On 12 Apr 2004 at 11:21, John McCreery wrote: > On 2004/04/12, at 10:39, Torgeir Fjeld wrote: > > > Concerning the discussion of the aesthetic and communicative economy > > of advertising, I'd just like to add that it's kinda difficult to > > define the borders of advertising, and that this may have some impact > > of how we relate to the issue. I'm thinking particularly of > > advertising's relation to journalism. > > Ideally the journalist is the perfect objective witness and what the > news reports is only carefully checked and tested facts. [As opposed > to] advertising creatives who are seen as professional sophists for > hire, employed to bedazzle and beguile naive consumers. In historical > retrospect it is, however, clear that this scheme itself is a > relatively modern development and one that is now being eroded by the > same sorts of market forces described in my other messages. I agree with your assessment of the ideological context of advertising contra journalism. To muse further on the issue, and from the perspective of a former practicing journalist (and still card-carrying member of the journalist union), it seems that the traditional concept of journalism was eroded both from the inside and outside at the same time. Internally to the field it became increasingly difficult to maintain the objective position, inaugurated by the USAnian subjective journalism movement. (It should be noted paranthetically that this form of journalism is still not wholly appropriated by mainstream media, although the more assimilable parts of it has -- "This is Torgeir Fjeld reporting from Parliament [but not in my own voice]".) From the outside traditionalist journalism was undermined by superior forms of the visually spectacular and some kind of "consumerization" of the political field. Much more could be added on the internal debates in mainstream media outlets and organizations as to the rifts in the discourse, but I think I only want to add one more point for now, and that is that traditionalist journalism still holds the most concecrated position both within the journalistic field proper and to the larger social field of those "in the know", the "movers and shakers" all read New York Times or Aftenposten or some such. (Cf. the efforts the New York Times went to in order to whitewash and scandalize itself after the latest "plagiarism" affair.) This form ("genre") endows its consumers with the highest degree of symbolic capital. Yet, as has been pointed out on this list multiple times, it's readership is small and its revenue negligible. -tor -- Torgeir Fjeld torgfje2@xxxxxxxxxx http://home.no.net/torgfje/ ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html