Transforming the city: The potential for urban ethnographies of PR. The case of Latin America

Authors: Hodges, C.E.M. and Denegri-Knott, J.

Journal: Public Relations Review

Volume: 38

Issue: 4

Pages: 529-540

ISSN: 0363-8111

DOI: 10.1016/j.pubrev.2012.05.008

Abstract:

Framed within García Canclini's concept of cultural hybridity, this paper will argue that " the city" and, consequently, the field of urban anthropology, offers great potential for the study of public relations and its audiences. Urbanisation will be one of the twenty-first century's biggest drivers of global economic growth (Dobbs et al., 2011) and public relations efforts will need to adapt to reflect the shifting urban environment. We will propose that cities provide opportunities for exploring the meanings, confines and possibilities of public relations as a socio-cultural practice. We will consider how ethnographically-inspired research can help us to further understand how public relations is understood and practised, both formally and informally, in large metropolitan cities and how public relations is influenced by, and can contribute to, urban cultural life. We will propose an ethnographic framework for research to explore the phenomenology of everyday lived experiences of public relations (PR) in relation to the complexity of the global processes which shape today's cities and the PR practices which take place within them. To contextualise our proposed research framework, we will draw on two particular cases from our own work: one of a project now completed in Mexico City, Mexico, and the other, a project in progress, in Lima, Peru. © 2012 Elsevier Inc.

Source: Scopus

Preferred by: Janice Denegri-Knott