ABSTRACT
This chapter provides the theoretical underpinnings of the book, by examining the literature around coverage of humanitarian disasters, in particular the ritualisation of humanitarian coverage, discussion of ‘distant suffering’, the CNN effect, in the context of user-generated content. It explains why Bourdieu’s field theory is a pertinent way of exploring these questions, in a Web 2.0 age.
In trying to understand the new structures and practices used for producing news, it takes Habermas’s public sphere and Bourdieu’s field theory as useful theoretical frameworks, bringing flexibility and insight into the economic, cultural and technological pressures that are all brought to bear on the way news is reported.
Digital technologies are altering the way we can get access to news and create different dynamics in the way news is produced and published (Tumber, 2014). Methods and production of journalism are changing in a world of new media technologies. This chapter looks at media concentration, personalisation of the media and the effect UGC has on the boundaries of journalism. It builds on previous sociological work (e.g. Tuchman and Tunstall), which concentrated on journalists’ routines, practices and power relationships.
