This thesis is an attempt to reconsider and clarify some of the issues the application of the term 'moral panic' to popular and media concerns. In particular the work raises grave doubts about the ways in which this term has been used by academics and the structure of assumptions around the relationship between the press, moral panics, and the public that traditional models assume. The work is also an empirical study of the forms of representation assumed in the presentation of the internet as a new technology by journalists over the period 1995-2000 and hence reflects upon the media as both subject and object of enquiry. The investigation covers a broad range of data collected from British broadsheet newspapers over the period under scrutiny and uses a qualitative approach to analysing the themes which emerged from these discussions, and the institutional situations against the background of which these types of discourse can be situated. The work takes a critical approach to the idea that such concerns can be adequately explained by models of moral panic popularised by theorists working within mainstream cultural studies models, arguing instead that moral panics must be disinterred from these discourses and reconsidered in light evidence concerning the functions and activities of modem media.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:491055 |
| Date | January 2002 |
| Creators | Cavanagh, Allison |
| Publisher | University of Manchester |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
Page generated in 0.0078 seconds