Abstract
The present thesis was begun in October 1996, with the aim of exploring the relationship between Cyprus television and aspects of the national and cultural identity of Cyprus youth.The thesis consists of seven chapters in all, which can be summarized as follows: In the first chapter, a survey of the historical, political and media realities in Cyprus establishes the ground for the present study, while in the second chapter, a literature review presents the writings on culture and identity, media theories and their development, with a discussion of important theoretical concepts and perspectives, like Cultural Studies, identity theory, globalisation versus localisation, postmodernism with its fragmentation and concepts of "otherness," as well as the relationship of all these concepts to Cyprus realities. A review of the relationship between television and media research to young audiences — internationally and locally - and a final discussion of quantitative and qualitative methodologies, ends Chapter two, foregrounding, at the same time, the third chapter on Methodology.
The choice of the mixed paradigm — quantitative (statistical) and qualitative (Text and Discourse analysis of television programmes, and interviews and group discussions with the sample) is discussed, explained and documented in the third chapter. The fourth chapter consists of the presentation, statistical correlation and discussion of the results from the Statistical Field Survey, which rendered insights into the sample's attitudes and mapped the ground for the next two stages — the Programme analysis and the Interviews, by offering cues and clues for these stages. The fifth chapter presents a textual and discourse analysis of the first five programmes leading the sample's preference list in the Field Survey, while chapter six discusses the interviews and group discussions which were both cross-fertilized by the results of the Statistical Survey and the Programme Analysis. Finally, in the seventh chapter the conclusions from the Research are discussed in the light of the initial aims and goals of the study and suggestions are made for future research which can both derive from, and continue to add to the issues which have been investigated in the present project.
The present Research Study did not aim at validating or corroborating one or more hypotheses, as it used a mixed paradigm with different methodological approaches, which could not, as a result render thoroughly congruent or consistent results. It did seek, however, through the use of its progressive, longitudinal research model conducted at different time periods, to empirically draw to the surface, as consistently and extensively as possible, answers to the goals and aims established initially in the thesis, which answers have rendered complementary conclusions throughout the stages of the cross-paradigm used.
Date of Award | 2001 |
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Original language | English |
Awarding Institution |
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Supervisor | David French (Supervisor), Peter Wilby (Supervisor) & Mike Richards (Supervisor) |
Keywords
- national identity
- cultural studies
- media
- teenagers