“It’s chaos”: affective spaces of journalism in Istanbul

Abstract

Based on 9 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Istanbul, Turkey, this article explores the affective attachments circulating around urban spaces of journalism in Istanbul, with particular attention to how experiences of urban life shape journalists’ imaginaries of their relationship to each other, the city, their audience, and the broader “public” of Turkey. This article considers how journalistic life and practice is a form of subjectivity that hinges upon spatialized affects and affective spaces. These affects emerge as the physical landscapes and spaces of journalism alter, whereby journalists attach and reflect on different spaces as they try to make sense of their professional lives amidst the uncertainties of spatial change. This article orients the narratives presented—which highlight themes of professional solidarity, dispossession, and social isolation—to argue that definitions and practices of journalism are “embedded in the changing rhythms and dynamics of urban life” (Rodgers et al., 2014: p. 106).