Search

Visual climate change communication has seen increased scholarly attention in recent years, with a strong focus on science communication. However, less is known about the producers of climate imagery. The current article presents results from interviews with 20 photographers engaged in climate change on the challenges they see for climate photography today and the key strategies they use to achieve reach and impact in the digital media environment. Results indicate that practitioners gravitate toward variations of a “gateway strategy,” in which motives and forms of visual presentation are chosen as gateways to bypass the potential resistance or indifference to climate change messages. The article proposes a typology of such visual gateway strategies.

Fake news, in the sense of lying (the circulation of disinformation) is, of course, nothing new. While it is today typically associated with political propaganda or conspiracy theories such as climate change denial, it is as old as human communication itself, and a seemingly inevitable aspect of public discourse. Falsehoods can be used for numerous ends, from myth to satire to outright deception; the effects of fake news can range from laughter to death (Burkhart JM. Libr Technol Rep 53(8):1–36, 2017, p. 5). One might doubt the utility of a buzzword such as “fake news”, but the phenomena indicated by the term nonetheless constitute a serious challenge to modern notions of the “public sphere” as the space in which commonality is established and maintained. The very idea of the Anthropocene, and the contexts in which it appears, is perhaps one of the best illustrations of the risks involved, as well as of the problematic nature of “fake news” as a concept. In this paper, we briefly review the literature on fake news in order to locate common themes. One of these in particular stands out as central, namely, the perceived threat to liberal democratic institutions and the viability of the very idea of a public sphere on which they rely. We argue that while empirical studies and categorization of actors, motives, effects, and techniques of dissimulation and distortion are useful for understanding the nature of fake news, they tend not to pay careful attention to what is perhaps the greatest challenge, namely, the expansion and consequent reconstitution of the public sphere as a genuine plurality, with all the risks of disintegration that is entailed. We conclude with a proposal, inspired by Steve Fuller, that we acknowledge the post-truth condition as a kind of “fact” of contemporary life in which the most important function of the public sphere is, as Richard Rorty would say, to keep the conversation going. This means that the notion of “fake news” should not be taken at

Engaging Vulnerability

This open access book focuses on the dimensions of the discourse of 'The World Class University', its alleged characteristics, and its policy expressions. It offers a broad overview of the historical background and current trajectory of the world-class-university construct. It also deepens the theoretical discussion, and points a way forward out of present impasses resulting from the pervasive use and abuse of the notion of "world-class" and related terms in the discourse of quality assessment. The book includes approaches and results from fields of inquiry not otherwise prominent in Higher Education studies, including philosophy and media studies, as well as sociology, anthropology, educational theory.The growing impact of global rankings and their strategic use in the restructuring of higher education systems to increase global competitiveness has led to a ‘reputation race’ and the emergence of the global discourse of world class universities. The discourse of world class universities has rapid uptake in East Asian countries, with China recently refining its strategy. This book provides insights into this process and its future development.

Kan man tänka sig att det finns alternativa bildningsvägar och andra kulturella möjligheter utanför centrum som utgår från periferins egna resurser och som inte behöver värderas efter centrums normer? Kan centrum lära sig något av periferin? Eller är kulturen och den kritiska diskussionen reglerad av centristiska normer för vad som anses som värdefullt och korrekt? Texterna i denna bok bygger på föreläsningar från en heldagskonferens i Skräppbo Skola i Riddarhyttan, Västmanland, den 5 juni 2019. Ett samarrangemang mellan Kulturreservatets Folkhögskola, Engaging Vulnerability vid Uppsala universitet och Sparbanksstiftelsen Nya., Engaging Vulnerability

In this introductory chapter, the editors place the current volume within vulnerability scholarship—in particular, discussions by feminist thinkers who see vulnerability as more than a weakness. They address four aspects that may make vulnerability a problematic theoretical lens: the problem of ontology, the question of privilege, the unease with the state and the fact that the language of vulnerability is very much in motion. Given the Scandinavian focus of this volume, the welfare state and its position in relation to vulnerability is particularly addressed. Finally, the chapter provides an outline of the book while also making clear how the various topics have been presented in four different parts., Engaging Vulnerability

With 600,000 listeners, P3 Documentary is the most popular pod radio format in Sweden—a country of 10 million people. The majority of the documentaries stage crime—most often, famous murder cases. In this chapter, 19 of the programmes on murder are analysed with a focus on the choice of murders, the use of victims, perpetrators, family and experts, the horror genealogy and a dramatic form that has increasingly tightened over the years. Hyvönen et al. analyse how listeners are vulnerable to the circulation, invoking and mobilizing of emotions (Ahmed in The Cultural Politics of Emotion. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, 2012), and they show that the documentaries do significant political work. A politics of mobility is distributed and, in controversial cases on migrants, the pain of others is used in processes of othering that compromise the public service aim of impartiality., Engaging Vulnerability

Peter Pomerantsev visar i sin bok hur internet och sociala medier det senaste decenniet använts av informationskrigare för att påverka politiken i västliga demokratier. Ur informationskrigarnas perspektiv är det bara bra att de blir ertappade för det visar världen att de är handlingskraftiga. Detta skapar allvarliga problem för den liberala demokratin som dess försvarare står vilsna inför.

Att medierna inte förmedlar verkligheten är ingen ny insikt, men Dopping och Ljunggren lyckas ändå komma med något nytt genom att skifta fokus. Eftersom alla försök att få medierna att skärpa sig har misslyckats, är det dags att försöka reformera publiken. Att vara mediekonsument i dag kräver besinning.

This chapter takes up the now infamous case of the so-called Macchariani Scandal in light of the Karolinska Institute’s tactics for maintaining and enhancing its position as a WCU. It pays special attention to research funding policies in general, and, in particular, the role of the chairman of the Institute’s Board of Trustees, the Liberal politician Lars Leijonborg, as an example of how the dream of becoming a world-class country in the increasingly fierce global competition can have far-reaching negative consequences for national higher education systems as well as for individuals., Engaging Vulnerability

Around 1960, the politics of the emerging media society in Sweden tended to fixate the formative functions of mass communication. The monopoly of public service broadcast media, press subsidies and new tendencies in film policy were some of the issues around which uncertainty prevailed. New methods to provide reliable data were sought by politicians, since empirical facts were required as arguments for an updated media policy. This article examines the different ways that the field of media studies was introduced in Sweden between 1960 and 1980. We argue that Swedish academic media studies departed from, and emerged within, a rather diffuse borderland between industry, politics and academia. The formation of national media research in Sweden can partly be seen as an effect of politicians and the media industry wanting to be better informed on issues such as media influence, media ownership and the habits and composition of the media audience.

This edited collection brings together international authors to discuss the meaning and purpose of higher education in a “post-truth” world. The editors and authors argue that notions such as “fact” and “evidence” in a post-truth era must be understood not only politically, but also socially and epistemically. The essays philosophically examine the post-truth environment and its impact on education with respect to our most basic ideas of what universities, research and education are or should be. The book brings together authors working in Australia, China, Croatia, Romania, Canada, New Zealand, Portugal, Sweden, UK and USA.

This chapter discusses the consequences of mediatization and marketization for public discourse and debate, and offers a proposal for how the academy and the media can work together to meet the challenges that they face in a changing media environment., Engaging Vulnerability

I mars 2015 gav regeringen journalisten Anette Novak i uppdrag att leda arbetet med att utreda dagens mediemarknad och ta fram förslag till mediepolitiska åtgärder för framtiden. I början av november i år presenterades Medieutredningens slutbetänkande, som ger en dyster bild av mediernas och journalistikens situation. De digitala jättarna tar journalistikens intäkter, vilket ses som ett hot mot demokratin. Därför föreslås bland annat ett nytt teknikneutralt mediestöd. Mottagandet av utredningen har överlag varit positivt, men kritiker ser problem med de åtgärdsförslag som presenteras.