The Impact of international television: a paradigm shift

Abstract

Impact of International Television: A Paradigm Shift. Michael G. Elasmar, ed. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2003. 213 pp. $22.50 pbk. This book stands as an assessment-and rejection-of Herbert Schiller's of cultural imperialism (CI). (Although the text refers to him the present tense, Schiller died 29 January 2000 at the age of 81.) Thus the subtitle A Paradigm Shift could be extended to include the phrase Away from Cultural Imperialism. Moreover, inserting the word Entertainment before Television would give the book an even more accurate (if unwieldy) title. Considering that almost everywhere the world entertainment rather than information dominates TV we should applaud this direction of inquiry. In Ecuador, for example, as the author of Chaptor 7 points out, information accounts for only 13.4% of prime-time programming hours. Editor Michael Elasmar, an associate professor of communication research at Boston University, asserts that, regarding TV message flows, CI has been the theoretical framework of choice for most researchers. Furthermore, CI contentions at the roots of all international legislation to protect indigenous culture. Elasmar's paradigm shift recalls Klapper's (1960) limited effects approach, Bauer's (1964) active audience emphasis and Everett Rogers' (1976) Passing of the Dominant Paradigm. In diametric opposition, CI proponent Goonaskera (1987) warned that in the face of this media invasion, the indigenous cultures of the Third World would disintegrate consistently and without resistance. In reality, Third World audiences have stubbornly asserted their likes and dislikes. Dallas never broke into the top 100 shows Mexico; General Hospital fared poorly Ecuador. As one Ecuadoran stated, U.S. soaps, unlike telenovelas, go on for years-how horrible! new paradigm, which emphasizes reception analysis, acknowledges the audience preference for proximate content as well as the powerful appeal of exotic, nonlocal programming, including the action, violence, and sex of U.S. movies. Dividing the book's chapters into three parts would aid readers, this reviewer believes. editor and Kathryn Bennett's The Cultural Imperialism Paradigm Revisited: Origin and Evolution would constitute Part A. next six chapters, Part B, describe case studies covering the United States, Iceland, Francophone Canada, Russia, Argentina, Ecuador, and Greece. In the chapter on Greece, Zaharopoulos calls CI a later form of the hypodermic needle model. In the chapter on Brazil, Joseph Straubhaar further critiques the CI school: What media imperialism theorists did not anticipate was the growth of national and regional (cultural-linguistic) television producers, protected and encouraged within national and cultural-linguistic television markets, it seems, by elements of cultural capital that seem to provide natural barriers against interest many types of imported when national or regional alternatives are available. …

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