scholarly journals ‘Alternative facts are not facts’: Gaffe-announcements, the Trump administration and the media

2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 172-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris McVittie ◽  
Andy McKinlay
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Ontological Status ◽  
Alternative Facts ◽  
Normative Expectations ◽  
The Media ◽  
Trump Administration

Gaffes are actions or events that are treated as problematic in subsequent news coverage through the production of what we term here ‘gaffe-announcements’. In an analysis of news media interviews conducted with members of the Trump administration during its first 100 days, we examine how interviewees respond to interviewer gaffe-announcements. Interviewees are seen to challenge the making of an announcement, to attempt to rework the ontological status of infelicitous talk, or to introduce the views of others who view the prior talk as felicitous. These responses lead in subsequent turns to reformulation of the gaffe-announcement, rejection of the response, or the views introduced being treated as irrelevant. These forms of response allow interviewees to avoid accepting that gaffes have occurred and allow the interviews to continue in line with normative expectations but discussion continues on matters that are treated as negative and detrimental to the interests of the administration.

scholarly journals News Framing in a Time of Terror

2020 ◽  
Vol 37 (s1) ◽  
pp. 85-99
Author(s):  
Hanne Jørndrup
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Terror Attack ◽  
Critical Approach ◽  
Television Channel ◽  
Saturday Afternoon ◽  
Public Meeting ◽  
The Media ◽  
Media Event ◽  
Charlie Hebdo

AbstractOn Saturday afternoon, 14 February 2015, a man attacked a public meeting at Krudttønden in Copenhagen and later the city's synagogue, killing two persons. The attacks did not take the Danish media by surprise since they had recently been engaged in the coverage of similar events, reporting the attacks at the Charlie Hebdo office in Paris in January 2015.This article analyses how the Danish television channel DR1 framed the attacks in the newscast from the first shot at Krudttønden and for the following week. Furthermore, the analysis will discuss how the framing of the shooting as a “terror attack” transformed the news coverage into a “news media” media event, abandoning the journalistic norm of critical approach while the media instead became the scene of national mourning.

Facts, Faction, Anachronism

PMLA ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 134 (5) ◽  
pp. 1143-1149
Author(s):  
Russ Castronovo
Keyword(s):  
Point Of View ◽  
Past Participle ◽  
Defining Moment ◽  
The Past ◽  
Latin Word ◽  
Alternative Facts ◽  
The Media ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Trump Administration

Temporal concerns are baked into the matter of facts. From an etymological point of view, facts are moments of making and doing that are no longer alive and kicking. Coming into English and other modern Western languages by means of both the past participle of the Latin word facere (“to make or to do”) and the Latin noun factum, whose senses include the “result of doing” and “something done,” fact denotes an action that has happened and is now preserved like a fossil in the accumulated sediments of history (“Fact”). Etymologically speaking, facts are safely removed from the vicissitudes of the present and the whims of our leaders. So it makes sense that there should be some hand-wringing over facts that have become so thoroughly destabilized that they no longer seem to be based on anything. The defining moment in this distressing development occurred when the Trump administration, not content merely to put a spin on facts, dismissed quantifiable facts by summoning “alternative facts” to deny that the low attendance at the 2017 presidential inauguration was real. A dictionary, not the renowned one from Oxford but Urban Dictionary, offers the following definition of alternative facts: “an attempt to gaslight the population in an effort to control the media and create propaganda” (Mozzy-o). If only we could take refuge in etymology and remind ourselves and anyone else who will listen that facts are veritable faits accomplis, over and done with, past participles that stand as linguistic monuments to a bygone event beyond alteration.

scholarly journals Rights and Representation: Media Narratives about Disabled People and Their Service Animals in Canadian Print News

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 38-76
Author(s):  
Lana Kerzner ◽  
Chelsea Temple Jones ◽  
Beth Haller ◽  
Arthur Blaser
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Animal Rights ◽  
Animal Studies ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Disabled People ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Media ◽  
Media Reports ◽  
The Many ◽  
Media Narratives

Canadian news coverage is reflecting and shaping an evolution of thought about how we must publicly account for animals’ roles in the disability rights movement. Through a textual analysis of 26 news media articles published between 2012 and 2017, this research demonstrates that the media play a key role in reporting on discrimination, yet media narratives about service animals and their owners too often fail to capture the complexity of policies and laws that govern their lives. In Canada, there is widespread public confusion about the rights of disabled people and their service animals. This incertitude is relevant to both disability and animal oppression. This research identifies nine frames within the media narratives, as well as evaluating perspectives from critical animal studies in the news articles. These frames, which emerge in the media reports, in their descriptions of human and (less often) animal rights, illustrate public confusion surrounding these rights. The confusion is inevitable given the many laws in Canada that govern service animals. Thus, to give context to the news coverage, this article also surveys the legal protections for disabled people who use service animals in Canada, and suggests that until the news media understand the legalities surrounding service animals, they will not be well equipped to fulfil their role of informing the public. This is a lost opportunity in light of the media’s potential role as a pivotal tool to educate the public about disability and animal rights.

scholarly journals Media And Cultural Heritage

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Inge Hutagalung
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
News Media ◽  
Agenda Setting ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Good News ◽  
Media Report ◽  
Amplifying Effect ◽  
The Media ◽  
Setting Theory

In general, media coverage can have a strong influence on the reputation of a cultural heritage. Media coverage often has an effect on a cultural heritage’s reputation when ‘good’ or ‘bad’ news is reported.This amplifying effect has often been studied through the lens of agenda setting theory. The hypothesis behind the theory is that the frequency with the media report on an issue determines that issues’ salience in the minds of the general public. In other words, the media may not be successful often time in telling people what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about. The news media ‘set’ the public agenda.Since people cannot possibly attend no to every little detail about the cultural heritage around them, setting in communication is important because it helps shape the perspectives through which people see all cultural heritage in the world.In generating good news coverage about a cultural heritage, communicating with the media is one of important activities that should be maintained between communication professionals (in cultural heritage) with journalists. Keywords: media coverage, agenda setting, framing news

Mistrust in media will fuel US populism

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Consumer Trust ◽  
Corporate Ownership ◽  
Fake News ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Alternative Facts ◽  
National Media ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
The Media ◽  
Critical Coverage

Subject 'Fake news' and US politics. Significance Throughout his presidency and the campaign that preceded it, Donald Trump has attacked news media that broadcast or write critical coverage of him and his circle. His habitual denial of unfavourable reports has established ‘fake news’, ‘alternative facts’ and ‘post-truth’ in the political lexicon. In contrast to Trump’s shifting positions on policy questions, the president’s animus for the media has been one of the constant aspects of his presidency. Impacts Trump’s central focus on his personal legitimacy will see him increase attacks on the media as difficulties mount. Deregulation will concentrate corporate ownership of local and national media, exacerbating the polarisation of news. Increased regulation of social media platforms is unlikely to restore consumer trust. The traditional media will probably cater to concentrated pockets of affluent and educated consumers.

Warriors of Word and Sword

2016 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 334-367
Author(s):  
Nicholas Evan Sarantakes
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
News Media ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
The United States ◽  
World War ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
The Media ◽  
Battle Of Okinawa ◽  
Armed Services ◽  
Probing Questions

The Battle of Okinawa was the last major ground battle of World War ii. The Tenth u.s. Army that invaded this small piece of Japan was a unique force composed of units from the u.s. Army and others from the u.s. Marine Corps. Much historical literature has focused on the different approaches to ground combat of the two armed services, but they also employed very different policies towards support of the news media. The u.s. Marines were much more supportive than the u.s. Army. The two different policies and styles of news coverage that reporters employed led to coverage favoring the u.s. Marines. Reporting suggested that u.s. Marine procedures were less costly in lives and created enormous concern in the United States about casualty rates, motivating President Harry S. Truman to hold an Oval Office meeting to re-think strategy in the Pacific theater. It would be wrong, though, to argue that the media altered the course of the war. Truman asked hard probing questions about the direction of the war, but General of the Army George C. Marshall acted to ensure that the United States stayed on its current strategic path.

scholarly journals The Role of the Media in the Propagation of the Terrorist Agenda

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Goodman ◽  
Shane Warren ◽  
Robyn Jolly ◽  
Maggie Norton
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Psychological Impact ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Kenneth Burke ◽  
The Public ◽  
Terror Attacks ◽  
National Leaders ◽  
The Media ◽  
High Level

The thesis of this paper is that jihadists are using terror as a propaganda weapon to create a high level of fear among the public around the world, a level above the actual threat. We believe the media and national leaders enhance the effectiveness of the jihadists' propaganda in the ways they present terror attacks. Previous research indicates that horrific events, whether created by humans or the result of nature, leave a lasting psychological impact on the victims. We show a psychological link by victims of the Mumbai attack seven years ago and the Paris attacks in November of 2015. We argue that the psychological impact may be caused when the cultural signifiers of terror result in a meaning abyss because most people do not have signifieds that readily link to brutal terrorists' signifiers. What Derrida described as the abyss occurs when acts of brutality create panic and chaos because most people do not know assign signifieds-- i.e., meanings-- to the brutality. Kenneth Burke critiqued Mein Kampf by explaining how Adolph Hitler had used god terms and evil terms to create ideological agreement with Hitler's concept that the Aryan race was being undermined by a Jewish conspiracy. We examine how the news media coverage of nine terrorist attacks invoked god terms and evil terms in their description of the terror created by the jihadists. Further, we looked for chaos terms, which are terms that describe such inhumane acts of terror that people do not have existing signifieds to translate those acts into meaning. Not only did we find that chaos terms in the news coverage, as well as the god terms and evil terms, but we also found chaos terms used by world leaders. We draw the conclusion that both the media and world leaders contribute to the propaganda impact of jihadists attacks by using chaos terms.

Talking About School Bullying: News Framing of Who Is Responsible for Causing and Fixing the Problem

2016 ◽  
Vol 94 (3) ◽  
pp. 725-746 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sei-Hill Kim ◽  
Matthew W. Telleen
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
School Bullying ◽  
Victim Blaming ◽  
Frame Building ◽  
News Organizations ◽  
Political Orientations ◽  
The Media ◽  
Internal And External Factors ◽  
Social Level

Our content analysis examines how American news media have framed the question of who is responsible for causing and solving the school bullying problem. We identified presence of considerable victim blaming in news coverage. Among potential causes examined, victims and their families were mentioned most often as being responsible. When talking about how to solve the problem, the media were focusing heavily on schools and teachers, while bullies and their families—the direct source of the problem—were mentioned least often. We also found that liberal newspapers were focusing more than conservative papers on social-level responsibilities, while conservative papers were more likely than liberal papers to attribute responsibility to individuals, suggesting that the political orientations of news organizations can affect which level of responsibility will be highlighted. Drawing upon the notion of frame building, we discuss in detail how several internal and external factors of news organizations can affect their selective uses of frames.

scholarly journals Out of an Abundance of Caution: COVID-19 and Health Risk Frames in Canadian News Media

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Rebecca Wallace ◽  
Andrea Lawlor ◽  
Erin Tolley
Keyword(s):  
Health Risk ◽  
News Media ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Epidemiological Data ◽  
Online News ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
The Public ◽  
Early Stages ◽  
The Media

Abstract Although Canada's first documented case of COVID-19 appeared in mid-January 2020, it was not until March that messaging about the need to contain the virus heightened. In this research note, we document the use of the media's construction of risk through framing in the early stages of the pandemic. We analyze three dimensions of the health risk narratives related to COVID-19 that dominated Canadians’ concerns about the virus. To capture these narratives, we examine print and online news coverage from two nationally distributed media sources. We assess these frames alongside epidemiological data and find there is a clear link between media coverage, epidemiological data and risk frames in the early stages of the pandemic. It appears that the media relied on health expertise and political sources to guide their coverage and was responsive to the public health data presented to Canadians.

scholarly journals Investigating the Use of Language in Islam-related News: Evidence from Selected Non-Western Online Newspapers

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isyaku Hassan ◽  
Mohd Nazri Latiff Azmi ◽  
Aliyu Abdullahi
Keyword(s):  
Content Analysis ◽  
News Media ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Sensitivity Training ◽  
Negative Stereotypes ◽  
Online Newspapers ◽  
Exchange Program ◽  
The Media ◽  
Negative Tone

The manner in which language is utilized in reporting Islam is disheartening. This is because sensationalized language, especially in the news media, could reinforce negative stereotypes. As such, those who rely on the media to understand Islam are likely to develop negative preconceptions about the religion. This study aims to investigate how the non-western online newspapers use language in news coverage of Islam. Content analysis was used to collect and analyze the data. Using purposive sampling, Punch and Vanguard were selected from Nigeria while The Star and New Straits Times were selected from Malaysia. A total of 599 Islam-related news articles were collected from the selected newspapers using internet-based search from November 2015 until September 2016. The findings showed that almost half of the overall Islam-related articles conveyed negative tone toward Islam while very few conveyed positive tone. This shows that the language used in news coverage of Islam is inappropriate and sensational. Hence, there is a need to enhance the reporters’ knowledge and writing skills through inter-media exchange program, exposure to different religious, social and cultural lives, workshops, seminars, conferences, as well as sensitivity training and retraining on reporting religions.

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