66. Name: Shangyuan Wu Title: Can East Asia Produce its Own “Al Jazeera”? Assessing the Potential of Channel NewsAsia as a Global Media Contra-Flow Institution: Simon Fraser University Country: Canada Date: 2010 Language: English Abstract: In the last decade, Western news organizations have been increasingly upstaged by satellite news services from the global South. New players like Al Jazeera in Qatar and Telesur in Venezuela have emerged as alternative media to challenge a monopoly long held by Western broadcasters like CNN and BBC international news networks. This study examines the contribution of the fast-growing region of East Asia to the emergence of such media contra-flows, focusing on an increasingly prominent player, Channel NewsAsia, based in Singapore. By using Al Jazeera channel as a point of reference, the study develops a fourfold working model of a contra-flow, against which other regional and international news organizations may be assessed. Through a content and discourse analysis that compares Channel NewsAsia’s news coverage with that of BBC as a Western media news network, the researcher finds that the Singapore-based news station is not as uniquely Asian as it purports to be, due to numerous political and economic constraints that limit its contra-flow potential. The model that Al Jazeera presents in this regard remains unique for various reasons this study tries to explain.
302
Made with FlippingBook Online newsletter