A field theory approach to international journalism: The case of Indian journalists in the middle east

Abstract

Interest in Bourdieu’s field theory has been steadily growing within the field of journalism studies. Today the application of this theory is not limited to the Global North; journalism studies scholars employ it—rather unreservedly—to study news practices even in the Global South. This leads to the fundamental question whether “Western” media theories have universal relevance. Contributing to this longstanding debate, this article demonstrates one possible way in which journalism studies scholars can “provincialize” or translate Western theories for contexts outside the occidental world: by opening them up to critical ideas from and interdisciplinary scholarship on the Global South. The article operationalizes this approach by using field theory to analyze non-Western journalism cultures. It examines the range of negotiations that Indian journalists in the Middle East undertake to produce vernacular news, revealing the need to not only interrogate conventional media practices but also scholarly lenses that often guide our understanding of mediated processes.