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Although some scholars have argued that social media provide opportunities for sportswomen to bypass mainstream media reporting, there is little existing research on how female athletes use, and experience, digital platforms. This article uses insights from studies of 'gendered visibility' alongside work on 'closeness and distance' in journalism studies to put forward the concept of 'appropriate distance' when trying to understand how these athletes manage their time and engagements online. Drawing on interviews with UK-based elite sportswomen, the findings not only show how distance is carefully managed to protect themselves from negative comments and over-exposure online, but also the significance of building connections with young female followers. Indeed, the athletes prize their status as 'role models' and seek to provide ongoing support and a sense of community in what is often an antagonistic online space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sportswashing is a neologism that has begun to appear with increasing regularity in the English-language media over the past few years. However, there has been limited academic discussion of the term and certainly no sustained analysis of what it might or might not offer to sports scholars. This lacuna is particularly curious given the rapid rise in interest in related issues, such as the links between sport and soft power, sporting mega events and place branding and sports diplomacy. Therefore, this paper has three main objectives. First to trace the links between sport and other forms of 'washing' (whitewashing, greenwashing etc) and to identify similarities and differences in these approaches. Second, to situate sportswashing within the wider literature on sports and state relations so as to better assess what, if anything, makes it different from cognate terms, including propaganda, public diplomacy, soft power and place branding. Third, to reflect on the utility of the concept, in both analytical and practical terms, in the contemporary era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-954X.2009.01832.x Byline: Michael Skey (*) Abstract: Abstract This paper is designed to provide a critical engagement with Michael Billig's seminal thesis of Banal Nationalism (1995), perhaps the most influential study of everyday forms of nationhood. With an increasing number now focusing on the (re) production, dissemination and negotiation of the national through routine texts and practices (cf Foster, 2002; Edensor, 2002; Madianou, 2005; Brubaker et al., 2006 ; Bratsis, 2006) and others employing the concept of banality in relation to non-national (Gorringe, 2006) and post-national identities (Aksoy and Robins, 2002; Szerszynski and Urry, 2002; Beck, 2006; Cram, 2001), it would seem like an opportune moment to assess Billig's contribution and also the limits of his approach. Author Affiliation: (*)London School of Economics Article History: Received 5 September 2007Finally accepted 5 June 2008

The article focuses on the concept of media events that continues to generate widespread debate among scholars around the globe. It discusses the media theory and distinction between one-off events and those that are cyclical in nature which is being theorized using insights from studies of the television format industry by drawing ethnographic material from the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest.

This article proposes a new typology for understanding events or programs that represent exceptions to the norm in that they interrupt media schedules and/or monopolize coverage across numerous platforms and capture public attention for short periods of time. First the master category of exceptional mediated event is introduced and four main categories identified, media events, media disasters, news events and pseudo-events. Then, a primary distinction is drawn between those that interrupt mainstream programming and those that interrupt specialist news channels or are staged for publicity purposes by media producers. This typology builds on recent responses to Dayan and Katz's (1992) classic study of Media Events but argues that rather than expanding conceptual categories, specific analytical tools—that focus on temporality, organization, scale, liveness and genre—are required to make sense of an increasingly complex, and competitive, media landscape [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we argue for the importance of a non-media-centric approach to mediatization. To do this, we develop a theoretical framework that combines Schulz’s influential work on the four dimensions of mediatization with novel insights from the phenomenology of media. The latter foregrounds the significance of practical, embodied forms of mediated knowledge and habit as well as the extent to which media environments become part of the familiar landscapes that people traverse. Using football (or soccer) fans in East Africa as a case study, we show how football-related activities are increasingly orientated toward the schedules and performances of leagues, clubs, and players in Europe and, as a result, become inextricably bound up with, and informed by, media. This approach offers an important means for theorizing both the sport–media nexus and the power of media in the contemporary era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic literature on media events is increasingly concerned with their global dimensions and the applicability of Dayan and Katz’s theoretical concept in a post-national context. This article contributes to this debate by exploring the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) as a global media event. In particular, we employ a perspective from ‘inside the media event’, drawing upon empirical material collected during the 2014 Eurovision final in Copenhagen and focusing on the experiences of fans attending the contest. We argue that the ESC as a media event is experienced by its fans as a cosmopolitan space, open and diverse, whereas national belonging is expressed in a playful way tied to the overall visual aesthetics of the contest. However, the bounded and narrow character of participation render this cosmopolitan space rather limited. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]