South Africa offers a rich context for the study of the interrelationship between the media and identity. The essays collected here explore the many diverse elements of this interconnection, and give fresh focus to topics that scholarship has tended to overlook, such as the pervasive impact of tabloid newspapers. Interrogating contemporary theory, the authors shed new light on how identities are constructed through the media, and provide case studies that illustrate the complex process of identity renegotiation taking place currently in post-apartheid South Africa. The contributors include established scholars as well as many new voices. Collectively, they represent some of South Africas finest media analysts pooling skills to grapple with one of the countrys most vexing issues: who are we?
For teachers, students and anyone else interested in questions of media, race, power and gender, as well as the manner in which new identities are created and old ones mutate, much of interest will be found within the contributions to this important collection.
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Introduction
Identity in theory
Media, youth, violence and identity in South Africa: A theoretical approach
Abebe ZegeyeEssentialism in a South African discussion of language and culture
Kees van der Waal'National' public service broadcasting: Contradictions and dilemmas
Ruth Teer-TomaselliField theory and tabloids
Ian Glenn and Angie KnaggsIdentity in post-apartheid South Africa: 'Learning to belong' through the (commercial) media
Sonja Narunsky-LadenMedia restructuring and identity formation after apartheid
Finding a home in Afrikaans radio
Johannes FronemanThe Daily Sun and post-apartheid identity
Nicola Jones, Yves Vanderhaegen and Dee VineyOnline coloured identities: A virtual ethnography
Tanja BoschThe mass subject in Antjie Krogs Country of My Skull
Anthea Garman-
Expressing identities
Crime reporting: Meaning and identity-making in the South African press
Marguerite J. MoritzAfrikaner identity in a post-apartheid South Africa: the Self in terms of the Other
Wiida FourieForeign policy, identity and the media: Contestation over Zimbabwe
Anita HowarthMasculine ideals in post-apartheid South Africa: The rise of mens glossies
Stella ViljoenTsotsis, Coconuts and Wiggers: Black masculinity and contemporary South African media
Jane StadlerThe media and the Zuma/Zulu culture: An Afrocentric perspective
Simphiwe SesantiHe lova tata icova sesiya vela: Black masculinity and the tyranny of authenticity in SA popular culture
Adam Haupt
Under the banner "Holding us together or pulling us apart? The role of the South African media in the creation and mutation of identities", six contributors plus political scientist Ivor Chipkin as discussant looked at a range of ways that a changing media is currently engaging with a changing society. Listen to the edited podcast of this spirited discussion.
Duration: 8 min 58 sec
