Research into television's ethical value has mostly focused on scandal genres, such as Big Brother, Jersey Shore, and Jerry Springer. Only recently have researchers started to explore television's moral content with a broader focus. In this study we explore and describe the types of morality and moral content of a night of Dutch prime time television with an open and inductive approach through a qualitative content analysis. Our results revealed 13 types of morality and a basic differentiation between morals that (...) react on violations and transgressions, focusing on restricting behavior, and morals that are focused on ideals and values and stimulate social behavior. Lastly, we differentiated three moral meta-themes that permeate all genres, as well as six moral themes that arose only in specific genre-clusters. (shrink)

In many European countries the question of cultural identity has gained special importance due to the increase of globalization, the position of the United States, and the European unification. How can political leaders deal with these developments without alienating their people? In what ways do they express national identity in popular communication? Is nationalism a characteristic of their rhetoric? These questions are asked in regard to thirty-six New Year's speeches held by the last five French presidents. By answering these questions (...) we will develop a perspective on the concepts of national identity and nationalism. Discourse analysis shows a typical discourse for every president, in which nationalist rhetoric appears to play a role. Above all, differences between three structures of significance, or frames, are distinguished, which can be described as ‘sense of belonging’ or ‘paternal protection’, ‘the myth of French values’, and ‘the significant other’. (shrink)

This article aims to examine existential meaning constructions from an action theoretical perspective in a specific Internet environment: the personal homepage. Personal homepages are on-line multi-media documents addressing the question ‘Who am I?’ Authors of personal homepages provide information on both their personal and public identity. These identity constructions sometimes include reflections on the meaning of life. Answers to questions on the meaning of life reflect the way in which individuals assign ultimate meanings to human life, and consist of three (...) key components: orientation, beliefs, and experience. This paper aims to examine existential meaning constructions from a action theoretical perspective in a specific Internet environment: the personal homepage. Findings are reported of a qualitative content analysis of answers to the meaning of life provided in a sample of 42 personal homepages. We found that most answers to the meaning of life could be interpreted either as ‘divine/religious’, ‘experience centered’, ‘cosmic’, or ‘social utopian’. The answers provided on the homepages showed similarities with findings reported in other studies on existential meaning. In addition, we found that this Internet environment offers new venues for expressing orientation, beliefs, and experience reflecting answers to the meaning of life. (shrink)