Stability and Change in the Style and Standards of European Newspapers' Arts Reviews, 1960–2010

Abstract

Reviews of cultural products are central elements in creating, legitimizing and disseminating cultural tastes and hierarchies. In this empirical study, we examine the changes that have taken place in European newspaper reviews during the last 50 years (1960–2010). Our sample consists of 205 highbrow arts reviews found in Helsingin Sanomat (Finland), Le Monde (France), ABC/El País (Spain), Dagens Nyheter (Sweden) and The Guardian (UK). We analyse our sample using the framework of Shrum and observe possible changes in descriptive, entertainment, instructive, analytical and evaluative schemes of the reviews. Unlike one might expect in light of previous scholarly findings on the popularizing content of cultural journalism, the changes in European highbrow arts reviews between 1960 and 2010 are not drastic. If anything, the evaluation becomes more analytical and subtle, emphasizing the institutional role of highbrow arts reviews and the print newspaper as a traditional, rather conservative media.

KEYWORDS:

• criticism
• cultural gatekeepers
• cultural journalism
• cultural sociology
• newspapers
• reviews

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We want to thank all of our colleagues on the ESA Consumption network for their comments and suggestions on previous versions of this work. We also wish to thank Carlos J. Fernández Rodríguez and Tina Lauronen for their help.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 We use two different Spanish newspapers for historical reasons. El País is the logical equivalent for the other newspapers, but it was founded only in 1976 after the Spanish transition to democracy so we were able to include it our data only from 1980 onwards. For the remaining years (1960 and 1970), we chose ABC, a right-wing yet liberal publication, with large circulation numbers.

2 The original coding system had altogether nine variables for literature. These were: poetry, novel, whodunnit/thriller, other fiction, non-fiction: philosophy/religion, non-fiction: science/nature, non-fiction: history, other non-fiction and autobiography. For our subsample, we only chose “novels”, thus omitting, for instance, thrillers.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Kone Foundation; Academy of Finland (Research Council for Culture and Society) [grant number 291619]; University of Helsinki Funds.