Legacy media
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The media described as legacy media are those that engage in traditional mass communication. These media are distributed from a single point of distribution to a fundamentally divided audience and no interaction is possible. In diametrical opposition to legacy media are the so-called new media that, with the rise of the Internet, allow interaction. The rise of the Internet has also meant that media content is less produced by media professionals, but that anyone can create media. This manifests itself especially in the so-called social media where anyone can spread messages. Within the traditional media sector, both print and audio-visual media, new means are also constantly being found to respond to the new market, so that older media are also often branded in the ‘new’ market.
⇢ see also Filter bubble
References and further reading:
Arrese, Ángel, and Jürg Kaufmann. 2016. “Legacy and Native News Brands Online: Do They Show Different News Consumption Patterns.” International Journal on Media Management 18.2: 75–97.
Wagner, Kurt, 2017. Three Major Ways Social Media is Changing Journalism. Illuminate: Bright Ideas from Santa Clara University Leaders. URL: https://www.scu.edu/illuminate/thought-leaders/kurt-wagner-12/three-major-ways-social-media-is-changing-journalism.html. Date of access: September 8, 2023.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 4, 5
[DC / LH / SM]
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Life story
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Life stories are narratives that individuals or groups (co-)construct to share experiences. Research in narrative studies distinguishes between big stories and small stories in this context. While the term big story mainly refers to the coherent narrative of a person’s self or personal identity, so-called small stories qualify as narratives we tell each other in everyday communication for the purposes of making sense of our experiences and forming collective identities with specific social groups.
A special type of small story is the “broken narrative” (Nünning and Nünning 2016) – stories people tell to come to terms with lifechanging experiences such as a severe illness, a trauma, or other kinds of social, political, economic, or ecological crisis. Since these narratives are associated with a drastic rupture in people’s lives, they display a high degree of tellability; they are frequently incoherent, fragmented, or disorganized (see Hyvärinen et al. 2010). Migrant stories may constitute such broken narratives, especially if they deal with traumatic experiences of war, violence, suppression, or flight.
⇢ see also Experience, Migrant narrative, Migration and identity, Narrative identity, Tellability
References and further reading:
Bamberg, Michael. 2007. “Stories: Big or Small – Why Do We Care?” In Narrative – State of the Art, edited by Michael Bamberg, 165–174. Amsterdam and Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.
Bamberg, Michael, and Alexandra Georgakopoulou. 2008. “Small Stories as a New Perspective in Narrative and Identity Analysis.” Text & Talk 28.3: 377–396. Georgakopoulou, Alexandra. 2006. Small Stories, Interaction and Identities. Amsterdam and Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.
Hyvärinen, Matti, Lars-Christer Hydén, Marja Saarenheimo, and Maria Tamboukou, eds. 2010. Beyond Narrative Coherence. Amsterdam and Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.
Nünning, Ansgar, and Vera Nünning. 2016. “Conceptualizing ‘Broken Narratives’ from a Narratological Perspective: Domains, Concepts, Features, Functions, and Suggestions for Research.” In Narrative im Bruch: Theoretische Positionen und Anwendungen, edited by Anna Babka, Marlen Bidwell-Steiner, and Wolfgang Müller-Funk, 37–86. Wien: V & R unipress / Vienna University Press.
Ochs, Elinor, and Lisa Capps. 2001. Living Narrative: Creating Lives in Everyday Storytelling. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
[CG]
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Limited effects paradigm
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In the 1930s, the study of media placed strong emphasis on the powerful effect of media. This was not surprising, given the impact of the Nazi regime’s propaganda. Later, beginning in the 1940s and 1950s, attention shifted to a perspective of limited effects. From that time on, the study of the media has made it clear that a variety of intermediate variables determine how the media exerts influence (see Valkenburg et al. 2016 for a synthesis of the evolution of thinking on media effects). For example, research shows that people like to hold on to their existing ideas rather than absorb information like a sponge (Holt 2018). Arno Slaets et al. (2021) rightfully remark that news users (being one specific example of media users) who are confronted with a multitude of (internally) diverse messages, interpret messages selectively, depending on cognitive interpretation frames that have been shaped by their personal, family, and social life trajectories and are influenced by their current living conditions and social contexts.
⇢ see also Attitudes, beliefs, and values, Frames of migration, News frame
References and further reading:
Holt, Lanier Frush. 2018. “Using the Elaboration Likelihood Model to Explain to Whom “#Black Lives Matter” … and to Whom It Does Not.” Journalism Practice 12.2: 146–161.
Slaets, Arno, Pascal Verhoest, Leen d’Haenens, Joeri Minnen, and Ignace Glorieux. 2021. “Fragmentation, Homogenisation or Segmentation? A Diary Study into the Diversity of News Consumption in a High-Choice Media Environment.” European Journal of Communication 36.5: 461–477.
Valkenburg, Patti, Jochen Peter, and Joseph B. Walther. 2016. “Media effects: Theory and Research.” Annual Review of Psychology 67: 315–338. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-122414-033608.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 4, 5
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Media selection behaviour
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In a research paper of which Leen d’Haenens, promoter for IMS in the OPPORTUNITIES project, is a co-author (see Verhoest et al. 2019), the phenomenon of media selection behaviour was synthesized as follows: “The abundance of available news channels and titles, to which the Internet has greatly contributed, raises the issue of choice. Does the availability of a multitude of viewpoints enlarge people’s vision of the world or do they select from it in ways that consolidates or even narrows down their existing view? This type of question has traditionally been the concern of selective exposure research and has spurred much new research into news consumption. The core assumption of most recent literature on selective exposure to news is that recipients tend to filter out value-inconsistent information which causes them to feel discomfort and are, consequently, more likely to consult value-consistent information that confirms their viewpoints.” (Verhoest et al. 2019, 4–5)
⇢ see also Filter bubble
References and further reading:
Verhoest, Pascal, Arno Slaets, Leen d’Haenens, Joeri Minnen, and Ignace Glorieux. 2019. Selective Exposure in an Environment of Information Diversity: Results of a Diary Survey and Attitude Analysis of News Use. DIAMOND report. URL: https://soc.kuleuven.be/fsw/diamond/selective-exposure.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 4, 5
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Metaphor
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Simply put, a metaphor is a linguistic comparison between two conceptual domains that are normally seen as separate and independent. Metaphor theorists call this comparison a “cross-domain mapping.” The phrase “a flow of migrants,” for instance, implicitly compares migrants to a fluid moving through a container (such as a water pipe). This metaphorical expression thus maps the conceptual domain of human migration onto the movement of a physical, inanimate substance. A metaphor is an implicit comparison, while a simile is an explicit comparison (“the migrants are like flowing water” etc.), but the underlying conceptual mechanism – the cross-domain mapping – is largely the same.
Metaphors and similes have long been associated with literary works (especially poetry), but they are pervasive in everyday language and media discourse. Some metaphors are so convntional that they hardly register as metaphors (arguably, this is the case for “a flow of migrants”). Other metaphorical expressions are more sophisticated and unconventional – they stand out and therefore may elicit a stronger emotional response. Creative metaphors can be used to enrich and complicate the meanings of narrative; alternatively, narrative can build on and challenge existing metaphorical expressions.
⇢ see also Discourse analysis, Metaphorology, Narrative technique
References and further reading:
Kövecses, Zoltán. 2010. Metaphor: A Practical Introduction. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 3, 5
[MC]
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Metaphorology
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Inspired by conceptual metaphor theory and cultural narrative theory, metaphorology – i.e. the systematic study of metaphor – proceeds from the assumption that metaphors play a central role in processes of sense-making and shaping culture (see Lakoff and Johnson 2003). According to Ansgar Nünning, “[m]etaphors not only serve to structure how we understand cultural transformations, they also project ‘mini-narrations’ onto them, thereby providing ideologically charged plots and explanations of cultural and historical changes rather than neutral descriptions thereof” (Nünning 2009, 233; Nünning 2012, 62–63). The metaphor of crisis (see “Crisis”) serves as a perfect example of such a mininarration, as crises do not naturally occur in the world, but are always the result of discursive strategies by means of which we try to make sense of past events as leading to a current situation and now require “a decision about the further progress of the incident that has to be made amongst a number of possibilities” (Nünning and Sicks 2012, 15).
⇢ see also Crisis, Crisis narration, Narrative
References and further reading:
Lakoff, George, and Johnson, Mark. 2003. Metaphors We Live By. Chicago, IL and London: The University of Chicago Press.
Nünning, Ansgar. 2009. “Steps Towards a Metaphorology (and Narratology) of Crises: On the Functions of Metaphors as Figurative Knowledge and Mini-narrations.” In Metaphors Shaping Culture and Theory [= REAL: Yearbook of Research in English and American Literature 25], edited by Herbert Grabes, Ansgar Nünning, and Sibylle Baumbach, 229–262. Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag.
Nünning, Ansgar. 2012. “Making Crises and Catastrophes – How Metaphors and Narratives Shape Their Cultural Life.” In The Cultural Life of Catastrophes and Crises, edited by Carsten Meiner and Kristin Veel, 59–88. Berlin and Boston, MA: De Gruyter.
Nünning, Ansgar, and Kai Marcel Sicks. 2012. “Turning Points as Metaphors and Mininarrations: Analysing Concepts of Change in Literature and Other Media.” In Turning Points Concepts and Narratives of Change in Literature and Other Media, edited by Ansgar Nünning and Kai Marcel Sicks, 1–28. Berlin and Boston, MA: De Gruyter.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 5, 8
[CG]
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Migration and identity
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Migration research distinguishes between labor migrants, economic migrants, refugees, asylum seekers, and expatriates – to name but a few categories. While the distinction between refugees and asylum seekers is established in European or national law, the differentiation between refugees and migrants is less clear-cut, as migrant serves as an umbrella term for persons leaving their home country to reside or take refuge in another country. “To gain official status as a refugee,” Meike Watzlawik and Ignacio Brescó de Luna (2017, 247) argue, “one must […] bridge the gap between one’s specific individual life experiences resulting from an oppressing regime, conflict, or war zone, and the legal and abstract category of ‘a refugee,’ as well as the set of expectations, predefined ideas, and conventions associated with such a category.” Recognition as a refugee consequently requires a specific performative act: “The way refugees have to present themselves so as to meet the cultural expectations of the hosting society […] heavily depends on the representations whereby the very notion of refugee is socially constructed and imagined. Such representations in turn mediate the way in which societies come to perceive, understand, and behave vis-à-vis a phenomenon only experienced directly by very few people.” (Watzlawik and de Luna 2017, 248) Media and the digital public sphere play a central role in producing, multiplying, and perpetuating diverging notions of and attitudes towards refugees, expatriates, and other migrants.
⇢ see also Asylum; Asylum seeker, Narrative identity, Migrant, Migration, Refugee, Representation of migration
References and further reading:
Watzlawik, Meike, and Ignacio Brescó de Luna. 2017. “The Self in Movement: Being Identified and Identifying Oneself in the Process of Migration and Asylum Seeking.” Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science 51.2: 244–260. URL: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12124-017-9386-6.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
[CG]
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Migration culture
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The term migration culture is used to refer to proverbs, songs and sayings that shape social representations and collective consciousness of local populations while contributing, in part, to the desire to travel, the desire to be elsewhere.
In Senegal, research carried out by the Gender, Environment, Religion and Migration Studies and Research Laboratory (GERM) has enabled us to understand that through proverbs, songs and sayings, people praise migration or travel. To this end, it can be said that the language system values migration, which symbolizes an act of bravery or courage. This explains why in certain areas, former migration basins, those who have not attempted the journey are seen as cowards.
⇢ see also Circular migration, Mobility
References and further reading:
Tandian, Aly, and Serigne Mansour Tall. 2010. “Regards sur la migration irrégulière des Sénégalais: vouloir faire fortune en Europe avec des pirogues de fortune [Technical Report, Migration Policy Centre].” CARIM Analytic and Synthetic Notes 2010/50. URL: https://cadmus.eui.eu/bitstream/handle/1814/14405/CARIM_ASN_2010_50.pdf?sequence= 1&isAllowed=y.
Tandian, Aly, and Serigne Mansour Tall. 2011. “Cadre général de la migration internationale sénégalaise: historicité, actualité et prospective [Technical Report, Migration Policy Centre].” CARIM Analytic and Synthetic Notes 2011/54. URL: https://cadmus.eui.eu/handle/1814/18480.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 4, 5
[AT]
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Mixed movement
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The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the Mixed Migration Centre apply the term mixed migration or mixed movement to refer to cross-border movement – usually in irregular manner – of individuals and groups with different motives for migration who travel alongside each other, using similar routes and means of transport or facilitators. Such ‘mixed movements’ may include asylum seekers, refugees, victims of trafficking, unaccompanied or separated children, stateless persons, and other migrants. The UN and other support agencies and countries hosting migrants have to pay attention to the different needs and profiles of migrants in any form of ‘mixed movement.’
⇢ see also Asylum; Asylum seeker, Human trafficking, Labor migration, Migrant, Migration, Refugee
References and further reading:
Mixed Migration Centre and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, eds. 2021. A Roadmap for Advocacy, Policy Development, and Programming: Protection in Mixed Movements along the Central and Western Mediterranean Routes 2021. URL: https://mixedmigration.org/resource/road-map-2021/.
The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). 2021. “Asylum and Migration.” UNHCR: The UN Refugee Agency. URL: https://www.unhcr.org/what-we-do/protect-human-rights/asylum-and-migration.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
[MM]
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Mobility studies
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The recent “‘humanities turn’ in mobility studies” (Aguiar et al. 2019, 4; see also Merriman and Pearce 2018) has inspired many literary scholars and cultural theorists to engage with the “new mobilities paradigm” (Sheller and Urry 2006) in the social sciences. New mobilities studies put the notion of mobility at the center of their research agenda, as they set out to investigate different forms and practices of mobility, such as migration, travel, tourism, and transportation (Urry 2007, 6–8), different “figures of mobility” (Salazar 2017), such as the migrant, the refugee, the nomad, or the vagabond, as well as the nexus between mobilities and immobilities (Hannam et al. 2006) from an interdisciplinary perspective. Within this vibrant cross-disciplinary research field, “mobility humanities” seek to contribute to the “discussions on the phenomena, technologies, and infrastructures of mobility and its ramifications from a humanities perspective, specifically focusing on their cultural-political, ethical, and spiritual and emotional meanings” (Shin and Lee 2022, 3).
⇢ see also Mobility, Politics of mobility
References and further reading:
Aguiar, Marian, Charlotte Mathieson, and Lynne Pearce. 2019. “Introduction: Mobilities, Literature, Culture.” In Mobilities, Literature, Culture, edited by Marian Aguiar, Charlotte Mathieson, and Lynne Pearce, 1–31. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.
Hannam, Kevin, Mimi Sheller, and John Urry. 2006. “Editorial: Mobilities, Immobilities and Moorings.” Mobilities 1.1: 1–22.
Merriman, Peter, and Lynne Pearce, eds. 2018. Mobility and the Humanities. London and New York, NY: Routledge.
Salazar, Noel. B. 2017. “Key Figures of Mobility: An Introduction.” Social Anthropology 25.1: 5–12.
Sheller, Mimi, and John Urry. 2006. “The New Mobilities Paradigm.” Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space 38.2: 2017–226.
Shin, Inseop, and Jinhyoung Lee. 2022. “Introduction: The Humanities in the Age of High Mobility.” Mobility Humanities 1.1: 1–5.
Urry, John. 2007. Mobilities. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Category: A
Work Package: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
[CG]
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