Transnational Streaming Television: Transforming the Relations of Global Companies, Nations, Language and Culture

Examining the impact of streaming on the global production and flow of television and film, this book provides an innovative theoretical framework to conceptualize how asymmetric dynamics of power play out in the era of global streaming.

This book analyses Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, two tech-based digital native streamers, and compares them to Disney+ and HBO Max (Warner Bros. Discovery), two legacy Hollywood studios with cable TV, and broadcasting operations, now pursuing global streaming. The book compares their different models of operation and specifically explores how these four streamers, particularly Netflix, are co-producing and commissioning television programs and films in an increasing number of countries. It also examines how this trend is creating new opportunities for independent producers and soft power for the producing nations. This book further considers the direct algorithmic targeting of individuals by their genre tastes preferences across boundaries of culture, language, and nation, boundaries that previously protected national and regional television markets, creating a new flow of data colonialism. At a more local level, the book also examines some of the national and regional streaming platforms emerging in some of the key players in the Global South: Brazil, India, and Mexico.

This is essential reading for students, researchers and academics interested in media studies, global media, and global television studies.

Joseph Straubhaar is an Emeritus Professor in the School of Journalism and Media at the University of Texas at Austin. His current research concerns the globalization of television, particularly streaming television, television in Brazil and Latin America, and disinformation in Brazil. He is the lead author of From Telenovelas to Netflix: Transnational, Transverse Television in Latin America (2021).

Swapnil Rai is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Film, Television, and Media at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. As an interdisciplinary scholar, she works at the intersection of media studies, critical cultural communication, women’s and gender studies, and industry studies. Her book Networked Bollywood came out in 2024.

Melissa Santillana is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Journalism and Creative Media Industries at Texas Tech University. Her research focuses on international media flows, activist movements and protests, feminist activism, digital media, and digital inequality. She is a co-author of From Telenovelas to Netflix: Transnational, Transverse Television in Latin America (2021).

Silvia de Freitas Dal Ben Furtado is a PhD candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, where she studies the use of Artificial Intelligence in Latin American journalism. Her research focuses on computational journalism, AI ethics, global media, streaming television, platform studies, and computational methods. Before graduate school, she worked as an executive producer at D2R Studios in Brazil.