Media Witnessing Testimony in the Age of Mass Communication

by Frosh, Paul; Pinchevski, Amit

• ISBN13: 9780230551497
• ISBN10: 0230551491
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-01-15
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

From the Holocaust to 9/11, modern communications systems have incessantly exposed us to reports of distant and horrifying events, experienced by strangers, and brought to us through media technologies. In this book leading scholars explore key questions concerning the truth status and broader implications of 'media witnessing'.

Author Biography

PAUL FROSH is Assistant Professor and Lecturer, Department of Communication and Journalism, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. He is the author of The Image Factory: Consumer Culture, Photography and the Visual Content Industry.

AMIT PINCHEVSKI is Assistant Professor and Lecturer, Department of Communication and Journalism, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. He is the author of By Way of Interruption: Levinas and the Ethics of Communication.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. vii
Notes on the Contributors	p. viii
Introduction: Why Media Witnessing? Why Now?	p. 1
Perspectives on Media Witnessing
Witnessing	p. 23
An Afterword: Torchlight Red on Sweaty Faces	p. 42
Telling Presences: Witnessing, Mass Media, and the Imagined Lives of Strangers	p. 49
Mundane Witness	p. 73
Witness as a Cultural Form of Communication: Historical Roots, Structural Dynamics, and Current Appearances	p. 89
Archaic Witnessing and Contemporary News Media	p. 112
Performances of Media Witnessing
Witnessing as a Field	p. 133
From Danger to Trauma: Affective Labor and the Journalistic Discourse of Witnessing	p. 158
Scientific Witness, Testimony, and Mediation	p. 182
Witnessing Trauma on Film	p. 198
Index	p. 216
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