Media and the Dissemination of Fear: Pandemics, Wars and Political Intimidation

“This is an outstanding book which will be of interest to media historians and communications scholars around the world. It reveals how fear is incubated, spread and, sometimes, countered through the media in ways that are profoundly illuminating and relevant in the era of Covid.”
—James Curran, Professor of Communications, Goldsmiths, University of London

“This outstanding volume traces the impact of fear, uncertainty – and sometimes related – hope, historically, from World War I to the present and the COVID-19 pandemic. More specifically, media reporting is deconstructed in much systematic detail which allows understanding continuities and discontinuities of its complex role, locally, glocally, and globally. A must read for scholars and laypeople alike!”

—Ruth Wodak, Emeritus Distinguished Professor, Lancaster University

“Media and the Dissemination of Fear explores its workings across natural disasters, wars, conflicts and health crises over the past 100 years. Although circumstances may have changed, the exploitation of fear as a means of social control and intimidation has not, and this book speaks to the myriad ways in which its damaging currents destabilize individuals and communities, force widespread compliance and entrench enmity and otherness, particularly in association with populist regimes. A thoughtful, important volume that wrestles mightily with the centrality of fear in contemporary life writ large.”

—Barbie Zelizer, Raymond Williams Professor of Communication, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania

This book offers a diachronical and inter-/transmedia approach to the relationship of media and fear the media’s role in pandemics, wars and other crises, as well as in political intimidation. It points out the historically and transculturally strong nexus between media and fear, which persistently finds ever-new forms with new media, but always follows similar logics.
Nelson Ribeiro is Associate Professor at the Universidade Católica Portuguesa in Lisbon where he is the Dean of the School of Human Sciences.

Christian Schwarzenegger, Dr., is a researcher and lecturer (Akademischer Rat) at the University of Augsburg, Germany