“In the end, Germany will always resort to hot pants”: watching Europe singing, constructing the stereotype

The Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) is an annual popular music event that attracts millions of people who consume it with enthusiasm, irony, humor, but also sometimes with anger. The contest has been increasingly dressed with numerous stereotypes about the nation, Europe, and cultural difference. This paper looks at two different groups of ESC audiences in the UK and analyzes their engagement with the event and the stereotypes around it. The first audience group consists of participants in the BBC Online Forum debates and the second group consists of committed Eurovision audience members participating in focus group discussions. Findings show that the stereotype becomes a powerful, political, yet ambivalent, tool in making sense of cultural difference.