Abstract
This paper, which looks at exposure to and use of host and home media by Turkish minorities in Belgium, illustrates that media use is determined by cultural as well as socio-demographic features. The Turkish community in Belgium has access to a variety of ‘old’ and ‘new’ media outlets in their native and host language, allowing them to learn about events and issues through both Western and non-Western lenses. By means of a quantitative survey among 400 respondents of Turkish origin between the ages of 18 and 60, home and host use of ‘old’ (television, newspapers) and ‘new’ media (Internet) was analyzed in relation to culture-specific features such as ethnic cultural position, religion, and command of language, alongside with socio-demographic features such as age, gender, education, years of residence and socio-economic status. Our investigation found religion and ethnic cultural position to be the strongest cultural determinants for home language news media use and command of the language as well as religion for host language news media use. These findings nuance earlier findings with Turkish youngsters in the Netherlands and Flanders (12-19), whose media use was predominantly related to socio-demographics.
