A Marxist Analysis of Key Media Representations of the Migrant Crisis in Serbian Media

Authors

  • Marko Đorđević

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i18.291

Keywords:

refugee crisis, migration, class conflict, ideology, media, Serbia, The Balkans

Abstract

This work aims to question the main contradictions of the migrant crisis by media coverage. The sheer amount of images and discourses produced to service the everyday political jargons is met by a Marxist critique of the political economy behind the mass displacement. Close attention is given to the economic and geopolitical conjunctures that preceded the events of 2015 and the earlier history of labor power allocation. This lays the groundwork for a more specific context, i.e. the role of the Balkans in this crisis and the ideology of its media. The problems dealt with are: the coining of the term “The Balkan Route”, the economic and political conjuncture that determines the contemporary Serbian media sphere and the several key representations of the migrant crisis, primarily in social and news media. The conclusion summarizes the main points of the article. Critical assessments are made on potential field research possibilities that could further strengthen the arguments developed in the course of the text.

 

Article received: December 7, 2018; Article accepted: January 23, 2019; Published online: April 15, 2019; Original scholarly paper

How to cite this article: Đorđević, Marko. "A Marxist Analysis of Key Media Representations of the Migrant Crisis in Serbian Media." AM Journal of Art and Media Studies 18 (2019): 141−149. doi: 10.25038/am.v0i18.291

 

Author Biography

Marko Đorđević

Marko Đorđević
Faculty of Media and Communications, Singidunum University, Belgrade
Serbia

Marko Đorđević, PhD candidate, was born in 1988. Received his bachelor’s degree in art history at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade. He curated and co-curated a couple of exhibitions and published several papers that deal with theory of art, politics and film. He received his MA degree at the Theory of Arts and Media Chair of the University of Arts in Belgrade. In 2015, he published a book titled “Institutional Critique and the Problem of Subjectivization in Contemporary Art”. He is currently a PhD candidate in the DTUM program at the Faculty of Media and Communications in Belgrade.

References

Ali, Tariq. The Extreme Center: A Warning. London: Verso, 2015.

Althusser, Louis. “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses.” In Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1971. https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/althusser/1970/ideology.html. Accessed February 28, 2019.

Althusser, Louis. “Three Notes on the Theory of Discourses.” The Humanist Controversy and Other Writings (1966–1967), edited by Francois Matheron, 33–84. London, New York: Verso, 2003. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/z.184.25alt

Arrighi, Giovanni. “The African Crisis: World Systemic and Regional Aspects.” The New Left Review, 2002. https://newleftreview.org/II/15/giovanni-arrighi-the-african-crisis. Accessed February 28, 2019.

Arrighi, Giovanni, and John S. Saul. “Social and Economic Development in Tropical Africa.” The Journal of Modern African Studies 6, 2 (August, 1968): 141–169. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X00017122

Badovinac, Zdenka. “Future from the Balkans.” October, 159 (Winter 2017): 103–118. doi: 10.1162/OCTO_a_00284 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1162/OCTO_a_00284

Beblawi, Hazem. “The Rentier State in the Arab World.” in The Arab State, edited by Giacomo Luciani, 85–98. London: Routledge, 1990. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315685229-5

Haddad, Bassam. “Syria, the Arab Uprising, and the Political Economy of Authoritarian Resilience.” Interface: A Journal for and about Social Movements 4, 1 (May 2012): 113–130. doi: 10.1057/9781137344045_12 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137344045_12

Lacan, Jacques. D’un Autre à l’autre: Le séminaire, livre XVI. Paris: Seuil, 2006. http://www.lacaninireland.com/web/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/Book-16-from-an-Other-to-the-other.pdf. Accessed January 11, 2019.

Močnik, Rastko. “Balkan as an Element in Ideological Mechanisms.” In Balkan as Metaphor: Between Globalization and Fragments, edited by Dušan I. Bijelić and Obrad Savić, 79–117. Cambridge MA, London UK: The MIT Press, 2002.

Močnik, Rastko. Spisi o suvremenom kapitalizmu. Zagreb: Arkzin, 2016.

Pantić, Rade. "Kritičko-materijalističke teorije reprezentacije u savremenoj umetnosti i kulturi." PhD diss., University of Arts, Belgrade, Serbia, 2014. http://eteze.arts.bg.ac.rs/bitstream/handle/123456789/40/Rade%20Pantic_Kriticko-imper.%20teorije.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y. Accessed March 3, 2019.

Siapera, Eugenia, Moses Boudourides, Sergios Lenis, and Jane Suiter. “Refugees and Network Publics on Twitter: Networked Framing, Affect, and Capture.” Social Media + Society 4, 1 (March 2018): 1–21. doi: 10.1177/2056305118764437 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305118764437

On Frontex: https://frontex.europa.eu/media-centre/focus/frontex-activities-in-the-western-balkans-TW1ZIm. Accessed June 10, 2018.

Government media reporting: http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-34210994; https://www.telegraf.rs/vesti/politika/1728273-vucic-srbija-ce-primiti-jedan-broj-migranata-mi-ne-podizemo-ograde; Accessed February 25, 2019.

Leftwing media reporting: http://rs.n1info.com/a93212/Vesti/Situacija-na-Horgosu.html. Accessed February 25, 2019.

Rightwing media reporting: http://informer.rs/vesti/drustvo/281974/istinski-horor-beogradu-migrant-zarazen-malarijom-pobegao-bolnice-luta-gradom; http://mondo.rs/a942765/Info/Drustvo/Subotica-Pakistanci-migranti-pokusali-da-siluju-devojcicu.html; http://www.pravda.rs/lat/2016/3/26/haos-u-grckoj-migranti-pale-pravoslavne-ikone-i-traze-zabranu-crkvenih-zvona/. Accessed March 3, 2019.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i18.291 DOI: https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i18.291

Downloads

Published

15.04.2019

How to Cite

Đorđević, M. (2019). A Marxist Analysis of Key Media Representations of the Migrant Crisis in Serbian Media. AM Journal of Art and Media Studies, (18), 141–149. https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i18.291

Issue

Section

Beyond the Main Topic – Student Research