[Tamara's notes]

Douglas, “The Turn Within: The Irony of Technology in a Globalized World” (2006)

620: contradiction b/w McLuhan’s empathetic global village and the narcissism of contemp pop cult - McL’s tech determinism prevented him from seeing social constructions

- e.g. the “turn within” caused by new comm tech in US

- yet there is a soft determinism of tech, esp in terms of scopic potential

621: Turn Within - four aspects: irony of tech; narcissism; ethnocentrism; triumph of youth

- tightly intertwined with the crisis in American journalism, and rise of reality TV

623: academic debates around tech determinism: currently accepted is soft determinism, where

tech has some agency in network of actors [Latour]

625: contra much of McLuhan, esp global village, that is currently a myth in the US

- irony of technology: comm. tech often have exact opposite consequences of what is

predicted, because of the ideological system’s primacy over tech system

627: e.g. impact of Vietnam War in TV, and subsequent control over Gulf War portrayal

628: most of the Iraq images post 9/11 also controlled, until bloggers et al began disseminating

incriminating news – chaos, but highlights the corporate underpinnings of news

629: corporate interests à narcissism bias in news, fluff pieces rather than int’l conflict

630: int’l news stories declining since 1980s… sells less than “news you can use”

631: dominant storytelling practices shape the ideological work of news: othering

- in addition, rise of reality TV and celebrity frenzy, replacing TV newsmagazines

632: narcissism sells through elevating everyday, and as advertising, self-scrutiny

- e.g. consider reality show close-up confessionals vs. int’l group shots of others

633: problem with reality TV is its convergence with trends in news, legitimizing them

634: at the same time, wide disregard for hegemonic news media has spurned alternatives