Arab News Sources and Practices in Times Crisis: Challenges and Opportunities for Sociology of News Research

Abstract

ABSTRACT The relationship between journalists and news source has been challenged by new digital technologies, the crisis in public communication and the multiplication of sources of information and news, and the COVID-19 pandemic, which has transformed journalistic routines and audience behaviour. Existing research on news sources has contributed to our understanding of which voices dominate the news agenda in normal conditions, but there remains little research on the news sources and journalists’ relationship during crisis, particularly in non-Western contexts. In this paper, we seek to partially address the lacuna, drawing on semi-structured interviews with selected journalists from across the Arab world to address the effect of COVID-19 on journalists’ relationship with their news sources and what we call source cultivation practices in a region where traditional forms of personal networking as well as cultural norms have defined the relationship between journalists and news sources in the legacy media. In addressing these issues, this paper contributes to research on news sources during crises while drawing attention to the theoretical and methodological gaps in news sources research in the region as well as the continued dominance of Western- and media-centric paradigms in the broad field of the sociology of news production.