MACMILLAN Post-Truth and the Mediation of Reality: New Conjunctures

Our contemporary moment is preoccupied with arbitrating ‘reality’. With the spectre of buzzwords like ‘fake news’ and ‘post-truth’ we find a scramble to locate or fix some sort of universal ‘real’ beneath what are positioned as ‘fake’ articulations. To engage with this crisis, this collection argues for the importance of a new conjuncture in communication and cultural studies of media. Building on Hall’s understanding of ‘conjuncture’ as a way of grasping moments within hegemonic struggle, the essays suggest that the current moment requires a revitalization of the concept of conjuncture.  Review “This timely and much-needed collection cuts through the public chatter around post-truth to give us a clear sense of the political stakes of this particular crisis-moment. This superb set of interventions provides conceptual tools to map contemporary reality production. The book is key for anyone who wants to understand the conjunctural ruptures around truth, reality, and mediated life.” (Jack Bratich, Associate Professor of Journalism and Media Studies, Rutgers University, USA) “The cases addressed in this collection provide cogent perspectives on our current moment. Drawing inspiration from traditional cultural and communication studies, as well as a host of contemporary critical theories, this book teaches us how to understand the media within our current struggles for hegemony. The book revitalizes the ground-breaking achievements of cultural studies, and its conception of the conjuncture to think our media struggles today. It is sure to enlighten readers about how we might think our media conjuncture as a way of understanding our historical present.” (Matthew Flisfeder, Associate Professor of Rhetoric and Communications, The University of Winnipeg, Canada) From the Back Cover Our contemporary moment is preoccupied with arbitrating and articulating ‘reality’. With the spectre of buzzwords like ‘fake news’ and ‘post-truth’ we find a scramble to locate or fix some sort of universal, immovable ‘real’ beneath what are positioned as ‘fake’ articulations and discourse. To engage with this crisis, this collection argues for the importance of a new conjuncture in communication and cultural studies of media. Building on Hall’s understanding of ‘conjuncture’ as a way of grasping moments within hegemonic struggle, the essays suggest that the current moment requires a revitalization of the concept of conjuncture. In particular,  Post-Truth and the Mediation of Reality confronts questions of how to grapple with mediated politics in what has been dubbed a ‘post-truth’ era. Divided into three sections, the book tackles key sites in which realness is in crisis within contemporary Anglophone media culture, including Trumpism, reality TV, the #metoo movement, and social media productions of the truth. About the Author Brett Nicholls is Head of Media, Film and Communication at the University of Otago, New Zealand. His work focuses on media, culture and politics, technology, and critical theory, and has been published in Continuum, Communication, Culture & Critique and Critical Horizons. Rosemary Overell is Lecturer at the University of Otago, New Zealand. She is the author of Affective Intensities in Extreme Music Scenes (2014) and co-editor, with Catherine Dale, of Orienting Feminisms (2018). Rosemary is also a regular contributor to un Magazine and tweets @muzaken.