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A content analysis of editorial items about Māori issues and the Treaty of Waitangi in 14 Suburban Newspaper publications in Auckland and Northland found a low proportion of articles about these issues, despite high proportions of Māori resident in several areas served by these publications. Stories included a higher proportion of apparent news releases compared to a national sample of non-daily papers. Māori perspectives came largely from sources representing pan-Māori non-government organisations; Suburban Newspapers used a low proportion of iwi and hapu sources compared with other community papers. Use of te reo Māori was low, and there were no signs of attempts to support readers in learning or increasing their understanding of te reo Māori. This article concludes that Māori and non-Māori readers are poorly served by the poverty of Suburban Newspapers reporting of Treaty and Māori issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using as a case study examples from a range of Lincolnshire newspapers, the article examines the emergence of sports journalism at a local level. Towards the end of the 19th century, provincial newspapers’ content was becoming increasingly local in orientation as attempts were made to distinguish themselves from the cheap, popular national dailies. With the growth of commercialised leisure and professional sport, increasing coverage within the local press became devoted to the reporting of such activities. The article examines the development of sports journalism between 1870 and 1914, a period of significant change within the provincial press. The work of several historians such as Richard Holt and Dave Russell have suggested that the coverage of sports news within the local newspaper played a part in forging local and regional identities: this article will assess the degree to which an analysis of the Lincolnshire press supports this argument. Increasingly, the identity of local press titles was, to an extent, shaped and defined through their sports coverage. This enabled newspapers to distinguish themselves from neighbouring rivals. The article will examine the ways in which local sports reporting competed with or complemented that appearing within the popular national press and the specialist sports papers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I focus on one particular player in the newspaper production process, i.e. the sub-editor. I analysed the sub-editing process through participant observation in newsrooms in the United Kingdom, Belgium and the Netherlands. Looking at both the sub-editors at work (think-aloud protocol) as well as the articles in various stages of production, and informed by (retrospective) interviews, I have compiled a list of six of the sub-editor’s “production values”. These values guide sub-editors whenever they intervene, and help them to transform a news story into an appealing, correct and credible newspaper article. I took the lead from Östgaard’s “factors influencing the flow of news”, but also from Galtung and Ruge’s “news values” which help reporters to determine which “events” are transitioned into “news”. In doing so, I go beyond the limitations of previous research, in which the types of interventions carried out in the sub-editing stage of newswriting were categorised. By identifying the guidelines driving the alterations made by the sub-editor, I aim to move one step closer towards uncovering the intricacies of the sub-editing process. Moreover, I demonstrate how “the rewrite men” add journalistic value to their newspapers, as perhaps their brand’s strongest ambassadors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Twitter has become a convenient, cheap and effective beat for journalists in search of news and information. Reporters today increasingly aggregate information online and embed it in journalism discourse. In this paper, we analyse how tweets have increasingly been included as quotes in newspaper reporting during the rise of Twitter from 2007 to 2011. The paper compares four Dutch and four British national tabloids and broadsheets, asking if tabloid journalists are relying more on this second-hand coverage than their colleagues from quality papers. Moreover, we investigate in which sections of the paper tweets are included and what kinds of sources are quoted. Consequently, we present a typology of the functions tweets have in news reports. Reporters do include these utterances as either newsworthy or to support or illustrate a story. In some cases, individual tweets or interaction between various agents on Twitter even triggers news coverage. We argue that this new discursive practice alters the balance of power between journalists and sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – News agencies are important stakeholders for large organizations, since the news they distribute will be adopted by other news outlets, which influence public opinion and hence corporate reputation. The purpose of this paper is to advance the understanding of how corporate earnings press releases are transformed into financial news by investigating whether the frames introduced by companies are adopted or reframed by news agencies. Design/methodology/approach – A content analysis of framing techniques in corporate earnings releases and their corresponding news-agency releases was performed, focussing on the financial figures and benchmarks presented, performance attributions, and the tonality of the texts. Findings – The findings suggest that news agencies reframe earnings releases at the textual-pragmatic level by reducing their length, using fewer financial figures, and changing the position of these figures in the texts; they increase transparency by avoiding adjusted financial figures, qualifying figures, and adding analyst assessments; and they change the tonality by down-toning positive statements and highlighting negative aspects. Originality/value – This paper makes a contribution to the field of corporate financial communication, which has not shed much light on the transformation of earnings press releases into financial news. In addition, this paper contributes to the stream of research on journalistic transformations of corporate press releases in general, which has ignored the influential role of news agencies as both manufacturers and wholesalers of news. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the newspaper industry is in crisis and less time and resources are available for newsgathering, social media turn out to be a convenient and cheap beat for (political) journalism. This article investigates the use of Twitter as a source for newspaper coverage of the 2010 British and Dutch elections. Almost a quarter of the British and nearly half of the Dutch candidates shared their thoughts, visions, and experiences on Twitter. Subsequently, these tweets were increasingly quoted in newspaper coverage. We present a typology of the functions tweets have in news reports: they were either considered newsworthy as such, were a reason for further reporting, or were used to illustrate a broader news story. Consequently, we will show why politicians were successful in producing quotable tweets. While this paper, which is part of a broader project on how journalists (and politicians) use Twitter, focuses upon the coverage of election campaigns, our results indicate a broader trend in journalism. In the future, the reporter who attends events, gathers information face-to-face, and asks critical questions might instead aggregate information online and reproduce it in journalism discourse thereby altering the balance of power between journalists and sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What role does the local media, particularly the local press play, in the local constituency campaign during UK general elections? Drawing on interviews with MPs and candidates and evidence from a series of content analysis studies of local newspapers, this article reviews the extent to which the local press offers coverage to political actors during and outside the period of the election campaign. It argues that the pressure to court the local media and to build a local profile is rarely matched by extensive coverage and that this should raise questions about the place of the local press in the local constituency campaign. The paper also sets out the strategies used by MPs and candidates to court the local press and argues that this reflects the very limited role that the local press plays within the local constituency in respect of its political coverage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author situates her approach of discourse genera within the framework of text linguistics, enunciative approach and discourse pragmatics. The article focuses on the report: the position it confers to the journalist's point of view and the elements that contribute to the construction of his point of view. Thus, the author attempts to examine the presence of the enunciative instance through the modes and places of its linguistic inscription in connection to the operations of the theme construction and the textual organization of information. In order to describe these operations as accurately as possible, the author analyzes three papers published in Libération in 2010 and in Le Monde in 2011. The author concludes that the degree of implication of the journalistic enunciative instance in the media discourse depends on several defining choices that relate to hypergenus and discourse genus, thematic section, the information turned into discourse object, the angle of approach projected on the discourse object, the textual organization, the enunciative setting, the presence of markers belonging to an evaluative judgment, the editorial line and the ideological position of the newspaper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes how four Nigerian newspapers framed the local Niger Delta conflict between January and May 2008. It also analyzes the main sources of news reports on the conflict, including the extent to which journalists relied on new technologies, as well as the ethical implications of such practice. Drawing on the theoretical framework of peace and conflict reporting, the methodological context of framing analysis, as well as content analysis techniques, the author demonstrates how the Nigerian press constructed the conflict in a law and order frame, suggesting that the ongoing crisis posed a serious security threat not only to the Niger Delta region but also to the entire Nigerian nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Harrison Cochran was known in Colorado journalism circles as the successful young executive of a group of Denver-area weekly newspapers. Cochran had become a familiar figure in the state press association and journalism professional society. His journalism career began as a reporter on the weekly Bloomfield Enterprise, where he became editor after only ninety days, then general manager. He purchased a share of the paper and joined the Cowles Media Company as a publisher in 1979 when the Enterprise was purchased by the Minneapolis based corporate giant. Three years later at age 36, Cochran was named president of Sentinel Publishing, Cowles' thirteen paper group of Denver suburban weeklies. The group, which employs about 240 people and has a combined circulation of more than 200,000 weekly, is reported to have earned a profit each year since he became president. In 1985, rumors circulated in Denver that Cochran was more than a publishing success story. As an 18 year old college freshman, the Cochran ten known as Harrison Crouse, had fatally shot his parents and younger sister in their Wilmette, Illinois. Investigations into these reports by several news organizations determined they were true.

History shows that wherever there is war, there is propaganda. In part for that reason it is often difficult to discover the truth about events that take place during war. For instance, many initially believed the western assertions that a chemical attack took place in the Syrian city of Douma in April 2018 and that the Syrian government was responsible. Yet it has become increasingly clear that it is more likely than not that the alleged attack did not occur and was instrumentalized for western political purposes. By way of a content analysis and a Critical Discourse Analysis this article investigates how the two most reputable Dutch newspapers reported and commented on the alleged attack in 2018. In particular, it explores the extent of the newspapers' reliance on western sources and to whom the newspapers assigned responsibility for the alleged attack. The results show that the newspapers heavily depended on western sources and promoted western propaganda by uncritically providing it much prominence. Despite a lack of evidence and before any investigation had taken place, the newspapers often held the Syrian government responsible for the alleged attack. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During March, April and May 2007 the local newspaper for the island of La Réunion, “Le Journal de L’Ile de La Réunion” (JIR), published 427 articles relating to natural hazards, with hazard-related articles occupying a total paper area of 21.94 m2 and appearing in all but four of the 90 editions of the newspaper. This high level of coverage was due to the passage of two cyclones in March, the largest historical eruption of Piton de la Fournaise in April, and a major rock fall event in May. The high level of coverage may also be due to the fact that JIR is a tabloid that follows tabloid news values. Cyclones, volcanic eruptions and rock falls fit the news values of a tabloid well, especially when the stories involve the power elite, feature stories of human interest, include surprise elements and rescues, and are of high impact, especially to the local population. Disasters also provide spectacular imagery and the opportunity for eye-catching headlines, which is another element of the tabloid format. These key parameters thus all flag stories about natural hazards and, in particular, volcanic eruptions as being newsworthy for a tabloid.Of the page space devoted to natural hazards, 9.24 m2 (42%) were set aside to reporting of volcanic activity, specifically the April 2007 eruption of Piton de la Fournaise. We completed a content analysis of these reports to understand the quality of information disseminated to the readership and to extract data regarding the impact of the eruption on local communities. We found the information to be of extremely high quality, with lava reporting being the most important issue covered by page area, mostly due to its photogenic nature. If we consider text-dominated reports, and exclude photo-montages, then the order of importance in terms of space set aside to reporting of a particular theme becomes: (i) general eruption details; (ii) summit collapse; (iii) lava flows; (iv) evacuation; (v) gas; (vi) ocean-entry; (v) air fall; (vi) vegetation fires (lit by lava contact); and (vii) volcano-seismicity. As the eruption and the nature of the hazard evolved (from lava flow through air-fall and gas, to summit collapse and ocean-entry) so too did the focus of the reporting. Once the eruption had finished, emphasis shifted from the hardships of the impacted community to sightseeing and tourism. We found that the quality of the reporting resulted from the use of journalists who were specialized in their reporting areas and who therefore knew the background and the correct sources to seek out for information. This shows that a well-informed journalist can be (i) a means to disseminate information and educate an impacted population, and (ii) a source of information for the volcanologist regarding societal impacts of, and population responses to, natural hazards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper seeks to contribute to the scholarship which is interested in the rhetorical, axiological workings of what are sometimes termed ‘hard news’ or ‘objective’ news stories—a style of news journalism typically associated with the ‘quality’ or ‘broadsheet’ news media and involving a regime of ‘strategic ‘impersonalisation’. It is interested in the communicative mechanisms by which such texts are often able to advance or favour particular value positions while employing a relatively impersonal style in which attitudinal evaluations and other potentially contentious meanings are largely confined to material attributed to quoted sources. It reviews previous research on the evaluative qualities of these texts, with special reference to the literature on attribution and so-called ‘evidentiality’ in news discourse. It is proposed that understandings of the axiological workings of these text can be enhanced by referencing some of the key insights emerging from what is termed the ‘Appraisal ‘framework’, an approach to the analysis of evaluative language developed within the Systemic Functional Linguistic paradigm of Michael Halliday and his associates. In particular it is proposed that understandings of the workings of these texts can be enhanced by referencing proposals in the Appraisal literature with respect to implicit or ‘invoked’ attitude and by reference to an account of attribution and so-called ‘evidentiality’ which is grounded in Bakhtinian notions of dialogism, rather than in notions of truth functionality and certainty-of-knowledge claims. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In this paper I examine the position of women as news reporters and editors – as journalistic authors and animators – in relation to their male counterparts, and consider changes in news coverage as their numbers increased in the newsroom over the past 50 years. I compare profession-internal guidelines which encapsulate gender ideologies pervasive in the larger culture – starting with a popular 1959 career guide – alongside journalistic genre forms, using as specific examples ‘women''s pages’ and ‘page one’ in the New York Times. The change from a backgrounded position on the ‘women''s pages’ to greater visibility in more prestigeful news contexts is indexed through macropragmatic factors such as byline (who is entitled to be recognized by name) and story topic (what counts as salient in the journalist''s world), both of which can be viewed in terms of their nonreferential index value within the community of journalists. Profession-internal critiques suggest that despite increased opportunities for women over time, the place of women at the Fourth Estate is still limited – and the discourse-level evidence supports that, affording a potential explanation for more global gender disparities in news media coverage. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Analyzing newspaper coverage of the 1998 Nairobi and 2002 Mombasa terrorist attacks by the Nairobi Daily Nation and East African Standard finds that generalizations from Western sources, such as newsworthiness criteria and coverage of government officials and terrorists, appear similar in Kenyan media, although interpretation of the attacks were colored by a “developing world” perspective in some respects. Terrorists also ironically are more prominent in subsequent attacks, although perhaps only when they fail to inflict heavy damage and casualties. The second attack also brought far more criticism on the Kenyan government, which may have implications for similar events in other countries. Adhabu ya kaburi aijau maiti (The corpse knows the torment of the grave).—Swahili proverb [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The "Port Arthur Massacre" holds a prominent place in journalism history for the sensationalist accounts by some western correspondents of the slaughter of the city's Chinese inhabitants by conquering Japanese troops in November 1894. Most representative of these accounts were those of James Creelman of the New York World. Forgotten in the history of wartime reporting from Port Arthur, however, are the accounts of A.B. de Guerville, a special correspondent for the New York Herald, who, as an eyewitness of the fall of the dry, flatly denied Creelman's account of a massacre. This article seeks an explanation behind the widely divergent accounts of these two American reporters, and in so doing details the complex combination of factors--personal, professional, and political--that influenced the way the fall of Port Arthur was reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two main theoretical concepts to interrogate news content were adopted in this study. The Frankfurt School concepts of ideology (and in particular Althusser's concept ideological state apparatus) and the British Cultural Studies concept, moral panic, help document how 2 examples of print media covered a local encounter between young Black men and the police in one community. By reconceptualizing the press as an ideological state apparatus and using the concept moral panic, the authors include dimensions that may more forcefully illustrate links between media content and lived experience. The news concerning the death of Black Panther leader, Fred Hampton, challenged the existing status quo by bringing race and class issues to the forefront. The Black press (Chicago Daily Defender) provided an alternative understanding to the one offered by the general press (Chicago Tribune). Evidence is offered for how and under what circumstances the discourse of journalism professional values and norms suppress or obscure minority voices. Incorporating the concept moral panic provides a tool for explaining the distinctive narratives offered by the 2 Chicago newspapers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzed the frequency and placement given to male and female sources and story subjects in newspaper coverage and their relationship to the gender of the reporter. A content analysis of 889 stories found that male sources and subjects received more mentions and were placed more prominently in the stories. Controlling for structural and editorial influences, results indicated that the presence of females in the byline is a significant predictor of females appearing within the news story. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) is the self-regulatory body established by the UK newspaper industry to adjudicate readers' complaints. The PCC's code of practice is used to determine whether complaints should be upheld. Launched in 1991, the PCC has been in operation for more than ten years; this anniversary presented an ideal opportunity to conduct a statistical analysis of the commission's performance in dealing with readers' complaints. The study revealed that although the PCC handled more than 20,000 complaints in those ten years, it adjudicated on only 707, and upheld approximately 45 per cent (321). This is a relatively small number on which to judge the direction the PCC is taking in its ethical pronouncements and to assess whether there are any changes in the Council's approach over time. There are some clear indicators, however, that the PCC's performance is varied and that while its record on complaints about the coverage of minors is commendable, driven largely by its concern to protect the two princes, Harry and William, its record on other areas of major concern to the public, particularly discrimination, is poor. The PCC has certainly not regulated certain aspects of newspapers with sufficient vigour to satisfy many of its critics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines how the Nation, Punch, Vanguard and Daily Trust newspapers reported Southern Kaduna conflicts in terms of frequency, direction, placement and level of sensationalism between September 2020 and March 2021. The media which are powerful tools of communication can aid in promoting peace, unity and development, as well as creating conflict along ethnic, religious and political inclinations. The study which was anchored on social responsibility and agenda setting theories used both content analysis and critical discourse analysis in order to code and interpret the data collected. A total of two hundred and twenty-four (224) editions of the newspapers under review were selected using the stratified random sampling technique by days of the week. Out of the sample, only 203 editions were accessed, coded and content analysed. The research reveals, among other things, that the reports on Southern Kaduna conflicts were mostly straightforward news constituting 92% which lack sufficient context and background. The reports were also given less prominence as almost all the reports were buried or hidden in the inside pages. Also, most of the reports on Southern Kaduna conflicts were inflammatory and sensational in order to keep the audience glued to the newspapers at the expense of accuracy and professionalism. The study therefore suggests that, media organisations should organise extensive training on conflict-sensitive reporting so as to arm reporters with professional requisite knowledge of reporting conflicts such that the reports don’t trigger more conflicts. Also, media organisations should not report conflicts in straight news format only instead; they should use editorials and features which are usually in-depth and analytical with sufficient context and background needed for conflictsensitive journalism. And, the media should also give prominence and priority to conflict incidences in order to attract the desired government intervention which will bring about lasting solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a partial model that will describe how economic and newsroom-related variables can interact to affect balance and fairness in newspaper articles. It uses economic, newsroom, and content variables in examining the connection. Findings of the study revealed the direct effect of the economic variables on story fairness. It may be that newspapers in competitive markets “specialize” in sources involved in controversy. The findings emphasize the relationship of story load to extensiveness of source use.

The summer of 1928 was marked by two internationally reported and disastrous events involving two polar explorers: the crash and rescue of Umberto Nobile's airship 'Italia' in the polar regions of the North Atlantic ocean, and the death of the Roald Amundsen, en route to rescuing Nobile. The article discusses these disasters as indicative of a historical moment in the mediation of events where technological and logistical developments enabled a continuous news coverage of radically remote locations. It argues that these new affordances came with an increased and pervasive sense of uncertainty about the veracity of factual information. Analyzing Norwegian newspaper coverage, the article finds a range of articulations of this uncertainty, including a preoccupation with rumours and speculations, as well as with chronic difficulties in determining factual veracity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this phenomenology, interviews were conducted with former newspaper reporters now working for plominent internet sports sites. Krumboltz's (2008) Planned Happenstance Learning Theory on career development was used as a guiding framework. Data were transcribed and coded by two researchers. Most of the journalists decided to be newspaper sports writers early in life and began garnering professional experiences in their teens or in college. None planned to work for Internet outlets. However, all foresaw the demise of newspapers and landed with lnternet outlets through media connections initially formed through newspapers. All but one expressed high satisfaction in their current jobs, citing large travel budgets, freedom to choose writing assignments, national platforms, and no hard time deadlines for submitting stories. These reporters find the future of sports journalism unpredictable, but believe they will be ready. Lehman-Wilizig and Cohen-Avigdor's media life-cycle model (2004) was used to understand results in a broader context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interpretive journalism is a journalistic style, characterized by reporters expressing their opinion, speculating about the future or explaining why something happened, without referring to verifiable facts or statements from news sources. Previous research upon this phenomenon is rather scattered, and inconclusive about the mechanisms underlying the presence of this journalistic style. This study aims to address both shortcomings by investigating newspaper coverage on coalition negotiations in Belgium. Conducting a quantitative, longitudinal content analysis, the evolution of interpretive journalism is studied between 1985 and 2014. Results show a remarkably strong, almost linear increase in the amount of interpretation in newspaper articles over a period of 29 years. Apart from the structural evolution in the media landscape that might cause this trend to occur, contextual determinants differing from one coalition formation to another turn out to be relevant as well. While interpretive journalism is on the rise, this is especially so when considering lengthy, difficult negotiations. This finding emphasizes the importance of contextual determinants—information accessibility in this case—in explaining journalistic trends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]