Have We Really Embraced “The Start of an Exciting New Journey”?: A Content Analysis of the Olympic Channel’s Original Series

• 作者: XU Mingming Yangchen Dolma
• 来源期刊: 新闻与大众传媒:英文版
• 学科: 体育
• 关键词: the OLYMPIC Channel Media FRAMING Theory gender NATIONALITY
• 年，卷（期）: 2019,（5）
• 页码范围: 223-234
• 页数: 12页
• 分类号: G81

摘要

After the 2016 Rio Olympics,the Olympic Channel was launched on 21 August,which is a multi-platform media providing a wide range of content about the Olympics in order to promote the Olympic spirit throughout the world,including games,news,originals series,and live sports events.Compared with videos,the other part of the Channel,those from the original series could represent the coverage tendencies of the platform more relevantly.Based on framing theory,this research focused on issues of sports and analyzed 653 Original Series videos from 21 August 2016 to 31 December 2017,aiming to explore if the coverage framework the Olympic Channel constructed is distinct from what traditional Olympic media adhere to.The study found that some tendencies of the coverage of the Olympic Channel vary from traditional sports media.First,the most-mentioned five sports in the Channel(track and field,skiing,swimming,basketball,and gymnastics)are different from those in traditional sports media(gymnastics,track and field,swimming,diving,and volleyball).Second,the Olympic Channel emphasizes more on promotion of the Olympic humanistic spirits rather than competition,which is valued in traditional sports media,and the Channel implements the promotion greatly by telling characters’stories,with nearly 60%of those characters which are non-Olympic champions,including coaches and sports instructors involved in Olympic movements.Third,the Original Series records athletes in a documentary way,with the shooting perspectives extended from ordinary athletes’performance insides the domain,to their multiple identities’outsides the field,conveying the images of athletes vividly and solidly,narrowing the gap between athletes and fans.In terms of gender,however,male athletes and men’s sports(46.3%)have superiority of media coverage over females and female sports.Coverage focuses placed in these two genders were found distinct as well—male athletes are endowed with more opportunities to show their athletic abilities and games experiences.As fo