Muusikateatri representatsioon Eesti trükimeedias
Date
2007
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Tartu Ülikool
Abstract
Description
This paper examines the representation of opera and musicals in the Estonian
newspapers comparatively in 2001 and 2006. The field of musical theatre was interesting
for several reasons. Both of the genres of the musical theatre are in a rather prominent
position in the society. Opera for its historical values and the importance assigned by the
national culture policy, and musicals for its popularity in the public. Also important were
the widely spread and varying controversial statements and opinions regarding both of
the genres.
The research was focused on the general model of representations of both genres of the
musical theatre: how often and in what form are they represented, who are the authors
and what kind of discoursive practices are used in the media texts about the opera or the
musicals. The methods of both quantitative and qualitative content analysis were used to
approach these goals.
The theoretical framework of the study was based on Stuart Hall’s theory of represen-
tation, Roland Barthes’ works on mythology and van Dijk’s concepts of ideology, as well
as the discussion over the concepts of high culture, mass culture and popular culture
(including Gans’ hierarchy of cultural taste, McQuail’s theory of popular culture etc.).
The population of the quantitative study consisted of 440 texts printed in Postimees and
Sirp in 2001 and 2006 that were about opera or musicals. Of those, there were 147 texts
in 2001 and 130 in 2006 from Postimees, and 114 in 2001 and 49 texts in 2006 from Sirp.
The results of the quantitative content analysis showed, that the representation of the
genres in both years was rather balanced and equal in numbers, with the exception of the
dominance of opera in Sirp when compared to musicals. The most prominent change in the representation of musicals in Postimees was the transformation from being the
subject of culture editors to the subject of entertainment editors, including even the
reviews of performances. It is also notable, that the texts about the opera were slightly
shorter in 2006 than they were in 2001, as the texts about the musicals were slightly
longer in opposite. On the other hand, the quantitative emphasis had turned from news
stories to reviews and columns in 2006, which displays a positive change from formal
coverage to a more analytical approach.
The study showed a similar change towards the increase of the number of analytical texts
in Sirp in 2006 – there were more reveiews of both opera and musicals than there were in
2001. 2006 introduced also reviews of opera performances from major opera houses in
the world, which was rare in 2001.
A quite interesting phenomenon is associated with theatre Vanemuine – the theatre was
mentioned more in association with musicals than it was with operas in both years and
both newspapers, although the theatre is as active in the genre of opera (or sometimes
even more) as it in the field of musicals.
The comparison of the discoursive practices found in the texts regarding the opera and
the musicals displayed that there is more consensus in the notions associated with opera
and there is more contradiction and opposition in the notions associated with musicals.
The most dominant statement regarding opera in 2001 is the idea of static or weak
direction in terms of artistic conception, and in 2006 the view of opera as a vital genre
with strong potential to artistic development. When speaking of musicals, the most
important notion is the concept of extraordinariness of musicals (the largest, the unseen
etc). In addition to that there are opposing discussions of the artistic value or potential of
musicals and the frequent lack of artistic ambition of the producers of musicals. The
concept of extraordinariness has diminished by 2006, but the opposing discussion has
polarized even more – the discussion of artistic potential of the unfairly underrated genre
on one hand and the negative attitude towards musicals as non-theatre or cheap circus
on the other.
Keywords
H Social Sciences (General)