Traditional Owners do get mentioned in the media negatively, or from within a paternalistic white privilge rhetoric. The media tends to negatively report only on issues of alcaholism, domestic and sexual violence or poverty. The issues being faced by the Indigenous Australian community is important to be voiced, however the paternalistic way in which these reports are made and discussed echoes feelings of 'white mummy and daddy talking about their black children', so to speak.
Although it is important to report on and address the issues and possible strategies for Indigenous Australians, it should not be wholly done within the white frameworks, without Indigenous prescence. The media tends to take the attitude of reporting on the issues faced by the 'mischevious black children' and the prices that 'white mummy and daddy' will have to pay for the acts. The fallacy in this discourse is that the issues Traditional Owners face are all a direct result of colonisation, genocide, ethnocentricsm and racism caused by our caucasian ancestors.
The cultural memory of white supremacy and Indigenous Australians and other non-caucasians as threatening or below us still continues. These historical prejudices or cultural memories are now more passively implemented though, through media portrayal, governmental attitudes and filter down through the ranks to the civilian. It is no coincidence that some of the less desirable members of our society use offensive slang terms to refer to the Traditional Owners. Below I have posted a video from Australia Day 2012 Aboriginal tent Embassy, where some Traditional Owners were peacefully protesting and the police officer exhibits quite egregious aggression.
There is much contention around 9/11 discourse and the representations of Muslim, but the representation of Westerners should also be noted. The media, as our keystone of information in instantaneous events, is dualistic, that is, it represents and shapes attitudes not singularly, but of both concerned groups (Middle East/West). Even moderate Westerners who acknowledge acts like 9/11 are not a truthful or blanket representation of Muslims, hesitate to think of media representation of Westerners in the Middle East that may lead to incorrect 'knowledge of "them" and "their" knowledge of us' (Hoover 2012, p. 75).
Another factor that needs to be considered is media as a religion, as a 'public ritual of commemoration and mourning' (Hoover 2012, p. 76). The 9/11 media frenzy is an example of that, as the images of the towers it etched in the minds of those exposed to technology. This public and instantaneous public mourning and imagery did create a feeling of community and it could be argued it further insulated the "us" group from the "them" group, through the very process of mourning. Through loss and sorrow, ratified and legitimized previous misconceptions were re-embraced. In fact, information and education about 'others can lead as readily to mistrust and misunderstanding as to trust and understanding' (Hoover 2012, p. 78). This is due to the fact that context, bias and representation of by the media occurs. A typical example would be the framing of Muslims as conservative, if not archaic, fundamentalists with an affinity for chemicals and also Westerners as immoral and sexually deviant.
The 9/11 event was a tragedy, however many other tragedies have occurred with less shock and less media coverage. Although in the article Hoover proposes it was more because of the unprecedented nature of the where the act took place, I think it was mainly due to the 'global media landscape [believing] not all human lives are of equal worth' (Hoover 2012, p. 77). The reason for a higher volume of coverage for this event is not because it was unprecedented or unusual, as most events such as Tsunami's or genocide's are to a certain degree unexpected. For instance, the world was in partial disbelief on the release of information about Pol Pot, the Khmer Rogue and the genocide which followed. Most large scale events like these are unexpected or generally action would be taken, or media reporting occurring.
It could be argued that because Western countries do contribute financially, numerically and geographically the most to media, via the myriad of frameworks, that so much reporting occurred as so much of modern media is caucasian or Western. The event could have shocked due to the very event being a target to Westerners, as targeted Western suffering may not be as prevalent on the media.
Reference
Hoover S. 2012. Religion, Media and 9/11. In Lynch G. and J. Mitchell with A. Strhan. Eds., Religion, Media and Culture: A Reader. 75-88. London and New York: Routledge.
As discussed by Cheong in his article, faith tweets and online rituals are changing the way religion functions and forms connections. The internet has provided more ways to shape the blogosphere, and create new faith connections (Cheong 2010).
These online rituals and forms of sacred communication do not merely serve as an 'easy out', but provide congregation members ways to still connect in prayer or discussion during a physical absence from the church. This enables the believer to 'construct a connected presence and affirm their religious identities within an environment where wired communication is a significant part of everyday life' (Cheong 2010).
This new avenue of religiosity has created some friction also, as some church members may not approve of the tweeting during the sermon, or further see the social media platforms as devoutly secular and at odds with religiosity. However since the waning authority of the church, new modes and avenues to the transcendent will be deemed necessary.
Reference Cheong PH, 2010. Faith tweets: Ambient Religious Communication and Microblogging Rituals. M/C Journal: A Journal of Media and Culture.
Today's lecture on fast and slow religion was most poignant. Slow religion being usurped by New Age spirtiualities and fast religion does hit a wistful nerve in me. I think the old religious 'marketplaces', rituals and orthopraxy are so beautiful and wonderfully collective. However as Australian society has become more fast paced with work, studying and generally a 'busy' connotation, fast religion is becoming more necessary. A believer can now use their iPhone or foxtel to catch the weeks sermon while on the bus, or walking to work. This individual experience meshes with the privatization of self that we see people exhibited in these age. When you catch a train or bus most people have their ear phones in, locked in their private world. It is a good thing that religion can adapt and change to meet societal needs.
In saying that, the religions that are categorized as 'slow' religions, may be incorrectly viewed as authocthontic, however they were once 'fast' religions. For example the rise of Christianity in the Hellenistic world. In that era Christianity was branching out, using different modes and methods of experiencing the (transcendent) and to gain followers. I think this shows us that in order to survive, history has already shown us that religion and spirituality needs to be adaptive and reflexive of the society.
I plan to use this week's theoretical reading and apply it to a specific example of Islam and mediatization. Firstly though, credence and respect must be payed to the relationship between modern media and religion. Modern media's discussion and portrayal of religion through movies, news reporting and so forth has made the intangible, tangible. Hjarvard states that 'the metaphysical realm is no longer something you can only imagine or occasionally see represented in symbolic forms in fresco painting or pillars of stone' as now movies like Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings has made the supernatural a lived experience, albeit vicariously (Hjarvard 2008, p.9). Hjarvard here clearly exemplifies how ironically in our currently perceived secular state, we are put into contact with the numinous exponentially.
The media does not seek just to represent facts about religion but it also stakes opinions and incites changes to 'the ways in which people interact with each other when dealing with religious issues' (Hjarvard 2008, p.11). For instance Hjarvard discusses Joshua Meyrowitz's discussion of media as conduits, where media engages in a cycle of sending and receiving symbols and images between audience and writer. Media colloquialisms and messages in this context can embody acrimony, as they implement negative trending attitudes towards groups of people, such as Muslims. For instance, on news television shows that report on Islam, the majority of reports embody images of violence, bombings, patriarchy and home made terror videos. This consistently portrays part of society in a certain demoralizing light and alters the way the public views Muslims perennially.
Secondly, if we examine media as languages our focus turns to the way media constructs negative stories about Islam, which in turn legitimizes the fear as a real and substantiated fear in the reader or watcher. A model of this was when the rumor of piggy banks being removed from British banks adverts due to Muslim offense. The media jumped at this opportunity, even in Australia where the story went to print like wildfire in the Daily Telegraph, the Mercury, the Advertiser, the NT News, the Newcastle Herald and the Courier-Mail, as well as online websites of Channel Nine, the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald (Aly 2011). One particularly prominent Australian newspaper's version told the public quite manically that the banks were 'not merely withdrawing piggy banks from advertising, but no longer giving them to children...[and how]... the Muslim world is starting to control our thinking and actually our lives' (Aly 2011, p.50). This in particular reminds me of a certain character of The Simpsons, who always cries out at opportune moments "will someone please think of the children!". This example of media as languages through online, printed and oral news, shows the power between religion and the media and how the media if given the right mustard seed, can pugnaciously grow from it a moral panic.
Thirdly, we can examine media as environments, as how different facets of media operate communicatively with the subject, the story and the listeners. An example of this would be on talkback radio, when screening callers for a discussion on Islam and Muslims, only the most vehement callers would actually feature on a negatively inclined show for aggrandizement. This also allows the media to attempt to scapegoat societal problems on the current opinion of the most dangerous and threatening "other". An example of this scapegoating holds 'Muslims falsely responsible for an impressive range of social crimes from banning Christmas to risking the lives of hospital patients with unprofessional hygiene standards and mob violence against returned soldiers' (Aly 2011, p.53). In this instance the media exploits an already seated fear of the "other" in the once passive listener and transforms him or her into an agent for perceived justice, or more rightly incited moral panic. The media in such cases acts with ideological fundamentalism, that is the media heightens "us" and "them" attitudes to meet societal attitudes and fear, for impact and for entertainment.
This is a funny video of Uncle Sam, a comic from the show Salam Cafe.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSsAY0U66hE
References
Aly, W 2011, 'Monoculturalism, Muslims and Myth Making' in Gaita R (ed.), Essays on Muslims & Multiculturalism, Text Publishing, Melbourne, pp. 49-92.
Hjarvard, S 2008, 'The mediatization of religion: A theory of media as agents of religious change', Northern Lights, vol. 6, no. 1, pp. 9-26.
Photos
Muslim woman- http://www.sxc.hu/browse.phtml?f=download&id=490619
Religious Sensations in Mainstream Media, Theoretical-Week 2
After reading this weeks theoretical article, a few things resonated with me. Meyer talks about sacred images or representations such as the Christian cross, Hindu deities or sacred drums. Although these images may at first seem a mere tool in the larger scheme of the religious show that is put on, they are sensational forms (Meyer 2012). These aesthetic sensational forms not only exemplify the large void between humans and the Divine, but 'bridge that distance and make it possible to experience...the transcendental' (Meyer 2012, p.162). The deity, sacred drum or cross is no longer profane but sacralised by the ritual or context in which it appears. Eliade posit this beautifully when he said, 'The sacred tree, the sacred stone are not adorned as stone or tree; they are worshipped precisely because they are hierophanies, because they show something that is no longer stone or tree but the sacred, the ganz andere' (Eliade 1957, p.12).
Whether it be a beautifully ornate statue, a televised sermon or singing bowl chanting, 'the phenomenological reality of religious experience...[is]... grounded in bodily sensations' (Meyer 2012, p.164). What Meyer is trying to emphasize here is that the ecstatic experience is not attributed to one single factor, it is the sum of all sensations, the beautiful music playing as one enters the holy place, the holy imagery that its decorated with and also the participation in song or chanting that grabs the spectator and turns him or her into a participator. Meyer discusses how media in the current age now plays a role in inducing sensational transcendence (Meyer, 2012).
Today's media has shaken hands in renewed friendship with religion. With new technologies, has come new ways of promoting and reaching out through religion. Meyer claims that with these new technologies the relationship between media and religion has opened up in new ways, such as audiovisual religiosity used as empirical evidence for faith based truths (Meyer 2012). As humans rely on what is visible to prove authenticity, some people's 'belief becomes thus vested in the image, it becomes hard to distinguish between belief and make-believe, miracles and special effects, or truth and illusion' (Meyer 2012, p.164). In addition paradoxes arrive with religion and modern media's new friendship, paradoxes of ethics. Partridge discussed the release of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ and how although there was extreme violence in the film, there were Christian letters written to the board of movie rating classification arguing the age should be lowered from 18 to 15 because of the 'importance of the film's religious content' (Partridge 2001, p.496). For a faith that renounces violence, the paradox of enforcing a religious yet violent film is evident.
References
Eliade, M 1957, The Sacred and the Profane: The nature of Religion, Harcourt Inc, Orlando.
Meyer, B 2012, 'Religious Sensations: Media, aesthetics, and the study of contemporary religion', in Religion, Media and Culture: A Reader, Routledge, London and New York, pp.159-169.
Partridge, C 2001, 'Religion and Popular Culture', in Religions in the Modern World; Traditions and Transformations, Routledge, London and New York, pp.489-521.
