The Media Influence on Albanian Society

Abstract

The focus of this study is the relation of media with the audiences in Albania and Kosova. The study further aims to analyze the relations of television media, as a means of mass-communication with the public, observing above all their tendency to transform television into a control tool, namely to influence the path of creating independent judgments. The talk show type programs present in Tirana media will be treated as shows simulanously serving to initiate the public defense of powerful people. This claim shall be followed by the attempt to answer the questions: is the tendency to win the “public battle” one of imposing “the indisputable truth” to the audiences? What is the media impact on them and what transformation do media undergo as a result of the mediatization of society? What is the relation between them and what is their mutual refusal or impact? Does the Albanian spectacle present the current situation in Albanian society or is it an unrealistic portrayal of made-up images? Beyond this, other TV media from the Albanian environment will be treated, together with their impact in shaping the public opinion. Televisions in Kosova will be treated as being in apathy with regards to spectacular talk-shows, and dominated by political tendencies which predominate the cultural discourse. TV opinionism comprises another characteristic of the “Albanian spectacle” which will be in the focus of this study. Does this opinionism constitute a media mechanism to spectacularize the public, or does it comprise, together with the media itself, an instrument in the hand of “power” to control and construct the society? Special phenomena characteristic for the Albanian media in Albania (and its impact on the society), will be contrasted and compared to special phenomena of the media in Kosova (together with their impact). The relation of television with the public opinion in Albania and the tendency to “spectacularize” the society through presenting public judgments will be in the core of the research; while in Kosova the tendency to develop controlled media through information control shall be looked into closely.