From Media Systems to Media Cultures

The comparative study of media systems and their relationships with political systems has\nreceived a substantial amount of attention in recent years, and made significant strides in\nunderstanding the diversity of mass communication around the world, along with its causes.\nYet, while this systemic approach is important, it offers it offers only a partial insight into\ndiversity of global media landscapes and, more generally, into the social implications of mass\ncommunication. To gain a fuller grasp of these implications, we need to start from the premise\nthat socially significant communication extends well beyond the traditional domains of politics,\nand encompasses the mediation of basic cultural ideals and narratives, as well as the\nstructuring of everyday practices and routines. These include the perceptions of private and\npublic life, the understanding of the nation and its position in the world, the modes of organizing\ndaily routines and everyday spaces, the historical events remembered and celebrated on a\nmass scale, and much more. To investigate these dimensions, this paper develops a\nconceptual and analytical framework that conceives of media cultures as patterns of ideas and\npractices that enable mass mediated meaning formation, and that have distinct spatial and\ntemporal characteristics. These media cultures can vary on a number of dimensions, from the\nextent to which they seek to serve public or private goals, the degree to which they are open\nto transnational exchanges, to their modes of engaging with the past, present and future. This\nframework can be applied to different media and cultural forms, and in diverse political and\ncultural contexts. By way of illustration, the paper outlines how the framework can be used for\nthe comparative study of (analogue) television cultures.