Media and archetypes: On the concepts of affective mythologies and 'other news' in newspaper reporting

While Darren Kelsey approaches the media as narrative producing machines, John Langer points out the importance of so called other news as a means of shaping public opinion. Relying on Jungian terminology, Kelsey identifies mythic and performative aspects of news, while Langer mostly draws his conclusions on Gramsci's observations, insisting on the importance of so called trivial news. Darren Kelsey concludes that like magic, newspaper stories work in mysterious ways. They can be instruments of illusion, or a means for focusing attention towads new possibilities. Two decades earlier, John Langer, in his study Tabloid Television. Popular Journalism and the 'Other News' researched the news that were mostly regarded as secondary, although by accessibility and volume dominate media and thus shape the public opinion, feelings and acts of individuals. Typical and universal stories enable societies to move according to inherited patterns or initiate change. Both authors draw their conclusion on material gathered in a time span longer than thirty years while relying on various paradigms and methods, pointing out that individuals and societies live in a world of fairytales which govern seemingly rational political choices. The identification of congruent understandings is offered as a proposal for a synthesis of two concepts - the one based on psychoanalytical interpretation and the other based on the notion on importance of representational power. The synthesis shows in what manner different societies create narratives about themselves while relying upon archetypes, representations and stereotypes.