Do journalists cater to audience's social identity? Assessing the alignment of news content with readers’ national identity orientations

This study investigated the use of national stereotypes and home cultural referents (so-called “domestication”) in foreign news reporting, in relation to social identity theory which posits that individuals are drawn to information/assessments that positively describe the social groups to which they belong. Through a content analysis of influential newspapers from three different countries, this study finds that foreign news coverage tends to depict the home culture favorably while generally denigrating foreign societies, consistent with the theory's predictions. The study also finds that foreign news generally portrays the foreign society negatively with or without the stereotype but that stereotyping will enhance negativity. This research also employed cultural theories to probe the reciprocal nature between the audience and the journalists, both of who may share similar cultural frames.

Semantic Study on Network News Texts in Mode of “Distant Reading”

The corpus adopted in this study is from the official news texts of Chinese and foreign network media collected and processed by researchers. By Voyant, a web-based text reading and analysis platform, the study finds and analyzes the semantic differences of lexical chunk Chinese culture in Chinese and foreign news stories under the semantic view of systematic-functional grammar with the digital humanistic mode “distant reading” as the semantic analysis research means. the study explores the implicit semantic deviation and its logical semantic relationship between Chinese and foreign news texts.

News Media and Scandal: Balancing News Media's Socio-Political and Commercial Roles - A Case Study on the 2012 Libor Scandal

<p>Despite the potential for conflict between news media’s idealised socio-political role and its practical commercial role, a qualitative content analysis of the coverage of the 2012 Libor scandal in four newspapers, The Times (London), The Financial Times, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, revealed that these aspects of news media are in fact complementary. Although it is often argued that the commercial function of news media is prioritised over its social and political roles, the commercial aspects of the coverage of the Libor scandal did not overwhelm or significantly compromise the political watchdog role of the media. In fact, the unexpectedly large divide in coverage between the UK newspapers and the US newspapers signifies that the divide between domestic and foreign news is significantly more important than the divide between news media’s idealised socio-political role and its commercial aspects. The unexpected similarities between specialist and mainstream publications significantly contributed to this divide between domestic and foreign news. This suggests that scandals represent a unique case in which dramatic mass interest imperatives combine with critical public interest imperatives. The results of the analysis suggest that an equal fulfilment of both watchdog and newsworthiness imperatives – demonstrated by the UK press – can offer a comprehensive investigation of, and increase public concern for, issues within an international scandal. A strong emphasis on news values and construction of a personalised narrative by these newspapers enabled the scandal to attract and maintain audience attention. Their coverage also featured a strong emphasis on the morality of the scandal and used official political sources in order to inform the public of something they needed to know. In contrast, a lack of fulfilment of both watchdog and newsworthiness imperatives – demonstrated by the US press – can result in a weakening of public attention and debate about foreign issues that directly affect domestic political and economic policy. The US coverage failed to emphasise news values or construct a personalised narrative, which stripped the scandal of resonance. It failed to aggressively question the individuals involved and demand official investigations, failed to emphasise the substantive social impact, and used a limited range of sources. This resulted in the US press failing to construct a scandal frame.</p>

News Media and Scandal: Balancing News Media's Socio-Political and Commercial Roles - A Case Study on the 2012 Libor Scandal

<p>Despite the potential for conflict between news media’s idealised socio-political role and its practical commercial role, a qualitative content analysis of the coverage of the 2012 Libor scandal in four newspapers, The Times (London), The Financial Times, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, revealed that these aspects of news media are in fact complementary. Although it is often argued that the commercial function of news media is prioritised over its social and political roles, the commercial aspects of the coverage of the Libor scandal did not overwhelm or significantly compromise the political watchdog role of the media. In fact, the unexpectedly large divide in coverage between the UK newspapers and the US newspapers signifies that the divide between domestic and foreign news is significantly more important than the divide between news media’s idealised socio-political role and its commercial aspects. The unexpected similarities between specialist and mainstream publications significantly contributed to this divide between domestic and foreign news. This suggests that scandals represent a unique case in which dramatic mass interest imperatives combine with critical public interest imperatives. The results of the analysis suggest that an equal fulfilment of both watchdog and newsworthiness imperatives – demonstrated by the UK press – can offer a comprehensive investigation of, and increase public concern for, issues within an international scandal. A strong emphasis on news values and construction of a personalised narrative by these newspapers enabled the scandal to attract and maintain audience attention. Their coverage also featured a strong emphasis on the morality of the scandal and used official political sources in order to inform the public of something they needed to know. In contrast, a lack of fulfilment of both watchdog and newsworthiness imperatives – demonstrated by the US press – can result in a weakening of public attention and debate about foreign issues that directly affect domestic political and economic policy. The US coverage failed to emphasise news values or construct a personalised narrative, which stripped the scandal of resonance. It failed to aggressively question the individuals involved and demand official investigations, failed to emphasise the substantive social impact, and used a limited range of sources. This resulted in the US press failing to construct a scandal frame.</p>

Attacking with Their Own Words: The Use of Censored Sources by the Party Media in China

There exists a seemingly contradictory treatment towards foreign news and social media in China. On the one hand, foreign news articles and social media are severely censored. On the other, the Communist Party frequently quotes these censored sources when addressing the public. These behaviors are puzzling. It is natural for authoritarian regimes to hide repressive behaviors, rather than to expose them. The use of foreign news contents is also not necessary for advancing party ideologies because the party’s own words work just as well. To address the puzzle, I ask the following research questions: Why does the party media in China actively quote censored sources when reporting contested foreign affairs? I argue that the party media quote from foreign sources to demonstrate professionalism and to appear credible, while government censorship has effectively framed foreign news sources as generally biased and thus prevents people from trusting them in the first place.

Elections, Wars, and Protests? A Longitudinal Look at Foreign News on Canadian Television

This study reports on the Canadian data from a recent international content analysis of broadcast news in 18 countries. With a mind to Robert A. Hackett’s longitudinal analysis of foreign news on CBC and CTV in 1989, the current study addresses questions of foreign news prominence, geographic distribution, topic coverage, and variation between networks, noting differences and similarities in the content of foreign news in light of shifting cultural, political, and economic environments; news production processes; and communication technologies. This analysis provides an update to Hackett’s seminal work, painting a picture of the Canadian foreign news landscape two decades later.

Elections, Wars, and Protests? A Longitudinal Look at Foreign News on Canadian Television

This study reports on the Canadian data from a recent international content analysis of broadcast news in 18 countries. With a mind to Robert A. Hackett’s longitudinal analysis of foreign news on CBC and CTV in 1989, the current study addresses questions of foreign news prominence, geographic distribution, topic coverage, and variation between networks, noting differences and similarities in the content of foreign news in light of shifting cultural, political, and economic environments; news production processes; and communication technologies. This analysis provides an update to Hackett’s seminal work, painting a picture of the Canadian foreign news landscape two decades later.

Staying Ahead, Falling Behind

This chapter details the efforts of states to provide a ubiquitous telegraph service during the 1860s, and the tensions which emerged between the growing numbers of people and places competing for access to the network. Government intervention increased during this period, as secondary branches were built to cater to the needs of towns dispersed across territories and engaged in different economic sectors, and the implantation of foreign news agencies on German soil, Reuters in particular, was restricted. Increasing traffic on the lines led states to manage their networks as ‘organisms’, distinguishing between larger and smaller arteries of communication, placing certain users ahead of others in the exchange of telegrams. The promise that telegraphy would ‘annihilate space’ often remained unfulfilled as a result, however, and delays in communication caused divisions even within the privileged class of telegraph users. Within towns, moreover, the growing social diversity of these users made the positioning of telegraph offices increasingly contentious, as the members of the middle class engaged in finance, trade, and industry occupied different sites within the urban landscape and faced the prospect of delayed telegram deliveries. This section also considers the role of telegraphy in the changing geopolitical context of the 1860s, and how the technology’s impact upon events was represented in Kladderadatsch, as well as the role of the German entrepreneur Werner Siemens in the emerging field of global submarine telegraphy.