Media Solidarities: Emotions, Power and Justice in the Digital Age

“Say It Loud, Say It Clear…”: Concerting Solidarity in the Canadian Refugees Welcome Movement (2015–2016)

“…It is solidarity based on the perception of common interests, heritage and taken for granted categorical identities (Calhoun 2002). Political solidarity, on the other hand, refers to a “more conscious, active solidarity: a moral relation that unites individuals in a struggle for a common goal” (Nikunen 2019:15) that in many cases involves challenges to power and unjust institutional arrangements (Scholz 2008).…”

“…Disagreement and difference need to be acknowledged and incorporated into a solidarity that does not rely on artificial or forced uniformity. Dean and other feminist scholars have argued that openness to different forms of knowledge and experience, the recognition of others’ points of view, collaboration, dialogue and listening would allow the construction of more inclusive and potent solidarities (Nikunen 2019).…”

Makeovers Made Over: Ubuntu and Decolonization in Reality TV

“…Grindstaff and Murray (2015) emphasize the false assumption that, in reality television, characters are assumed to be most themselves, revealing their “true nature,” which producers then take advantage of by creating “branded affect” or the successful attachment of emotion and its display affect to a variety of popular media and consumer products. Describing this process as affective capitalism, Nikunen (2019) refers to economies that make value from emotional and affective activity of different kinds, commodifying emotional activity and relationships. And while M.…”

“…An educational tone is replaced with a tone that relays a sense of accentuated reality. In this way, it constructs new forms of education and pedagogy where the above-mentioned experts purport to “teach” ordinary people how to solve their own problems rather than giving them the opportunity to generate this capacity themselves (see Nikunen 2019; Ouellette and Murray 2009). Hence, by providing a sense of easy humanitarianism, such makeover shows amplify, normalize, and reinforce commercialized, individualized forms of humanitarianism (Orgad and Nikunen 2016) rather than sustainable, self-driven development.…”

“…What I do suggest, against this backdrop, however, is that the media’s primary focus on images, which perpetuate unidirectional or reductionist notions of power, are problematic and obscure a broad facet of ways in which relationships can be conceptualized and “reality” created/depicted. The consequence of this is that the act of charity and its televised representation create a false happy ending without the pressure or need for actual social change (Nikunen 2019). This relates back to the alternative conception of development provided by ubuntu, which is premised on the collaborative generation of both spiritual (immaterial) and material empowerment of communities and unfolds as a process that is driven by communities rather than by elites in a quest for sustainable social change.…”