On television

On television is a delivers Pierre Bourdieu retranscribing the contents of two television programs of Gilles the Host: On television and the journalistic field , carried out and diffused in 1996, within the framework of a series of course of the Collège de France. On television is followed of an article taking again the same topics in a more abstract and more precise way: the influence of journalism .

The work is composed of two parts:

the plate and its Slide S
the invisible structure and its

effects followed appendix: the influence of journalism

Without taking again this structure precisely, one can release three axes:

the tension within the Journalism between “pure” and “commercial”
the effect of homogenization related to competition
the influence of journalism on the other fields.

Pure journalism and commercial journalism

The Television, like very heteronomous Media, is strongly subjected to the law of the Marché (the Audimat). It tends to support the Commercial against the autonomous one, i.e. against the values of the journalistic profession. By its To be able of deformation of the media field it will push the others Média S to be made like it.

The logic of commercial is that of the law of the market, one makes what will sell, which “passes well”. It is the operation of a Scandal sheet: various facts, Sport, etc television grants a great part of its time to this kind of news. However time is one of the rarest things on television. According to Bourdieu, if one speaks about these futile things it is that actually they have an crucial importance:

from the economic point of view of: they make sell
and with the point of view of Politique: one does not speak about other more important things

Television touches an immense number people and it is subjected to the Loi Audimat. This double observation makes it possible to clarify the importance of the fact various: to sell with the largest world, to make TV rating, television cannot be allowed to be polemical. To speak about things without interest, which do not cause any debate (or of the factitious debates and médiatiquement orchestrated), it is to touch everyone without upsetting anybody. The pregnancy of the law of the Marché leads automatically to the Dépolitisation. Television dépolitise, it represents a danger to the Démocratie. All the more large danger as at the same time as they are subjected to the market and with its logic dépolitisante, those which make television are claimed the defenders of the democracy, defenders of the democracy by means of the TV.

The homogenization of the media

On a more general level, one notes that the journalistic field, pushed by the logic of the Concurrence, ends up proposing a uniform production. Instead of producing difference, the logic of the Marché leads here to all to homogenize.

The journalists cover the same subjects: “they spoke about it, it is necessary that one also speaks about it”. The implicit one of this kind of sentence is that, for media, not to speak about a subject covered by its competitors to being “exceeded” by them - comes down what it is necessary to avoid. To be distinguished it is then a question of producing microphone-differences which will actually be seen by nobody. For the Journaliste it is not only it says which counts but how it says it, which leads it to be dissociated on the form rather than on the bottom. This will “not to pass to with dimensions” and to be distinguished comes from the idea that these differences will have a real impact on the Vente. Obviously false idea since nobody, if they are not the Journaliste S, perceives these microphone-differences.

This homogenization of the production is also to put in bond with the circular circulation of information in the journalistic field. Beyond the standardization of the Information, one must note that the Loi market causes also devastations from the point of view deontologic and Politique. On-information, the rise out of pin of a news, can lead to consequences more than regrettable. Media beating can cause reactions among policies, who see themselves constrained to react and who make pass a measurement or Loi which would not have been adopted without the pressure of the Média S.

The influence of journalism

The Journalisme has a To be able on the other fields. But it is itself a subjected field. Through the journalistic field it is the law of the market, the Commercial, which is essential.

On the level of the evaluation of the professionals and their work S that poses a problem of legitimacy. One with media legitimacy on the one hand, and specific legitimacy to each field. Both are not recut inevitably and that contributes to create a blur for the Profane. Who is a good writer? That which the Média S do indicate like such? Or that which is recognized by its pars as being a good writer? This confusion reveals a mixed category. People who exploit two legitimacies at the same time: not being qualified enough in their field to be recognized by their pars, these people will find in the Média S an external legitimacy.

At the level of the diffusion of the work S one arrives at a difference between the requirements to produce pure”, “autonomous” work a “, and the terms of dissemination. The terms of dissemination are related to the Marché, to have a broad audience, it is necessary that it is “salesman”. The conditions of Production of the work are the exact opposite one.

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