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Law and the Media The Future of an Uneasy Relationship This book combines theoretical and methodological critique with original case studies, each illuminating a different aspect of the complex interplay between law and contemporary media culture. It is often claimed that people’s main exposure to legal institutions is through the media. This prompts this book to examine to what extent law is a feature of the everyday. It argues that the presence of law in everyday life cannot be attributed to the media alone. Moreover, through an analysis of reality TV, the book seeks to make sense of how media portrayals entrench law’s ordinariness. Secondly, claims about pervasive media influences are evaluated in light of recent trends in audience analysis as well as the changing nature of media culture itself. The book highlights how audiences are morphing into increasingly active users. This is excavated in a further case study involving the nascent culture of legal self-help on the internet. Finally, arguing that tensions between legal institutions and media culture are unavoidable and even beneficial, the book examines whether media distortions could ever be remedied. This is explored in a further case study concerning the proactive and pre-emptive strategies which judges and press officers adopt to combat media distortion. Dr Lieve Gies is a lecturer in the School of Law at Keele University. Her main research interest is in the study of law and society from the vantage point of media and popular culture. Her current work seeks to understand law as a form of social communication. Law and the Media The Future of an Uneasy Relationship Lieve Gies First published 2008 by Routledge-Cavendish 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge-Cavendish 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2007. “ To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” A GlassHouse book Routledge-Cavendish is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business © 2008 Gies, L All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gies, Lieve. Law and the media: the future of an uneasy relationship / Lieve Gies. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978–1–84568–101–2 (hbk) ISBN-10: 1–84568–101–0 (hbk) ISBN-13: 978–1–904385–33–2 (pbk) ISBN-10: 1–904385–33–8 (pbk) 1. Justice, Administration of—Great Britain. 2. Mass media and criminal justice—Great Britain. 3. Legal aid—Great Britain—Automation. 4. Newspaper court reporting— Netherlands. 5. Justice, Administration of—Netherlands. I. Title. KJC3655.G54 2007 343.4109′ 9—dc22 2007022683 ISBN 0-203-93727-9 Master e-book ISBN ISBN-10: 1–84568–101–0 (hbk) ISBN-13: 978–1–84568–101–0 (hbk) ISBN-10: 1–904385–33–8 (pbk) ISBN-13: 978–1–904385–33–2 (pbk) eISBN-10: 0–203–93727–9 eISBN-13: 978–0–203–93727–3 Contents 1 Acknowledgements Journal acknowledgements ix xi Anatomy of a troubled relationship 1 Pillars of (received) media wisdom 1 Everyday life and the popular, or, understanding the mystery of the Italian traffic lights 4 Case studies 6 Making method and theory matter 8 Law and the media spectacle 11 The quicksand of terminology: public and media 13 Overview of book c