Alternative Media

Abstract

Alternative media are defined as small-scale politically radical media, using a wide spectrum of communication technologies and formats. They are described in connection with a series of major historical and twentieth century movements, which singly and collectively indicate the potential of such media for substantial societal impact. These include the Protestant Reformation, the English Civil War, and the American and French revolutions; the US abolitionist, suffragist and labor movements; Leninist political movements; samizdat and Western shortwave radio in the later decades of the former Soviet bloc; rightwing extremist alternative media; ‘nonmedia’ alternative communication forms; and are placed in the context of energetic attempts by state and religious authorities to suppress alternative media. Three complex and under-researched issues are raised briefly at the review's close. They are the relation between alternative and mainstream media; the relation between social movements and alternative media; and the significance of alternative media for the conceptualization of the societal roles of contemporary media.