The echoes of grassroots media practices in Greece: a sociological approach

This thesis probes into grassroots media projects by addressing them in a broad theoretical framework that evaluates such projects in macro terms, along the interplay between 'public sphere' and 'civil society', as well as in micro terms, across the 'lived experience' of their practice, on the grounds of the expression and enactment of 'citizenship' correspondingly. From this perspective, the study researches media projects that are implemented `on the margins' in Greece, drawing both on their contribution to and intervention in the public and political life. By evaluating these projects in a resonant context the study prioritizes the 'agents', citizens/social groups, who are engaged in their practice.

Using empirical evidence from fieldwork conducted in Greece in 2003 involving: indepth interviews with people engaged (forty four participants) in the practice of diverse, heterogeneous media projects - one newspaper, two periodicals, three pirate radio stations and three Internet sites - this thesis evaluates the limits and the challenges of the practice of such projects in terms of their contribution to the public sphere and their intervention in the sphere of 'the political'. It argues that while such projects constitute a realm for the representation of various social domains, collectives/social groups and their discourses, as well as, for their intervention in civic life, at the same time their practice is entrapped in traditional 'politics' that deter the expansion of these projects, and negate the potential their practice encompasses for the constitution of `the political' in the realm of everyday life as well.