Description

It has become clear that the U.S. media are no longer increasingly their grip throughout the globe: Asia and the Arab/Moslem world is virtually saturated with their own national media output. Tunstall produces a well-written, provocative snapshot at global media today. His point of view is relentlessly global: he considers the role of the media in the collapse of the Soviet Union, the ascendance of the Brazillian and Mexican soap opera, the increasing strength of Bollywood - the national cinema output of India - as well as the relative decline in influence of US media. Importantly, Tunstall focuses on both the nation state and the geographical and cultural region as crucial levels in today's mass media. Both the United States and the US mass media have now lost their previous moral leadership. Lone American control of the world news flow has ceased today, rather than Global media, we see a world media system comprised of inter-locking national-regional-cultural systems. Tunstall's assessment is a wake-up call for insular American media consumers.