Media and the politics of the sacral
Freedom of expression in Tunisia after the Arab Uprisings
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11268214 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Roxane Farmanfarmaian (0000-0003-0227-9618, University of Cambridge, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2017 |
| Volume | 39 |
| Issue | 7 |
| Pages | 1043-1062 |
| Publication date | 2017-10-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Media Culture & Society (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0163-4437 • E-ISSN: 1460-3675 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0163443717690817 |
| OpenAlex | W2588167258 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 20 |
In 2011, calls for ‘dignity’ led the mantra for change in the Arab Uprisings. ‘Dégage!’ (‘Clear out!’) was hurled against Tunisia’s President Ben Ali and his fellow Arab dictators’ coercive paradigms that robbed citizens of agency and censored their convictions. During the exceptional politics that ensued, Tunisia’s liberated media exemplified the independence the revolution had achieved. Yet, how free expression was constituted grew increasingly contentious as the media’s lens projected ambiguities in practices surrounding religious and political norms – what Harald Wydra terms ‘sacral symbolisms’ – within the popular imaginary. This implicated interpretations of what was publicly acceptable and dignified and what was not. The media’s engagement with freedom of expression and its significations went through three stages. First, ‘Dégage’, or ‘freedom from’, was celebrated as an erasure of humiliation. The disharmony of competing symbolisms took on new import, however, as the second aspect of constructing dignity, ‘freedom to’, became a contested political and cultural space. Mediation of free expression became a site of power politics and appropriation, creating ‘red lines’ that curtailed certain liberties to secure others, thereby recasting the contention as ‘freedom for whom’. This third stage, in train, remains a realm of mediated uncertainty
Dignity · Freedom of the press · Mantra · Political science · Politics · Sociology · The Imaginary · Theology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Gender Studies · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Philosophy · Political and Social Issues
Media in Egypt and Tunisia
Comparing Media Systems
Communicating democracy
Politics and the Sacred
Isaiah Berlin
The Extraordinary Politics of the Tunisian Revolution
De-Westernizing Media Studies
Understanding media
What is private, what is public, and who exercises media power in Tunisia? A hybrid-functional perspective on Tunisia's media sector
Between Decision and Deliberation
A revolution for dignity and freedom
Government-media relations in Tunisia
Re-thinking secularism in post-independence Tunisia
Secularism, Sovereignty, Indeterminacy
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2025 - 2025 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |