Iran’s Satellite Media as a Heterotopic Space of Resistance and Competing Identities

Since the beginning of satellite broadcasting in 1991, there are around 100 foreign satellite channel programs currently being broadcasted in Iran. Satellite channels in Persian from outside of Iran are create alternative discourses. Moreover Satellite Media became ‘Heterotopic Space’ of resistance and competing identites. In this process, a rupture is formed between the top-down national identity fed through the Islam republic and the identity built through the discourses formed through alternative media. The Iranian nationals come in contact with global issues and discourses through global channels, therefore the Iranian government emphasizes the ‘soft war’ and warned the negative effects. This study will examine the processes in which the satellite media become the eyes and ears of the citizens who long for change in Iran when anti-governmental social movement is under way, and in which the Iranian people become aware of the ‘power of solidarity’ through the satellite programs.