The aesthetic alchemy of sounding impartial: Why Serbs still listen to ‘the BBC conspiracy’

The decisive developments in the region once known as Yugoslavia received substantial coverage by the BBC World Service, both in its regional language services and in its world headlines. We explore how the Serbian audiences acquired information based on western sources, particularly by tuning into the BBC, and how that information is critically talked about within Serbian public and private discourses. These discourses are decidedly multifaceted, given the way they embrace all available sources; they are eclectic in the best sense of the word and tune in to all media, but maintain a distrustful and critical attitude. The BBC’s aura of impartiality and its Serbian audiences’ responses are therefore analysed via the evolution of media-critical discourses and the audiences’ appreciation for the Corporation’s aesthetic and storytelling style; but importantly as a valuable source to observe and scrutinize conspiracy theories which have evolved in Serbia during and after the Yugoslav civil wars.