News as Entertainment
The Rise of Global Infotainment
- Daya Kishan Thussu - Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
The globalization of the US-model of commercial television news has transformed broadcast journalism globally. Do ratings-conscious 24/7 news networks, privilege style and spectacle at the expense of substance and sobriety? Is fiercely competitive and increasingly globalized and fragmented news market diluting and debasing television news?
Richly detailed and empirically grounded, this first book-length study of infotainment and its globalization by a leading scholar of global communication, offers a comprehensive and critical analysis of this emerging phenomenon. Going beyond - both geographically and theoretically - the 'dumbing down' discourse, largely confined to the Anglo-American media, the book argues that infotainment may have an important ideological role, a diversion in which 'soft news' masks the hard realities of neo-liberal imperialism.
Chapters include a historical appraisal of infotainment; the infrastructure for its globalization as well as coverage of recent wars on television news as high-tech infotainment and the growing synergies between Hollywood and Bollywood-originated infotainment. A 'global infotainment sphere' is emerging, the book argues, within which competing versions of news – from 24/7 news networks to bloggers - coexist. Accessible, engagingly written and robustly argued, the book combines analyses of theoretical debates on infotainment with extensive and up-to-date comparative data.
Thussu brings to this project the passion for news of a socially committed former journalist, the political economy of his international relations education and a formidable assembly of global detail, examining the recent explosion of 'infotainment'.
Thussu's account of war as infotainment, the Bollywoodization of news and the emergence of a global infotainment sphere, is as compelling as it is alarming. This is a significant and essential book for anyone interested in exploring the connections between news journalism, informed citizenship and democracy.
A very easy to follow text although I feel it would be better served as a sumplimentary taxt for the course I am teaching currently
adopted text book. Clear and easy to follow.
Interesting insights into the modern journlaism world. Used to draw attention to students critique of media and how stories are told.
I am actually using Thussu's book right now in a course called Globalization. It fits nicely in that course, though I won't have student reactions for a while yet. I'll still consider it for the Social Life of media course.
