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As a listener of NPR you may have at one time or another been stereotyped as an educated, white, maritini swilling, New York Times reading, Volvo driving, West Wing watcher. Using a new and very detailed profile, Brooke investigates how much truth there is in the stereotype.
Over the past 20 years, the U.S. has spent half a billion dollars to beam anti-Castro propaganda into the homes of Cubans via Radio and TV Martí. Earlier this year, Congress boosted the stations’ budget, and in the midst of Fidel’s convalescence, the stations have increased their programming hours. All this despite the fact that hardly anybody in Cuba is tuning in. Bob talks to Penn State communications professor John Nichols about the broadcasting boondoggle.
Pornography is a form rife with easily-recognizable tropes. Strategic lighting, hokey music, and close-up camera angles all are a part of creating the aspirational and idealized world of porn. In last October’s issue of Harper’s, Frederick Kaufman took a closer look at the cable channel he thinks is the most pornographic of all — The Food Network. Kaufman explains to Brooke how peach-pitting is made tantamount to foreplay.
For years, Twin Cities NBC affiliate KARE has been the undisputed king of local news. And that’s due in no small part to the down-homey feel of its newscasts, which have played well in a market famous for its… niceness. But this summer, KARE lost its top ratings spot to the CBS affiliate. And as Sarah Lemanczyk reports, many observers are blaming KARE’s new anchor, a man who viewers aren’t convinced is quite nice enough.
Throughout the Middle East, audiences have been relying on pan-Arab satellite channels for the latest on the conflict. Among them are several Lebanon-based stations, which are enjoying a new regional prominence. Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya remain the most popular sources, but their coverage has showed some interesting differences. Bob surveys the coverage with Jamal Dajani, producer of the Arab satellite TV highlight program “Mosaic.”
Al-Manar, a Lebanese satellite TV and radio network, has been must-see TV for many in the region looking for news of where bombs are falling…and where they might soon fall. It's also the self-described media outlet for Hezbollah. NPR's Deborah Amos joins Brooke from Damascus to discuss Al-Manar’s popularity and the muddying of the line between militants and the media.
In the past few years, the U.S. has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on its two Arab-language media outlets, Radio Sawa and TV AlHurra. But is the “public diplomacy” working? A new study suggests that not only are the two outlets not winning hearts and minds; they might be actively losing them. The study’s author, Mohammed el-Nawawy, tells Bob about his results.
Capitalizing on the popularity of reality television, cable TV’s Bravo has launched “Tabloid Wars,” a program that goes inside the New York Daily News and follows reporters out on the street. The series is likely to find – or make – heroes of several of the ink-stained wretches who chronicle city life. Brooke heads to the Daily News newsroom to find out how the hometown paper coped with cameras.
