Global Texts, Narrativity and the Construction of Local and Global Meanings in Television News

AbstractThis article discusses the relevance of narrative analysis to the study of media globalization by presenting results of an ongoing study of television news in the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. It discusses issues of local and global meanings by focusing on a number of elements of narrative structure (time, valence, story/discourse, themes, drama, genre, and myths) and argues that each element presents ways to track particularistic and universalistic meanings in television news. A concluding section emphasizes the importance of narrative analysis to the study of globalization with a discussion of live global television events. (Journalism and Mass Communication)