sobre os melhores momentos das campanhas políticas desse período, contudo, o enfoque mais abrangente é nas eleições de 2002. A presente pesquisa retrata pontos importantes relacionados à projeção da imagem dos candidatos à Presidência da República do Brasil. A comunicação, a trajetória, a televisão como veículo de comunicação de massa, a propaganda política, a publicidade eleitoral, o marketing político, o marketing eleitoral, em suma, as ferramentas utilizadas como aliadas imprescindíveis na conquista do poder.(AU)

A EVOLUÇÃO DO MARKETING POLÍTICO NA TELEVISÃO BRASILEIRA: 1989 2002.

Esta tese baseia-se na análise das campanhas políticas presidenciais, especificamente nos programas de Horário Gratuito de Propaganda Eleitoral veiculados na televisão brasileira de 1989 a 2002. Discorremos sobre os melhores momentos das campanhas políticas desse período, contudo, o enfoque mais abrangente é nas eleições de 2002. A presente pesquisa retrata pontos importantes relacionados à projeção da imagem dos candidatos à Presidência da República do Brasil. A comunicação, a trajetória, a televisão como veículo de comunicação de massa, a propaganda política, a publicidade eleitoral, o marketing político, o marketing eleitoral, em suma, as ferramentas utilizadas como aliadas imprescindíveis na conquista do poder.(AU)

ORÍGENES LESSA E A PROPAGANDA BRASILEIRA

A trajetória de vida do publicitário, jornalista, contista, novelista, romancista e ensaísta Orígenes Lessa é rica em experiência profissional e conhecimento intelectual na propaganda e na literatura. O objetivo central deste trabalho foi o de resgatar seu itinerário na propaganda, seus valores, as técnicas de publicidade por ele utilizadas, bem como suas contribuições para a evolução da propaganda brasileira. O publicitário, detentor também de ampla produção literária, foi o primeiro presidente da APP Associação dos Profissionais de Propaganda. Trabalhou em uma das primeiras agências de publicidade do Brasil, a Eclética. Começou a atuar em 1928 na multinacional General Motors, depois em agências estrangeiras, como a J.W. Thompson, e em meios de comunicação nacionais, consolidando uma carreira de 57 anos dedicados à publicidade. Adotamos o método de pesquisa histórica buscando os vínculos entre a trajetória pessoal e profissional de Orígenes Lessa e o desenvolvimento da publicidade. Privilegiamos o período das décadas de 20 e 30, época de ativa militância do publicitário na área. Destacamos sua percepção do trabalho do redator publicitário, seus valores, principais trabalhos e as repercussões dos mesmos na sociedade brasileira.(AU)

ORÍGENES LESSA E A PROPAGANDA BRASILEIRA

A trajetória de vida do publicitário, jornalista, contista, novelista, romancista e ensaísta Orígenes Lessa é rica em experiência profissional e conhecimento intelectual na propaganda e na literatura. O objetivo central deste trabalho foi o de resgatar seu itinerário na propaganda, seus valores, as técnicas de publicidade por ele utilizadas, bem como suas contribuições para a evolução da propaganda brasileira. O publicitário, detentor também de ampla produção literária, foi o primeiro presidente da APP Associação dos Profissionais de Propaganda. Trabalhou em uma das primeiras agências de publicidade do Brasil, a Eclética. Começou a atuar em 1928 na multinacional General Motors, depois em agências estrangeiras, como a J.W. Thompson, e em meios de comunicação nacionais, consolidando uma carreira de 57 anos dedicados à publicidade. Adotamos o método de pesquisa histórica buscando os vínculos entre a trajetória pessoal e profissional de Orígenes Lessa e o desenvolvimento da publicidade. Privilegiamos o período das décadas de 20 e 30, época de ativa militância do publicitário na área. Destacamos sua percepção do trabalho do redator publicitário, seus valores, principais trabalhos e as repercussões dos mesmos na sociedade brasileira.(AU)