To Örebro University

Whenever a major event flares up in the world, we are bound to be met by correspondents reporting live on the news. The correspondents are typically promoted as authoritative voices. Their live talk is delivered in “the live two-way,” a broadcast interaction between the presenter and the correspondent on location. Focusing on live reporting during the Ukraine–Russia war (2022–), this study analyses the communicative work that goes on in the live two-way, and how correspondents handle the tasks related to the enactments of epistemic authority. A conceptual framework is applied defining the communicative and epistemic dimension of the live two-way. This study applies a discourse approach and focuses on experienced correspondents in Swedish public service. Data consists of 30 live two-ways and interviews with 5 of the journalists about planning and execution of the live reporting. Results show how practices and roles separated in other genres of news are integrated in the complex work of the correspondent who is expected to fluently report from location, convey a sense of being there, present facts, and analyse and explain. This study indicates different styles of reporting when correspondents alternate between a careful and confident stance as they balance their commitments to truth.

This article examines how five bakeries in a mid-sized Swedish town communicate with their (potential) customers using different forms of ‘authentic’ displays of the much-loved seasonal pastry, the semla (a particular type of Lenten bun). Authenticity is understood as strategies of communicating with potential customers and passers-by in ways that make them feel included in a successful, sociable relationship with the bakery in question (see Scannell’s, 2001, article, ‘Authenticity and experience’). Specifically, various semla artefacts are used in the shop window/entrance as strategies to ‘talk to and interact with’ passers-by. However, these semla displays are not recognized as advertising by the bakers themselves. While previous research on authenticity, food discourse and ideology have identified traditional, natural and elite authenticityas expressed in relation to specific social groups, this study shows how authenticity may harbour oppositional values and seemingly incoherent ways of addressing customers in relation to such questions as power, eliteness and class. One explanation for these more subtly distinctive authenticity performances may be found in Swedish culture which has less social class distinction. This may, in turn, mean that certain establishments and products may not be as prominently class imprinted as others when it comes to how they address customers. Such a culture may create a more blended range of authenticity expressions.

This article explores viewers’ experiences of the Swedish Public Service (SVT) ‘slow TV’ broadcast Den stora älgvandringen (The Great Moose Migration), aired as a three-week long, live, multi-platform programme since 2019. Through semi-structured interviews with key informants, the aim is to qualitatively under- stand the audience attraction to the 24/7 programme, especially when it comes to authenticity, affordances and its apparent slowness of pace. The study showcases a spectrum of audiences’ experiences, ranging from appreciating the programme’s serenity and stillness to its potential for unexpected drama. It is suggested thatThe Great Moose Migration offers a ‘direct’ link to Swedish nature as it enables awallowing in Swedish landscapes and fauna, and allows for an unashamed adora- tion of the majestic Swedish moose, but without it being experienced as something particularly ‘Swedish’. It is found that authenticity is central to the programme’s success with both production team and audiences. However, both personal and sociable experiences of the programme as authentic rest on the collective accept- ance of authenticity as something intrinsically produced by people and technolo- gies yet not experienced as constructed. Rather, it is something that hovers in between experienced mediated and unmediated reality.

Gambling advertising’s use of celebrities, humor, and representations of happy people who Win Big, in narratives told in brash colored, high-pitched ads, are argued to increase the risk for gambling problems, or worse, addiction. Online casino ads have been subject to particular legislative attention partly for these reasons, as well as for being increasingly targeted to women who, by some, are judged to be especially vulnerable to such marketing. This paper presents a context-attentive, multimodal discourse analysis of a Swedish online casino brand’s advertising videos from 2014-2022. The study illustrates how general statements regarding risk in relation to (online casino) gambling ads’ content dramatically reduces their potential cultural significance to audiences. It is argued that one should, to a greater extent, treat these adverts as complex and socio-culturally rooted texts whose content may not so easily be written off as simply “risky,” to women or otherwise.

This study brings together an interest in contemporary gambling advertising, national regulatory impacts on such advertising, and the ways in which gender, in combination with ethnicity, operate in such advertising. The paper’s aim is to explore the interplay between state and self-regulations of gambling advertising and the concrete design of these advertisements in Sweden. More to the point, it explores how the “moderation” regulation in the Swedish Gambling Act (from 2019), as well as industry principles of non-stereotypical gender advertising, impact on the ways in which gambling ads are multimodally designed and organized. The results show that women are explicitly targeted by using both masculine and feminine semiotic strategies, albeit in a “moderate” way. The male market is addressed using stereotypically masculine framings, but without aggressively masculine or macho-like codes. The analysis further exposes that current regulations only partly cover other potential problems in ad design such as ethnic stereotyping. It is argued that the law’s demand for moderation in advertising may backfire as a strategy to protect people from the harmful effects of gambling. This because it promotes moderate narratives and moderate gender representations that mimic ordinary practices, settings and lifestyles that appear highly normalised (and thus risk-free).

This paper presents a case study of a contemporary Swedish gambling ad video from Svenska Spel published on YouTube. The study applies critical multimodal analysis to examine with what communicative strategies the state-owned operator positions itself on the soon-to-be de-regulated Swedish gambling market. The focus in the analysis lies on the linguistic and visual choices used to achieve certain communicative goals in relation to the consumer. The results show that nationalistic and patriotic values are conveyed and used in order to connect to an implied male consumer who is both ‘Swedish’ and of multi-ethnic origin; the latter being positioned as an Other in need of being taught about the Swedish values of fairness, trustworthiness and authenticity. Deleted from the advertisement is anything having to do with gambling as a social practice. Svenska Spel's identity is visually and linguistically converted from that of a gambling company into a philanthropist whose business quite unproblematically gain society and its “Swedish” people. The study raises questions regarding demands for “moderate” gambling advertisements, and suggests that current moderation regulations miss the mark when it comes to identifying and regulating problematic ideological content in seemingly inconspicuously designed gambling advertising.

Spelreklam uppfattas som ett kontroversiellt ämne. Det beror på att spelreklam antas kunna förvärra människors problemspelande. Forskningen kan dock bara i mycket begränsad omfattning påvisa en sådan relation. Resultaten som presenteras i det här kapitlet visar att det finns en stark opinion för att förbjuda reklam för nätcasinospel i Sverige. De demonstrerar även att det finns ett samband mellan en vilja att förbjuda sådan reklam och negativa attityder till spelreklam i allmänhet. Resultaten i kapitlet tydliggör även att bakgrundsfaktorer som klass eller eget spelande inte inverkar på om man stöder förbudet för nätcasinoreklam eller inte. Vi menar att det finns anled-ning att tro att våra attityder till spelreklam i allmänhet och nätcasinospel i synnerhet påverkas av den strida strömmen av spelreklam under senare år, liksom av den starkt negativa debatten om spelreklam och nätkasinoreklam som drivits på från politiskt håll.

This paper qualitatively examines a Swedish case where a TV broadcaster takes it upon itself to confront discriminatory practices in sports by addressing issues of segregation and racism in relation to the practice of cross-country skiing in a seven-part series called Stephan, Gliding. It is argued that racism and segregation are addressed through processes of cozification of both form and content. This means that the producers use semiotic resources and strategies of narration that strip the subject matter of any threatening and confrontative components, and instead embed it within a cosy story frame that will not alienate those watching. At a denotative level, Stephan, Gliding tells the story of a beginner who takes on the challenge of skiing in the 90-kilometre cross-country ski competition The Vasa Race. On an ideological level, the programme can be read critically as the narrative of a foreigner deciding to undertake the mission of his own integration into Swedish society by ways of learning to ski. It is argued that the existence of these simultaneous, competing discourses may be a better strategy to maintain a successful “communicative relationship” with audiences than to not address the topic at all.