ATLANTA — New research has been published in The Journal of International Communication via Taylor & Francis Online. The research titled ‘Signaling media professionalism: comparative social constructions of RT and CGTN’ was co-authored by Media & Journalism Professor at Denver University, Georgia State University (GSU) and TCV Alum, Kareem El Damanhoury, GSU Professor of Communication and Transcultural Conflict and Violence Initiative Lead Faculty, Dr Carol Winkler, TCV Research Coordinator, Virginia Massignan, TCV Presidential Fellow, Keyu Alexander Chen, Katerina Papatheodorou and Assistant Professor of Communication at Clemson University, GSU and TCV Alum Ayse Lokmanoglu.
Abstract
The messaging content of Russia Today (RT) and China Global Television Network (CGTN) provides alternatives to those offered in mainstream western media. Comparative studies point to RT’s aggressive, ideological rhetoric and CGTN’s more tacit, celebratory, and culture-focused approach. This study adds to these understandings by examining how messaging strategies construct media professionalism – one of the four historic pillars of media systems analysis – to delegitimize media systems of rival states and build credibility of their own platforms and by assessing the dialectical role of key oppositional voices to Western media hegemony in the digital sphere. Using a mixed methods approach, we analyzed thousands of RT and CGTN’s Facebook posts across language accounts between 2017 and 2022. The study documents that RT and CGTN utilise arguments by comparison to assess competing news outlets and redefine scholarly modes of assessing media professionalism. The study identified four metrics used by RT and CGTN to evaluate media professionalism: source attribution, adherence to positive news values, distinctions from negative news standards of competing outlets, and relative commitment levels to free expression. It further reveals differences in RT and CGTN’s language-based, message targeting in relation to media professionalism.
The scope of The Journal of International Communication is providing research from an international perspective on communication, relations, development, political economy, global sociology, media anthropology, media & cultural studies.