LAUSR

ABSTRACT Technological innovations have signaled a shift in the journalistic field, enabling a wider range of actors to participate in public discourses and challenge the hegemonic power structures of traditional journalism from the outside. Consequently, historical notions of alternative media have expanded to encompass a variety of new actors within and beyond the boundaries of the journalistic field, with some explicitly claiming to focus on issues of diversity. This study examines the role orientations of peripheral journalistic actors who prioritize journalistic diversity in their work. It also explores how they use their role orientations to position themselves within the journalistic field and its periphery. Based on 18 in-depth interviews with Austrian peripheral actors, the study finds that while their role orientations diverge from those of more traditional media, they share similarities with longstanding normative ideas of progressive alternative media. Further, they employ their cognitive and normative role orientations as boundary markers to distinguish themselves from the practices of more traditional media.