Introduction

Abstract

Since the 1990s, there has been a marked increase in the scholarly consideration of the relationships between humanitarianism and media culture, and from a range of critical and disciplinary perspectives and institutional contexts. 1 An emergent field of inquiry has been significantly shaped by several foundational analyses of the representation of humanitarian crisis, and particularly of the media's various repertoires for relaying to its audiences the desperate suffering of distant others. 2 As Suzanne Franks states, 'Our awareness of nearly all humanitarian disasters is defined by the media'. 3 Subsequently, and as Keith Tester argues, 'if we want to understand modern humanitarianism, we need also to understand modern media culture, because the two are inextricably entwined'. 4 An exhaustive historical overview of modern humanitarianism and media culture is beyond the scope of this introduction and book; however, with this collection we intend to understand some of the longer historical, cultural and political contexts that shape how humanitarian relationships have been mediated since the Second World War. As Simon Cottle and Glenda Cooper suggest, 'media and communications … have entered increasingly and sometimes profoundly into the contemporary field of humanitarianism and this warrants sustained, critical attention'. 5 Drawing and building on scholarship from sociology, journalism, development studies, politics, film and media studies and anthropology, we investigate the complex relationships between humanitarianism and popular media forms, technologies, events and cultures. Our authors explore a variety of media, from film, television and memoirs to music festivals and social media, and chart the development of different modes of communicating humanitarianism. As this book illustrates, the twentieth century is a significant period of transition in humanitarian and media institutions, which requires further analysis and investigation. The origins of humanitarianism have recently become the subject of historiographical debate. 6 Humanitarianism, as Peter Walker and Daniel G. Maxwell argue, is a system that 'evolved'. 7 Scholars such as Jonathan Benthall and Kevin Rozario suggest that global humanitarianism acquired its distinctive contemporary ethos