The sociological imagination and media studies in neoliberal times

Shani Orgad

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: To date, media and communication studies have mostly examined narratives either as stories that circulate in public discourse or as people’s personal narratives. In the context of deepening inequalities, the cementing of neoliberal rationality and the intensifying centrality of media and communication technologies in public and everyday life, connecting the two realms is a vital task. Drawing on The Sociological Imagination, I argue for and demonstrate the value of connecting what C. Wright Mills famously called “personal troubles” and “public issues of social structure” in the study of current media and narrative. Analysis of how contemporary cultural narratives furnish and condition our most intimate personal troubles highlights that our lives are shaped by social forces not of our own making. Yet, the intersection between media and cultural discourses and individuals’ sense-making of their experiences can open up possibilities for change and even resistance.

Keywords: narrative; representations; media discourses; inequality; personal stories; lived experience (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 7 pages
Date: 2020-09-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cul and nep-his
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Published in Television & New Media, 1, September, 2020, 21(6), pp. 635 - 641. ISSN: 1552-8316

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