Abstract
A binary approach to comprehend infotainment in relation to journalism has added more obscurity to this underexplored concept than conceptual clarity. While scholars have been researching infotainment since the 1980s, the changing nature of journalism in the digital age has made the genre of news elusive. Moreover, much of its theoretical application has been centred around ‘soft news’ limiting the scope of its applicability rather than broadening its use in journalism studies. This study aims to fill the gap in existing literature by extending the dimensions of infotainment and stress the consideration of ‘hard news’ as its sub-genre. More importantly, within this sub-genre, it proposes the concept of ‘infictotainment’ as a new genre of news which pertains to a fusion of information, fiction, and entertainment. Building on the seminal work of Brants and Neijens (2007) this study analyses the coverage of the 2020 controversial death of a Bollywood star, using their infotainment scale and expands it by adding fiction as content characteristics to map the changing nature of infotainment. The findings of this study are expected to have two important implications: the proposed new dimension will help expand theorising infotainment; and contribute to understanding the changing nature of television news, particularly in the context of developing countries.
| Original language | English |
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| Publication status | Published - Feb 2022 |
| Event | 2022 8th South Asian Media and Cultural Studies Conference: Imagining Futures - Online, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida, United States Duration: 10 Feb 2022 → 11 Feb 2022 https://comm.cci.fsu.edu/faculty-research/south-asian-media-studies/south-asian-media-and-cultural-studies-conference/ |
Conference
| Conference | 2022 8th South Asian Media and Cultural Studies Conference |
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| Abbreviated title | SAMCS 2022 |
| Country/Territory | United States |
| City | Tallahassee, Florida |
| Period | 10/02/22 → 11/02/22 |
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