REPRESENTATION OF ISLAM AND MUSLIMS IN U.S MEDIA

8/19/2019 REPRESENTATION OF ISLAM AND MUSLIMS IN U.S MEDIA

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Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 Introduction

Rapid growing and great enhancement of media in our world today as a results of

modernization have vastly benefited the human race in a way that access to information

become effortless. The great exposure towards media at our disposal combined with the

media’s enormous power and liberty in determining what information they want the

media consumers to be fed off their media texts ( Amir, azem, ! "ossein, #$%&' could

lead us to unconsciously bestow the authority to the media to shape our perspectives

on certain events ( Amir et al., #$%&'. n parallel, )aya, "afriza, and Ain *adzimah

(#$$+' highlighted that society is influenced by the media as people who depend on

media as a source of information often find themselves affected by their images.

*evertheless, despite the media’s selfproclaimed ob-ectivity and biasfree principle in

reporting life events and happenings all over the world, they actually presuppose their

preferred/ version of reality hence ma0ing their targeted readers to view this reality

from their point of view ( Alireza ! Rahman, #$%#'. 1oesmans (#$%&' is in agreement

with this view focusing on news as a particular example. "e depicted -ournalism as an

ideological choicema0ing practice in today’s informationdriven world. "e elaborated

that -ournalists as the news producers often based their reporting styles on how they

want their readers to decode the reported events and what effects do they want the

news to have on the targeted readers. Thus, this governs which issues are highlighted

and which ones are concealed in the news reports (1oesmans, #$%&'. 1oncisely, it is

often far from the truth that news reports are ob-ective and biasfree ( Alireza ! Rahman,

#$%#'. The notion how news reports could be deviated from the real facts due to news

producer’s hidden value had been illustrated brilliantly by 1aldas1oulthard (#$$&' as

well in such following2

*ews is socially and culturally determined which resulted in it being deviated

from the real facts of the events. )eanwhile, news producers play a role as


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social agents whose point of view is conveyed through how they constructed the

news.

Thus, news is hardly the event itself, but -ust an ideologically constructed report

of the event./ (p. #34'.

The explanation above highlighted such alleged claim that media or particularly news

create their own version of reality/ is often motivated by the media’s ideology which is

evident in the description of the news itself as it has been described as ideological

choicema0ing practice/ and ideologically constructed report/ (1aldas1oulthard, #$$&,

p. #34'. 1onse5uently, this leads to the next logical 5uestion that needs to be as0ed by

every media consumers2 how does media controllers or news producers carefully

weave their ideology in their discourses6 The answer to this 5uestion could lie in

Richardson (#$$+'’s hypothesis in which he proposes that language serves as the tool

to endow meaning to our action. 7ltimately, it is the language as well that can be ideally

used as the tool to derive meaning from our action. Thus, this answers the

aforementioned 5uestion in which language is deemed as the medium to convey

ideology. n a study analyzing the language use of newspapers, Richardson (#$$+'

identifies language as a nonneutral element/ which -ustifies his hypothesis that it isthrough language that media construct their own version of reality thus it is through

language as well that this presupposition of reality by media can be detected.

Richardson’s hypothesis found its affinity in 8a0off (#$$$'’s notes on language in which

she highlighted that words are rarely purely neutral as the way we use the language is

often motivated by the meaning that we want to achieve.

1.2 Statement of problem

The media’s enormous capacity in influencing the ideology of the public and their nature

as public discourse which denotes their wide, if not unlimited, access to the public

results in the media discourse being one of the popular social practices of what has

been termed as the contemporary form of racism (T. A 9an :i-0, #$$$'. The


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contemporary form of racism is differentiated from the old racism in a way that it does

not appear as ;transparent’ as the old racism which is often signified by the li0es of

physical and verbal violence and forceful segregation. nstead, contemporary form of

racism is characterized as ;discursive’ which is expressed and conveyed through text

and tal0 of various popular massmediated formats< news reports being one of them, in

as subtle and as ;natural’ it could possibly be (T. A 9an :i-0, #$$$'. *evertheless, the

power of contemporary racism should not be underestimated. t might not be as radical

as the old racism but it wor0s -ust as effective in marginalizing and demonizing

particular social groups. n light of this, T. A 9an :i-0 (%==3' inferred biased, pre-udiced,

and xenophobic ideology, hegemony practices and demonization of particular social

groups in media discourse as the contemporary form of racism.

>ignificantly, ?airclough (%==@' accentuates that the encryption of the ideology in media

discourse and the mind control by the media would be accomplished effectively under

the condition that the media consumers are not aware of the persuasive and

manipulative functions of the news texts which lead them to believe that the news

reports are true or the -ournalist’s point of view is legitimate and ma0ing sense. As a

conse5uence, identifying ideology in media discourse specifically those that could be

regarded as contemporary form of racism such as biased and pre-udiced ideology couldbe 5uite tric0y and often goes unnoticed by readers especially those who are less

privileged in education (*asser ! Alireza, #$%#'. "ence, the -uxtaposition of the fact that

news media play a huge role as the social practices of ideological construction

particularly those that are pre-udiced and biased and the fact that they have almost

unlimited access to the public discourse, places the media as the main source of

people’s pre-udiced and biased ideology especially if they are lac0 of other alternative

sources of information (1oesmans, #$%&'. Thus, being in the ris0 of becoming the

victim of the media abusing their power to impose a particular pre-udiced ideology on

our beliefs and understanding, this called for the urgency to e5uip ourselves with s0ills

and tool to identify the underlying ideology in media (*asser ! Alireza, #$%#'.


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Therefore, in order to explore the construction of ideology in media satisfactorily,

language use in the media should be addressed as a form of a social practice in which it

has a dialogical relationship with social facets< it is not only shaped by the social but

shaping the social as well. ?airclough (%==@' asserts that analysis of language has

certain advantages over other forms of analysis in media studies. This is -ustified as it

can give detailed account of the mechanisms through which media mediate

sociocultural changes discreetly< the imposition of certain ideology on their consumers

being one of the changes (?airclough, %==@'. "owever, as we treat the language use

as a social practice, language analysis alone would not ma0e the cut. 8anguage

analysis of media should be carried out as discourse analysis, specifically critical

discourse analysis. This is due to the fact that critical discourse analysis has the

capacity to simultaneously address both facets of the language use< the socially shaped

and socially constitutive (?airclough, %==@'. As a results, by analyzing mass media

linguistically in a critical discourse analysis manner, the 5uestions of representation,

identities and relations hence the ideological wor0 in the media could be explored

satisfactorily (?airclough, %==@'.

n the same light, oung and ?itzgerald (#$$+' proposes that the s0ills we need to e5uip

ourselves in the era of ideologicalsaturated news media is the ability to utilize our 0nowledge, experiences and perspectives to perform a critical Bitalics in originalC

examination on every discourse we encounter. The expression critical is used to

illustrate the reflective and interpretative approach of loo0ing at language. The reflective

approach comprises of finding out the spea0er’s or writer’s motivation in choosing

particular words and structures instead of others while interpretative approach could be

related to examining the relationship between language use in a society and societal

structures. 7ltimately, by ac5uiring this s0ills, we could approach discourses as a more

effective reader that goes beyond brea0ing the code and ma0ing meaning instead of

-ust acting as a passive reader and listener absorbing every piece of information li0e a

sponge (oung ! ?itzgerald, #$$+'.


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ndeed, the discussion above advocates the functional relationship between language

use and the power of media in influencing the minds of people. Thus, in general, this

study hopes to manifest as another prove that the language analysis of the mass media

can ma0e a meaningful contribution to research on sociocultural change ( ?airclough,

%==@', such as the constitution of social identities of particular social groups hence the

production and reproduction of biased and pre-udiced ideology in media discourse.

>pecifically, this study hopes to enrich the current literatures on media and its role in the

construction of ideology by demonstrating how language analysis, particularly critical

discourse analysis could unfold the underlying biased and pre-udice ideology using the

5uestions of representation. >ubse5uently, it is also hoped that this study could serve

as another prove to the readers with the bac0ground of language studies and the

readers with the bac0ground of media studies that media and language empower each

other and there should be a close amalgamation between these two fields as )aya et

al. (#$$+' insinuated that language and media share a symbiotic relationship that not

only does language analysis enrich media studies, but media analysis also enriches our

understanding of language/ (p. vii'. 8astly, as the findings of this study could turn out as

another prove that media consumers are unconsciously exposed to media’s biased and

pre-udiced ideology towards particular social groups, it might serve as a -ustification to

consider the teaching ofcritical

literacy in our current national curriculum.

1.3 Research purpose and questions

This study aims to linguistically investigate the underlying ideology conveyed by

different Destern media namely 7.> online newspapers towards )uslims and slam by

investigating the representation of this social group during the coverage of 1harlie

"ebdo attac0. n doing so, 1ritical :iscourse Analysis, specifically Doda0’s :iscourse

"istorical Approach would be performed. The research 5uestions pertinent to this study

are as followed2

%. "ow do the media construct polarized representation of )uslims and slam

through the selection of topics in their news reports6


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#. "ow are these topics thus the polarized representation of )uslims and slam

constructed through the representation of social actors6 Dhat representational

strategies are used by the media to name and refer to the social actors6

&. Dhat are the social actions attributed to the social actors6 Dhat 5ualities,

features and characteristics are ascribed to the social actors and social actions inorder to create the polarized representation6

4. "ow do the media legitimate and -ustify the construction of the positive self

presentation and negative otherpresentation of )uslims and slam through the

use of different types of argumentation strategies6

@. ?rom which ideological positioning do the media construct the representation of

)uslims and slam6 "ow do the media’s representation of )uslims and slam

compare to the public attitudes towards slam6

n essence, the analysis in this study mainly involves topic analysis and textual analysis

and a small part of intertextual analysis. The intertextual analysis is carried out as part

of the investigation of argumentation strategies.

The first research 5uestion involves the investigation of the discourse topics of different

news media when reporting the 1harlie "ebdo attac0 in representing the )uslims and

slam.

The second research 5uestion addresses how the media name and refer to the socialactors of )uslims and slam to create the representation of )uslims and slam as in

group or outgroup (hence >elf/ and Ether/'. n order to answer this research 5uestion,

textual analysis would be carried out to investigate the representation strategies at

wor0 by referring to 9an 8eeuwen’s sociosemantic inventory such as

inclusionFexclusion activationFpassivation, individualizationFassimilation,

associationFdissociation, personalizationFimpersonalisation to examine how media use

representational strategies to represent )uslims and slam as ingroup or outgroup.

>ubse5uently, in the third research 5uestion, the media’s polarization strategies of

positive selfpresentation and negative otherpresentation are investigated by loo0ing at

what 5ualities, characteristics and features are attributed towards the social actors and

social actions of )uslims and slam. n order to do this, textual analysis is carried out

focusing on the lexical choices, particularly the media’s use of ad-ectives and ad-ectival


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phrases in describing the social actors and social actions of )uslims and slam. After

the ad-ectives and ad-ectival phrases used by the media in describing the social actors

and social actions of )uslims and slam have been identified, how the use of these

ad-ectives and ad-ectival phrases contribute to the construction of positive self

presentation or negativeother presentation of )uslims and slam is explored.

n order to answer the fourth research 5uestion, argumentation strategies namely the

incorporation of external voices in the news text and use of topoi are focused on. Thus,

this -ustifies the use of both textual and intertextual analysis. :uring the intertextual

analysis, the ordering of the authorial voices and external voices in relation to each

other to legitimate the positive or negative construal of social images of )uslims and

slam is examined. n the meantime, textual analysis is carried out to examine what

types of topoi are used by the media to -ustify the construction of social images of

)uslims and slam in their news reports. n identifying the types of topoi, the list of topoi

from the Argumentation Theory as suggested by Doda0 in :iscourse "istorical

Approach is referred to.

8astly, the fifth research 5uestion is attempted by using the findings of research

5uestion %, #, and & and 4 to deduce the ideological position of the media. Then, in

order to demonstrate how the media position themselves visGvis with particular

ideology, attention is being paid to two perspectivation strategies which are the reporting

style and how the media frame the incorporation of the external voices by carrying out

intertextual analysis. )eanwhile, in analyzing the reporting style of the media, the type

of reporting employed by the media and whose voices are included and excluded in the

news reports are examined.

The manner in which the analysis in this study is conducted is summarized below2

%. A framewor0 is outlined in 1hapter %, #, and & of this study. 1hapter %

established an introduction and bac0ground to the study which central

upon the relationship between language and the media as well as the

contexts of the study which are sraelHalestine conflict. Everview of the

three events as the context of the study is also provided in 1hapter %.

)eanwhile, 1hapter # provides the detailed review of theoretical

framewor0s that governed this study and 1hapter & illustrated the corpus


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of the study as well as the methods involved in the data collection and

data analysis.

#. The findings and the analysis of findings which are governed by research

5uestions %, #, &, and 4 as presented above, are presented in 1hapter 4.

&. 1hapter @ highlights the fifth research 5uestion in which the ideologicalposition of the media is discussed in relation with the findings of research

5uestion %, #, & and 4.

1.4 Charlie Hebdo attack

The incident of 1harlie "ebdo attac0 happened on %%th Ianuary #$%@ when two

)uslims gunmen, stormed into the office of the 1harlie "ebdo magazine in Haris.

1harlie "ebdo is a wee0ly ?rench magazine 0nown for its publication of provocative

cartoons, particularly those related to religion. ?or examples, there have been several

publication in which the magazine illustrated the image of Hrophet of )uhammad in

their editorials which are prohibited in slam. Therefore, this has caused rage among the

)uslim community (Hhilip ! Ehlheiser, #$%@'. >everal people who were in the office

during the attac0 were shot dead including the magazine’s editor and a few of its

cartoonists. Everall, the attac0 caused the lives of %# people including one police officer

and four hostages when the gunmen too0 a hostage at a local supermar0et. The

gunmen selfproclaimed that they have a lin0 with the AlJaeda group ("arding, #$%@'.

The next 1hapter discusses the theoretical preliminaries relevant to this study.


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Chapter 2

Literature reie!

2.1 Introduction

The purpose of this chapter is to provide the theoretical bac0ground for this study as

well as to develop understanding of the ideas with regards to the research aim and

5uestions outlined in >ection %.&. Therefore, this chapter discusses five main 0ey

framewor0s that govern this study2

• Theoretical framewor0 of ideology (>ection #.#'

• Holarized representation as ideology in media discourse (>ection #.&'

• 1ritical :iscourse Analysis (1:A' (>ection #.4'

• :iscourse"istorical Approach (:"A'2 Threedimensional approach to polarized

representation (>ection #.@'

• 7.> media coverage of 1harlie "ebdo attac0 (>ection #.+'

2.2 "heoretical #rame!ork of Ideolo$%

T. A. 9an :i-0 (%==@' posits that the concept of ideology is situated within a triangulated

framewor0s of cognitive dimension, society dimension, and discourse dimension.

Therefore, in order to explore the concept of ideology satisfactorily, the theoretical


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framewor0 of ideology is discussed from the point of view of the three dimensions

namely2

• deologies as social cognition (>ection #.#.%'

• deologies as social practices (>ection #.#.#'

• deologies in discourse (>ection #.#.&'

2.2.1 Ideolo$ies as Social Co$nition

The understanding towards the cognitive dimension of ideology is crucial as it sets the

foundation for further discussion on the lin0 between ideology and two other dimensionswhich are social practices and discourse. T.A 9an :i-0 (#$$+' defines ideology as a set

of beliefs that determine the shared social representations of particular social groups/

(p. %#$'. n details, the beliefs shared by members of a group are often manifest in a

form of social representations with regards to different areas of society such as

immigration or crime. Therefore, if ideology is defined as a set of beliefs, it is plausible

to deduce that it is the ideology that forms these social representations. T. A. 9an :i-0

(%==@' emphasizes that not only ideology forms the social representations of the beliefs

but organizes their overall coherence as well. The capacity of ideology as social beliefs

that are shared among members of a particular group also conveniently permits new

social representations or social opinions to be formed and distributed within the group

whenever its members stumble upon new social events or situations (T. A. 9an :i-0,

#$$$'. n essence, the basic 0ey point to describe the cognitive definition of ideology is

that it is not individualistic in nature. Rather, it consists of socially shared beliefs that are

fundamental to the existence of a particular group and the construction of their

characteristics. ?or example, beliefs about how their identity should be portrayed, their

position within the society and how they are represented in comparison with other

groups (T. A. 9an :i-0, %==@'.


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1oherently, in order to understand the root of the ideological beliefs, it is worth to delve

into the notion of relationships between different types of beliefs and different types of

memory. Everall, beliefs that stem from experiences can be categorized as personal

and general (which is shared with others'. Hersonal beliefs which are also 0nown as

episodic beliefs are stored in the episodic memory. This type of beliefs is what T. A. 9an

:i-0 (#$$$' characterized as personal, autobiographic, and sub-ective which registers

our personal experiences/ (p. %#'. "owever, as this study is focusing on ideology as

shared social beliefs, episodic memory might not play a significant role in the

construction of this ideology. nstead, the notion of episodic memory is going to be

explored with regards to the issue of the influence of ideology on society. En the other

hand, the construction of ideological beliefs can be largely rooted in the notion of

general beliefs (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'. Heople share general beliefs about an event or

experience with other members of their group or even with members from different

groups. The most prominent example of this general beliefs is what termed as our

sociocultural 0nowledge which is located in our social memory (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'. T.

A. 9an :i-0 (#$$$' further highlights that the sociocultural 0nowledge shared by the

members of Kroup L is the 0nowledge that they believe is true and in which they have

-ustification on why they believe it is true. "owever, for the people from the other

groups, this is what they perceive as merely opinions, beliefs, pre-udice and indeed theideologies/ (p. %&' of Kroup L. >ubse5uently, as the origin of shared ideological beliefs

is prominently rooted in our sociocultural 0nowledge, it can be assumed that this

sociocultural 0nowledge serves as the framewor0 for the construction of social

representations as well (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'.

The framewor0 of ideologies as social cognition not only sets the ground for the next

discussion on ideologies as social practices and in discourse, it also sheds light on two

important issues with regards to ideologies which are2 how do ideologies determine or

control what type of interpretation of the world we build and how do ideologies dictate

how we construct certain representations in order to manipulate the readers’

interpretation of the world. The first 5uestion is explored through the notion of mental

models while the latter is discussed using the notion of context models. 1onclusively,


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these two types of models serve as an evident that ideologies not only may control

what we spea0 or write about, but also how we spea0 or write/ (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$, p.

#M'.

T. A 9an :i-0 (%==@' describes a mental model as a mental representation or

perspective or understanding of an event. This mental representation is actually the

representations stored in our episodic memory as highlighted in the aforementioned

discussion. As noted before, the notion of episodic memory might not be relevant in

discussing the origin of ideological beliefs. "owever, the construction and reconstruction

(through modification and updating' of episodic representations or better 0nown as

mental models are pivotal in discussing what dictate our interpretation and perception of

events (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'. As our interpretation and perception of the world stem

from the mental models, it is essential to note that it is 0nowledge, attitudes and

ultimately ideology that play a role in influencing the contents and structures of the

mental models of particular events. Kiven the fact that ideology is shared and general,

the role played by ideology in influencing the mental models implies that we are able to

;translate’ general ideologies to personal opinions or experiences embedded in mental

models/ (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$, p. ##'. ?or example, if our attitudes towards the

immigrants are controlled by racist ideology, our mental models might comprise of personal perception that immigrants prone to commit crimes and are thus dangerous.

Thus, this is one way of how the ideology forms or modifies our mental models.

Another way of how ideology influences our mental models is by forcing/ us to alter our

mental models so they would align with the mental models of the other members of our

group. :espite the fact the mental models are personal and sub-ective in nature, T. A.

9an :i-0 (#$$$' also rises an important point that there is still a trace of socially shared

ideology during the construction of mental models at the same time. This is -ustified

using two arguments. ?irst, in order to be able to communicate and comprehend each

other in a group, we need to have at least some shared social 0nowledge despite our

personal individual mental models. >econd, members of a particular group might have

different mental models of an event, but we 0now that in order to function effectively as


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the member of a particular group, we have to share other’s mental representations

which leads to a situation where we often say or do different things than what we would

li0e to say or do, in order to accommodate the mental models of others. "ence, the

presence of the fragment of socially shared ideological beliefs explains why, despite the

socalled personal and sub-ective mental models, we are still able to categorize social

actors or spea0ers using ideological labels such as racist, feminist, or conservative ( T.

A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'. T. A. 9an :i-0 (#$$$' also emphasizes that if mental models are

influenced by ideologicalbased opinions, then such mental models are deemed biased

as ideologicalbased opinions imply that the event is perceived from the ideological

perspective of a group.

Thus, the discussion above highlights how ideology dictate or modify our mental models

hence determine how we interpret or derive a meaning from a discourse. T. A. 9an :i-0

(#$$$' asserts that mental models are the most important interface between ideology

and discourse. This argument is further strengthened by the fact that not only mental

models mediate how ideology influence our understanding of the discourse but they

also serve as the basis for the production of the discourse itself. ?or example, this can

be illustrated through the production of media discourse. Nach media controller,

producer or -ournalist has a mental model of each reported news event which stemsfrom their ideological belief (T. A 9an :i-0, %==@'. Therefore, in order to reproduce these

ideological beliefs through the media texts, it is the pivotal aim of the media controllers

or the -ournalists to manipulate the news texts in such a way that would facilitate the

media consumers to form a mental model of a particular event that is at least almost

similar to that mental model of theirs (T. A 9an :i-0, %==@'. 1onclusively, manipulating

the mental model of the media consumers is the 0ey to the production and reproduction

of biased ideology in media. Thus, the relationship between ideology, mental models

and discourse is dynamic as illustrated in the ?igure % below2

Discourse


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?igure %2 Relationships between ideology, mental models and discourse

(T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$, p. #@'

Another significant interface between ideology and discourse apart from mental models

are the context models. As mentioned earlier, the notion of context models provides a

framewor0 to explain how ideology being conveyed in text and tal0. ?or example, how

do spea0ers or writers 0now what information to ma0e explicit in discourse and what

information need to be concealed. 1ontext models can be described as a

representation of what is relevantfordiscourse in the current communicative situation/

(T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$, p. #+'. n more details, in order to construct a discourse that is

socially appropriate, we need to adapt the style of our discourse to the currentcommunicative context. n order to understand the current communicative context, it is

vital to gather information about the social beliefs of the target recipients as well as

0now who these recipients are. Thus, the model that we build to govern the production

of discourse as well as determine the language use based on the information we gather

is what described context models. ?or example, the context models help to determine

whether we should use more formal or casual tone or which deictic expression is

suitable to be used. )eanwhile, the information about what the recipients already 0now

helps to determine what information should be provided in the discourse and what is

presupposed (T.A. 9an :i-0, %==M'. n essence, context models serve as some 0ind of a

control mechanism in discourse processing. This is due to the fact that context models

provide us with the information of what we believe our recipients 0now already, what

0ind of social situation we are in, what time is it, what is our relationship with the

EpisodicMemory

SocialMemory

Mental

KnowledgeAttitudesIdeology


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recipients and so on. n the discussion pertaining to mental models before, it has been

mentioned that mental models can be biased in nature in a case where it is influenced

by ideological beliefs. >imilarly, context models may share the same ideologically

biased nature (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'. This is illustrated as my ideological beliefs will not

only influence what interpretation have (my mental models' towards a particular event

or people, but they also affect my style of spea0ing about that event or people. ?or

example, if build pre-udiced mental models towards the members of Kroup A, not only

might say bad things about them but my tone and my choice of words when spea0ing

to them might be rude too. "ence, now that we 0now that context models also serve as

an essential interface between ideology and discourse, the notion of ideology as social

cognition is summarized in ?igure # below2

?igure #2 deology as social cognition

(T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$, p. #='

2.2.2 Ideolo$ies as Social &ractices

Although the earlier discussion explores the concept of ideology from the cognitive

dimension, there is a presence of the emphasis that ideology is social as terms such as

Discourse

EpisodicMemory

Socialmemory

Context models

Mental models

KnowledgeAttitudesIdeology


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social cognition, social memory and social representations are used to characterize the

ideology. Thus, T. A. 9an :i-0 (#$$$' proposes that in order to understand the concept of

ideology in greater depth, it is reasonable to discuss ideology not only from cognitive

aspect< that is, studying the representations of its structures in the mind of people when

they act as members of a particular social group, but also from social perspective. n

general, the social perspective of ideology accounts for its social functions such as the

role of ideology as the foundation for the social practices of members of a particular

social groups (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'.

n order to discuss the social dimension of ideology systematically, the notion of

ideologies as social practices is often organized in terms of how ideologies manifest

themselves at microlevel and macrolevel of the society. Dhen studying ideologies at

the microlevel of the society, it is common to observe ideologies manifest themselves

when social actors participate in the social practices of everyday life. These social

practices can be reflected in different forms of interaction, be it monological such as

through media texts or dialogical such as during facetoface interaction (T. A. 9an :i-0,

#$$$'. These different forms of interaction are what constitute discourse. ?or examples,

gender ideologies such as feminism might be evident during the interaction between

women and men while the interaction between members of different ethnic groupsmight exhibit racist or pre-udice ideology. Another example can be observed as

politicians and nature activists might have different ideologies when it comes to the

issues of urbanization and development. ?rom these examples, it is evident that

ideologies manifest in the social practices as soon as people associate themselves with

a particular social group such as men, women, politicians, activists, and so on.

n the meantime, the discussion of ideology at the macrolevel of society often involves

the notion of power and dominance. The notion of power is described in terms of social

power in which it highlights the power one group has over another group. >pecifically,

the notion of social power is often translated into how a group, for example, Kroup A

controls the actions of the members of different group, which is Kroup O. As discourse

is a form of social practices which has been mentioned earlier, discourse and its


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properties such as its topic, its style, and its context serve as one of the most prominent

medium for the exercise of this control (T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$'. Kiven the capability of a

discourse in influencing the minds of its consumers, it is plausible to deduce that the

group in powerful position who uses discourse as the vehicle to exercise control over

another group, will indirectly possess the power to influence the minds of the discourse

consumers as well. This can be illustrated by ta0ing the power of the -ournalists as

members of a particular group as an example. n the construction of media discourse,

the -ournalists present the information or manipulate the media texts by ta0ing a role as

a member or a particular social group. As such, the -ournalists might exercise their

power through the construction of media discourse to delegitimize other social group

and legitimize their own group. The exercise of power is executed by using the

structures and the contents of the news texts as the vehicle to manipulate the structures

and contents of the mental models of the media consumers as to ensure the

synchronization between the consumers’ mental model upon reading the news and the

ideological beliefs of the -ournalists. >ubse5uently, repeated exposure to biased mental

models could lead to e5ually biased attitudes such as ethnic pre-udices and over

generalization towards particular social groups. Ence these ethnic pre-udices are firmly

established, they will in turn control the future formation of mental models of the media

consumers upon reading any news related to the same particular social groups (T. A9an :i-0, %==&a'. Accordingly, the media’s ability to shape the mental models of a

particular event of the media consumers bestows them the power to control, to some

extent, the minds of the public and indirectly their attitudes.

2.2.3 Ideolo$ies in 'iscourse

The above discussion which explores the concept of ideology from both cognitive and

social perspective exhibit the manifestation of another important notion in studying

ideology, namely discourse. n fact, the goal of understanding the cognitive and social

theoretical framewor0 of ideology is to eventually understand the role of ideology in the

construction and interpretation of discourse. T. A. 9an :i-0 (#$$$' purports that the

reason why the notion of discourse seems to be very crucial when discussing the theory


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of ideology is because discourse serves as among the most significant and common

social practice influenced by ideology.

"owever, identifying ideology in text and tal0 is not a clearcut tas0. This is due to the

fact that, given the complex structures of discourse, ideology can be embedded in

various ways at different levels of discourse structures. Therefore, in order to adopt a

practical method to investigate ideology in discourse, T. A. 9an :i-0 (#$$$' suggests that

we shall refer bac0 to the basic characteristic of ideology< it commonly organizes people

and society in polarized terms such as 7> vs. Them and ingroup vs. outgroup. As

such, the typical strategy of most ideological discourse is2

• >ay positive things about 7s• >ay negative things about Them

• :o not say negative things about 7s

• :o not say positive things about Them

(T. A. 9an :i-0, #$$$, p. 44'

This typical strategy is also termed as positive selfpresentation and negative other

presentation. As this strategy is deemed as too general, E0tar (#$$%' mentioned that a

more solid framewor0 for positive selfpresentation and negative otherpresentation

which is called ;ideological s5uare’ has been formulated, also by 9an :i-0 and his

associates. The principles of ;ideological s5uare’ are as follow2

• Nmphasize positive things about 7s

• Nmphasize negative things about Them

• :eemphasize negative things about 7s

• :eemphasize positive things about Them

(E0tar, #$$%, p. &%='

The next section discusses the manifestation of ideology as positive selfpresentation

and negative otherpresentation specifically in media discourse.

2.3 &olari(ed Representation as Ideolo$% in )edia 'iscourse


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?airclough (%==@' hypothesizes that the investigation of ideological wor0 in the media

could be as0ed through series of 5uestions involving representation, identities or

relations such as why one representation is selected over the other available one or

why a particular identity is constructed in one way rather than the other, where does this

representation come from and why is it represented in such as way. >imilarly, 1roteau

(#$%4' proposes that the construction of these social images or representations can be

explored through 5uestions such as what standards or guidelines used by media to

determine what is acceptable/ and what is unacceptable/6 Dhat ma0es certain

representations appropriate/ and inappropriate/ in the media6 Dhat are -ustice/ and

in-ustice/6 Dhat are the underlying messages in media content and which parties do

this messages favor6 ?airclough (%==@' further elaborates that in the process of

producing the texts, text producers choose a number of representational strategies from

the whole array of strategies available to them and thus, these choices become

ideologically motivated as they construct the versions of reality desired by the text

producer. E0tar (#$$%' supports this view as he highlights that media controllers convey

their versions of reality through their selections of representational strategies during the

construction of the discourses which is governed by their social positions, ob-ectives

and intention Therefore, a representation analysis in a discourse centers on this choice

of representational strategies that text producers ma0e. 1orrespondingly, Adampa

(%===' highlights representation of social actors as one of the manners in which specific

attitudes, ideologies and standpoint are encoded through language in discourses.

Thus, this -ustifies why studies of ideology particularly in media discourses are

commonly drawn on social actor analysis. ?or example, *asser and Alireza (#$%#'

study the representation of social actors involved in ran’s nuclear activities to identify

conflicting ideology in four western newspapers with regards to the issue of sanctions

on ran. Oy examining how social actors are represented in the four different

newspapers using 9an 8eeuwen’s representational strategies, the study finds out the

reporting of ran’s nuclear activities in the four newspapers had covertly imposed

ideological bias in representing the ranian side on their readers (*asser ! Alireza,


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#$%#'. )eanwhile, Puraidah and Alan (#$%&' analyze how ran’s top leader, Ali

hamenei, is represented in pro government news media. The finding shows that the

way Ali hamenei is represented has ideological motives in which to elevate his

authority by manipulating the religious belief of ranian people. This was done

discursively for example, by positioning him as Kod’s representative on earth, the

discourse producers subtly imply to people, who by any chance, believe this, should

have undivided faith towards him as they would have towards Kod.

n the meantime, T.A 9an :i-0 (#$$+' studies the ideology in discourse not -ust from the

aspect of representation, but he specifically emphasized that ideology in discourse can

be traced when actions or actors are illustrated as extra or less positively or negatively,

governed by the mental models possessed by the discourse producers. ?ollowing this

idea, T.A 9an :i-0 (#$$+' further ma0es one important note pertinent to this study, in

which he mentioned that the construction of ideology in terms of positive and negative

construal of social actors and action is a common phenomenon for all discourses that

illustrate particular happenings and actions including news articles, opinion editorials

and narratives about personal experiences/ (p. %#%'. Therefore, it is reasonable to

deduce that an ideology is usually engrained in the relationship between the group and

Ethers in terms of us/ versus them/ in which us/ are lin0ed with positive values andthem/ are subtly presented in negative light (T.A. 9an :i-0, %==M'.

1orrespondingly, analysis of representation of ingroup and outgroup has been one of

the popular method of analysis for many studies focusing on biased, pre-udiced, and

xenophobic ideologies as well as hegemonic relations. ?or example, hosravi*i0 (#$%$'

in his study of a representation of social groups in discourse, explores the construction

of the representation of immigrants as outgroups. )eanwhile, in order to investigate

biased reporting of Iran Nuclear Program, Iran Sanctions, and Syria Crisis in Destern

printed media, Amir et al. (#$%&' explore how these three events were represented in

the headlines and lead paragraphs of various 7 and 7> newspapers such as

Independent , the Daily Mirror , The Guardian,the :aily Telegraph, the New York Times,

the os !ngeles Times, and the "S! Today . The investigation of the biased reporting by


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Destern media towards the three events was generally governed by the polarization of

Desterners and ranians as De/ and Ethers/. ?or example, the analysis of the lead

paragraphs of the newspapers with regards to ran sanctions demonstrate that ran or

ranian nuclear programs was depicted as the Ethers/ through negative lexical choices

such as in#erior$ trou%le&maker$ irrational$ stu%%orn$ and potentially dangerous ( Amir et

al., #$%&'.>imilarly, Puraidah and 8ee (#$%4' study the ideological standpoint of political

elites in )alaysia towards immigrants by investigating how immigrants were

represented as ;Ethers’, specifically as illegals, threats and victims through the

incorporation of the voices of these political elites in )alaysia newspapers.

The positive and negative representation to investigate the production and reproduction

of ideology in media (T.A 9an :i-0, #$$+' can be theorized using >ocial dentity Theory.

Therefore, the following section explicitly explains the role of >ocial dentity Theory as a

framewor0 for examining the polarized representation as ideological construction in

media which is applied in this study.

2.3.1 Social Identit% "heor%

>ocial identity theory is one of the theoretical framewor0s that has greatly benefited thestudy of ideology in media ()atu ! 8ubbe, #$$3'. ?or example, )atu and 8ubbe (#$$3'

use >ocial dentity Theory to investigate how enyan political groups in the run are

portrayed in three different newspapers which ultimately demonstrate how newspapers

construct conflicting ideological positions in election reporting. )eanwhile, >ocial

dentity Theory is also used as a framewor0 in a study carried out by E0tar (#$$%' to

examine how two Tur0ish newspapers of different ideological orientations construct the

representation of social groups in ;secular’ and ;antisecular’ discourse. n his study,

E0tar (#$$%' explains that >ocial dentity Theory was developed by Ta-fel and Turner

and their associates during mid to late %=3$s. >ocial dentity Theory is grounded in a

premise that the structure of hierarchy of social groups in society is organized with

regards to the notion of power and status. Nach level of the hierarchy provides the

members of its respective social group with a social identity. Thus, this social identity


22/51


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strategies of positive selfpresentation and negative otherpresentation outlined by the

;ideological s5uare’ as highlighted before in this study.

The next section discusses the general framewor0 for the investigation of ideology in

discourse which is 1ritical :iscourse Analysis (1:A'.

2.4 Critical 'iscourse *nal%sis +C'*,

As this study aims to disclose media ideology by loo0ing from the angle of

representation as explained earlier, the notion of polarized presentation of own group

and Ethers can be rooted from the idea of power and dominance as well. Thus, by

ta0ing into account the idea of power and dominance, this could -ustify clearer why 1:A

is chosen as the medium/ to understand the ideology at wor0 of different media.

:ominance is referred to as the execution of social power by elites, organizations or

groups. (T. A 9an :i-0, %==&b'. ?or example, in the context of this study, dominance is

referred as the enactment of social power by the media controllers or producers. As this

social power comprises control, it is not merely confined to action but cognition as well.

n fact, the most effective power is mostly in a cognitive form which is oftenoperationalized through persuasion, disguise or manipulation in order to influence the

mind of others to conform to one’s own interest or ideology. Thus, a powerful group may

not only regulate the freedom of action of other groups but affect their thoughts as well

(T. A 9an :i-0, %==&b'.

The conse5uence of this dominance or the exercise of power is in turn evident in social

ine5uality such as political, cultural, class, racial and gender ine5uality (T. A 9an :i-0,

%==&b'. T. A 9an :i-0 (%==&b' highlights that ine5uality in a discourse can be -ustified

and understood using two discursive strategies which are positive presentation of own

group and negative presentation of the Ethers which could subtly be implemented

through arguments, narratives, semantic manipulation and other structures of

discourses such as daily conversations, political speeches, academic boo0s and news


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articles. Thus, this is where the notion of representation as ideology intersects with the

notion of power and dominance. The action of influencing the minds of others through

the use of dominance and power to construct social ine5uality is indeed a function of

text and tal0. Doda0 and )eyer (#$$=' are in agreement with this as they emphasized

that texts are often serve as the medium for competing for dominance which manifest

through opposing discourses and ideologies.

Therefore, it is at this critical point, where the notion of text and tal0 is brought in,

particularly, that language is identified as the ideal vehicle to articulate power or to

challenge power, that -ustify the pivotal role of 1ritical :iscourse Analysis in examining

the ideology, power and dominance. n particular, 1ritical :iscourse Analysis enable

explicit investigation on how discourse structures are constructed in order to portray

social representations in such a way that sustain dominance. )ore specifically, the role

of 1ritical :iscourse Analysis is to find out what discursive structures are

operationalized, in a case where powerful spea0ers or groups manage to persuade or

influence their audiences. Thus, according to T. A 9an :i-0 (%==&b' the discursive

reproduction of dominance involves two point of views which are production and

reception. These point of view can be summarized in a way that the discursive

reproduction of dominance is rooted from the social cognitions of the people in power, inthe context of this study, the ideology of the media controllers and subse5uently, the

discourse structures affect the thoughts of the consumers of the discourse i.e. how the

readers or consumers construct their understanding of the discourse.

7ltimately, T. A 9an :i-0 (%==&b' summarizes that the focus of 1:A is the (re'production

and challenge of dominance in a discourse as what has been elaborated in the above

explanation. )eanwhile, although still in parallel, oung and ?itzgerald (#$$+' describe

1ritical :iscourse Analysis in a more simpler term2 1:A approach discourses through

language analysis in order to disclose any misconception, ine5uality or power

imbalance. n the same light, >ahragad and :avatgarzadeh (#$%$' highlight that 1:A

focuses on internalizing the ideological mechanisms at wor0 in discourse and aims to

provide a criti5ue on how discourses function as a platform to convey certain agendas.


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7ltimately, Doda0 and )eyer (#$$=' simply concluded that it is the revelation of

structures of power and disclosure of ideologies that lie at the heart of 1ritical :iscourse

Analysis.

Ene important note made by T. A. 9an :i-0 (#$$%' is that 1:A itself is not an

approach/. Hreferably, it attempts to provide an alternative manner/ or point of view/

of theorizing, analysis, and application of what it aims to discover in a discourse/ ( p.

&@#'. As such, 1ritical :iscourse analysts often differ in terms of their methods and

theoretical framewor0s as 1:A constitutes various approaches. Thus, in order to

investigate the ideological positioning of Destern media towards )uslims and slam

hence to attempt the research 5uestions satisfactorily, this study borrows the discursive

strategies of Doda0’s :iscourse"istorical Approach to explore the representation of

this social group in their news reports.

The next section discusses three approaches of studying polarized representation

proposed by :iscourse"istorical Approach (:"A'.

2.- 'iscourseHistorical *pproach +'H*,/ "hree'imensional *pproach of

&olari(ed Representation

The :"A analysis of representation in discourse is interdisciplinary in which :"A

suggests threedimensional approach2

%. dentification of the discourse topics

#. nvestigation of discursive strategies

&. 8inguistic means and linguistic realization of the discursive strategies

The following subsection explicitly elaborates the threedimensional approach of :"A.

The second and third approach, which are the investigation of discursive strategies and

linguistic means and linguistic realization, are elaborated handinhand as to clearly

illustrate how the discursive strategies are realized through particular linguistic means.


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2.-.1 Identification of the 'iscourse "opics

T. A. Van Dij !"###$ points out that the meaning of discourse is not solely ingrained in

its sentences or lexical choices. n fact, the glo%al meaning of the discourse also plays

an important role in shaping the interpretation of the discourse. This global meaning is

often supplied by topics or themes of the discourse. Topics of discourse often indicates

what information is deemed as valuable or important by the discourse producers in their

discourse. 1onse5uently, topicalization may also be an indicator of ideological

positioning of a discourse (T.A 9an :i-0, #$$+'. ?or example, it is not surprising for in

group discourse producers to detopicalize information that opposes their interests or

might -eopardize their positive selfrepresentation. 7nderstandably, they might

foreground the information that will pro-ects or exposes the negative construal of the

outgroup as the topics of their discourse. 1oncisely, ingroup discourse will not

topicalize topics that could lead to the construction of undesirable interpretations or

mental model detrimental to their positive image. ?or example, an analysis of topics of

discourse during a study of a written interview of Hresident 9aclav laus on climate

change, a 1zech politician, yielded a finding that topics of neoliberal and policyrelated

dominated the discourse while scientific topics were detopicalized. This is expected asthe selection of topics were aligned with laus’s political stance and perspectives which

are said to be neoliberal, anticommunist and antienvironmentalist (Reisigl ! Doda0,

#$$%'.

2.-.2 Inesti$ation of 'iscursie Strate$ies and the Lin$uistic Reali(ation

:"A determines the investigation of discursive strategies as the next step in studying

the positive selfpresentation and negative otherpresentation after the identification of

the discourse topics. Reisigl and Doda0 (#$$%' interpret discursive strategies as

systematic ways in using language which are located at different level of organization

and complexity/ (p. 44'. Accordingly, the :"A underlined five types of discursive


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strategies involved in the analysis of positive selfpresentation and negative other

presentation as follow2

%. Referential strategies

#. Hredicational strategies

&. Argumentation strategies

4. Herspectivation strategies

@. ntensification and mitigation strategies

1. Referential strategies and Predicational strategies

(e#erential strategies refers to the ways in which a person or a group of people is

named and referred to linguistically. The use of referential strategies imparts insights on

the construction of representation of social actors as ingroups and outgroups.

>ubse5uently, after the ingroups and outgroups have been constructed or identified,

the predications given to the social actors, either as individual, member of a group of as

group itself are identified. >pecifically, predications comprise of the attributions, traits,

5ualities and characteristics. Thus, these are what termed as Predicational strategies.

Reisigl and Doda0 (#$$%' assert that the role ofPredicational strategies

are to construethe representation of social actors as more or less positive or negative.

Although the investigation of (e#erential strategies and Predicational strategies often

seems li0e they are supposed to be carried out independently as they serve different

purpose and fulfill different needs of the analysis, Reisigl and Doda0 (#$$%' affirm that it

is difficult to completely separate the (e#erential strategies and the Predicational

strategies from each other. n fact, they might be overlapping with each other. ?or

example, some of the (e#erential strategies also play a role as specific forms of

Predicational strategies due to the fact that the identification of (e#erential strategies

very often simultaneously comprise of the examination of the positive or negative

labelling of the social actors. 1oherently, in order to carry out the analysis of (e#erential


28/51

strategies and Predication strategies satisfactorily, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+'’s >ocio

semantic nventory of Representation of >ocial Actors is borrowed.

The following discussion clearly illustrates the categories of representation of social

actors as proposed by 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' and the linguistic realization for each

category.

0an Leeu!ans sociosemantic inentor% of representation of social actors

9an 8eeuwen (%==+'’s model of representation of social actors offers systematic

theoretical bases for studying representation in discourses as described by ?airclough

(%==@'. n approaching the 5uestion of how social actors are represented in discourses,

9an 8eeuwen (%==+' in his framewor0, attempted to begin his analysis of representation

of social actors in unconventional way as linguists would commonly do where they tend

to launch linguistic operations in performing the analysis. "aving said so, instead of

starting off from linguistic point of view, he began approaching the representation of

social actors in discourses from sociological point of view in which he described as to

demonstrate the sociological and critical significance of the classifications/ (p. '.

"ence, the categories/ here refer to his systematic sets of representational strategiesin his framewor0 that he termed as sociosemantic inventory. n light of this, 9an

8eeuwen (%==+'’s framewor0 would exhibit the manifestation of sociological categories

such as nomination/ and agency/ instead of linguistic classifications such as

nominalization/ and the omission of passive agent.

*evertheless, despite his unconventional approach, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' states that his

framewor0 of representation of social actors still have a trace of variety linguistic

elements. Thus, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+'’s model of representation of social actors is

actually twotiered with the first level draws upon the sociosemantic inventory available

in the system networ0 as what have been described above. "ence, it is the second level

of his framewor0 that provides an evident of linguistic operations in which he see0s to

find out how a particular representation is realized linguistically soon after he performs


29/51

the sociosemantic inventory (9an 8eeuwen, %==+'. 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' 5uoted, each

of the representational choices shall propose will be tied to specific linguistic or

rhetorical realisations/ (p. &4'. This is evident as 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' explains the

operation of the sociological categories in the system networ0 using variety of linguistic

and rhetorical phenomena such as nominalization, ad-ectivalisation and transitivity, -ust

to name a few.

?or the purpose of this study, five sets of sociological categories from 9an 8eeuwen

(%==+'’s sociosemantic inventory are used to analyze the representation of social actors

in the reporting of sraelHalestine conflict by two 7.> news media in order to

deconstruct their underlying ideology respectively. Those five sets of categories are

inclusionFexclusion, activationFpassivation, individualizationFassimilation,

functionalizationFidentification and personalizationFimpersonalisation.

9an 8eeuwen (%==+' highlights that discourse producers include or exclude the

representation of social actors in their discourse to achieve the desired effect that they

want their choice to have on their targeted readers. En one hand, the e)clusion of social

actors could be biasfree as when the text producers presupposed that the text

consumers are already wellinformed about the particular details or the details arebelieved to be irrelevant to the readers. 1onversely, e)clusion could also be

ideologically motivated as the text producers used it to achieve a particular agenda ( 9an

8eeuwen, %==+'. 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' further categorized e)clusion into suppression

and %ackgrounding in which he described suppression as radical/ and bac0grounding

as less radical' . Dhen social actors are suppressed, there would be no trace of the

social actors anywhere in the text while when social actors are bac0grounding in

describing particular activities, readers might still be able to identify who they are by

ma0ing inferences based on their inclusion in elsewhere in the text although they are

not mentioned during the illustration of the given activities related to them. Thus, in light

of this, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' highlights that the social actors are not blatantly being

excluded, but it is more accurate to say that they are being deemphasized and

positioned in the bac0ground/ (p. &='. 8inguistically, suppression could be realized


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through passive agent deletion, nonfinite clauses and nominalization. )eanwhile,

ellipses in nonfinite clauses can be used to bac0ground the social actors.

)oving onto activation and passivation, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' asserts that social actors

can play either active roles or passive roles in representation. !ctivation is described as

when the social actors are portrayed as the operating forces of the activity while

passivation is when the social actors are represented as being affected by the activity.

"alliday’s systematic functional grammar particularly transitivity ("alliday, %=M@' is the

linguistic device that could realize this particular set of representation categories.

Orowsing further 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' sociosemantic inventory, individuali*ation and

assimilation is another set of categories that is used to represent the social actors. n

light of this, social actors thus can be denoted as either individuals which indicates

individualization or as groups which indicates assimilation. Thus, singularity signifies

individuali*ation while plurality signifies assimilation. Assimilation can be achieved using

a noun symbolizing a group of people. ?or example, this nation/ in s he entitled to

believe that this nation, which only recently shed Dhite Australia Holicy, is somehow

impervious to racist sentiment6/ (p. 4=' might refers to the citizens of Australia or the

policy ma0ers. 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' further brea0s down the notion ofassimilation

intoaggregation and collectivi*ation. !ggregation 5uantifies groups of participants while

collectivization does not. According to 9an 8eeuwen (%==+', as it is socially sanctioned

in our society that the ma-ority rules, aggregation is often utilized to ideologically signify

unanimous opinion. as !ggregation is described as 5uantifies groups of participants/, it

is often realized through definite and indefinite 5uantifiers.

Dith regards to the next set of representation categories, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+'

distinguishes #unctionali*ation and identi#ication in such a way that #unctionalisation

happened when social actors are referred to their action, occupation or role. There are

three ways of how #unctionalisation is realized linguistically. ?irstly, by a noun formed

from a verb with the addition of suffixes such as +er$ &ant$ &ent$ &ian$ or +ee. ?or

examples, ;speaker ’, ,employee- , ;driver ’. >econdly, by a noun formed from another


31/51

noun with the addition of suffixes such as +ist and +eer . ?or example, motorcyclist .

8astly, by the compounding of nouns denoting places or tools closely associated with an

activity and highly generalized categorization such as ;man’, ;woman’, ;person’, ;people’.

?or example, ;cameraman’ and ;chairperson’ (9an 8eeuwen, %==+, p. @4'. En the other

hand, identi#ication happens when social actors are represented by who they are,

instead of what they do. Identi#ication can be bro0e down into classi#ication, relational

identi#ication and physical identi#ication. 1oncisely, classi#ication refers to when social

actors are represented by ma-or categories which are used by a particular society to

distinguish between classes of people. This includes age, gender, economic status,

race, beliefs and others. )eanwhile, relational identi#ication occurs when social actors

are represented by their relationship with each other which is realized by set of nouns

denoting the relationship. ?or example, ;friend’, ;aunt’, and ;mother’. 8astly, physical

identi#ication happens when social actors are described in terms of physical

appearances which gives uni5ue identity to them in a particular context. 8inguistically $

physical identi#ication is signified through nouns indicating physical features such as

;blonde’ and ;redhead’ or through ad-ectives such as ;disabled’ and ;thin’ ( 9an 8eeuwen,

%==+, p. @3'.

All those categories above which represent social actors as human beings are actuallyindicate personalisation of social actors. Thus, 9an 8eeuwen (%==+' emphasizes that

social actors could also be ;impersonalised’ in which impersonalisation occurs when

representation of social actors are realized by nonhuman element. 9an 8eeuwen

(%==+' introduced two categories of impersonalisation which are a%straction and

o%.ectivation/ !%straction of social actors can be seen in the sentence of Australia is in

danger of saddling itself up with lot of unwanted problem/ ( 9an 8eeuwen, %==+, p. @='

where the phrase unwanted problem/ is actually impersonalized the migrants. As 9an

8eeuwen (%==+' highlighted that a%straction occurs when 5uality is used to illustrate a

social actor in a discourse, thus, in the example above, the 5uality of being problematic

is used to represent the migrants. )eanwhile, o%.ectivation happens when social actors

are represented by a place or ob-ect they are related with or in terms of the activity that

they are currently associated with (9an 8eeuwen, %==+'. ?or example, when


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;Australians’ are substituted by ;Australia’, this indicates o%.ectivation in the form of

spatialisation. Another example of o%.ectivation in the form of instrumentalisation is

showed in this sentence A %#$ mm mortar shell slammed into >ara-evo’s mar0etplace/

(9an 8eeuwen, %==+, p. +$'. n this example, the attac0er is represented in terms of an

ob-ect which is the instrument used to accomplish the activity, a %#$ mm mortar shell/

(9an 8eeuwen, %==+'. n addition, somatisation is another type of o%.ectivation in which

body part is used to represent the social actors such as >he put her hand on )ary

ate’s shoulder/ (9an 8eeuwen, %==+, p. +$'. n this sentence, )ary ate/ is

represented in the phrase )ary ate’s shoulder/ instead of -ust directly )ary ate/.

The last common form of o%.ectivation is utterance autonomisation/ "tterance

autonomisation is signified when utterances are used to represent the social actors.

Thus, the report/ and surveys/ in This concern, the report noted, was reflected in

surveys which showed that the level of support for stopping immigration altogether was

a postwar high/ (9an 8eeuwen, %==+, p. +$' are actually impersonalised the social

actors who actually carried out the report/ and surveys/. Thus, it can be deduced that

the claim that immigration is in urgent need to be stopped can be rooted to these social

actors instead of the report/ and survey/. "ence, as explained above, o%.ectivation

can manifest in five different forms namely spatialisation$ instrumentalisation$

somatisation, and

utterance autonomisation.

The following part contains the explanation of another two more significant linguistic

means pertinent to the analysis of (e#erential strategies and Predication strategies.

Metonymies and Metaphor

Apart from the linguistic realization of 9an 8eeuwen (%==+'’s sociosemantic inventory of

representation of social actors as discussed above, metonymies and metaphor are also

another two linguistic means through which (e#erential strategies and Predicational

strategies manifest.


33/51

)etonymies are described as substitution involving two semantically ad-acent fields of

reference/ (Reisigl ! Doda0, #$$%, p. @3' in which instead of depicting the name of the

real referent, another referent is used to replace the real referent which embed a

particular ideological implication. ?or example, by substituting the people by the place

they are living in as in America condemns the act of terror/. n this sentence, the real

referent which is the citizens of America are replaced by their country. This might be

used to indicate collectiveness/ in the condemnation.

Dhile metonymies are substitution between two semantically similar fields of referent,

metaphors are connecting two different semantic fields namely the semantic feature B

humanC and the one that embodies the semantic feature BQhumanC (Reisigl ! Doda0,

#$$%'. This can be observed in various study of discourses on immigrants in which the

metaphors are often used as the referential and predication strategies. ?or examples, in

a study of a representation of refugees, asylum see0ers and immigrants in Oritish

newspapers, the word flooding/ was used to described the immigration in which flood

has negative connotation as it is regarded as a natural disaster. "ence, this contributed

to the negative presentation of the immigrant (hosravi*i0, #$%$'.

The next part discusses the second discursive strategies which are the argumentationstrategies and the linguistic means to realize these strategies.

2. *r$umentation strate$ies

!rgumentation strategies play a role in -ustifying the construal of positive self

presentation or negativeother presentation of the social actors (Reisigl ! Doda0,

#$$%'. n other words$ !rgumentation strategies are used in a discourse to legitimate

the (e#erential strategies and Predicational strategies.

Olac0ledge (#$$@' highlights that the 0ey feature of argumentation strategies lies in

Doda0’s notion of topoi/ Among the category of topoi highlighted by Doda0 are topoi of

advantage0use#ulness$ danger0threat$ de#inition0name&interpretation$

%urdening0weighting down$ law0right$ culture$ a%use$ authority$ #inance$ e1uality$ human


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rights and responsi%ility/ Thus$ topoi provide a tool to identify discriminatory arguments

that serve to construe own self positively while emphasize the negative 5uality of Ethers

which are traceable in the discourse (Olac0ledge, #$$@'.

The upcoming discussion explains the third discursive strategies which is

Perspectivation strategies along with the linguistic means to accomplish these

strategies.

3. &erspectiation Strate$ies

The ob-ective of Perspectivation strategies is to position the media producer or the

-ournalist’s point of view with the ideological stance conveyed through the discourse. n

essence, it is to find out from which perspective is the (e#erential strategies,

Predication strategies, and !rgumentation strategies expressed. n addition,

Perspectivation strategies also provide information on the media producer or -ournalists’

involvement or detachment from the ideological positioning (Reisigl ! Doda0, #$$%'.

Thus, the information below highlights two strategies of involvement and detachment

that are used to investigate thePerspectivation strategies

used in a discourse.

Strategies of involvement and detachment

?raming and discourse representation are among two strategies used by discourse

producers to indicate their distance with the ideological positioning conveyed in the

discourse.

?raming can be illustrated as how the content of the text is presented as well as the sort

of angle or perspective the discourse producer is ta0ing when producing the discourse.

The investigation of framing is closely related with the notion of foregrounding and

bac0grounding. Therefore, in identifying the framing of an event, it is worth to consider


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what concepts and issues are pro-ected or emphasized and what are concealed or

made implicit (Haltridge, #$%#'.

Dith regards to discourse representation, the incorporation of different types of

5uotation can signify the degree of involvement of the discourse producers with the

ideological stance of the discourse. The use of 5uotation can be classified into three

types which are direct 5uotation, indirect 5uotation, and free indirect speech. n brief,

indirect speech is an indication of detachment while direct speech and free indirect

speech often express the involvement of the discourse producers which invites the

involvement of the discourse consumers as well upon reading or hearing the discourse

(Reisigl ! Doda0, #$$%'.

*ext, the last discursive strategies which are Intensi#ication and Mitigation strategies are

depicted.

4. Intensification and )iti$ation Strate$ies

8astly, intensi#ication and mitigation strategies can be defined as the strategies used to

strengthen or alleviate the illocutionary force of utterance (Doda0 ! )eyer, #$$='. nother words, the analysis of intensi#ication or mitigation strategies loo0 into how the

intention or ideology of the spea0ers or writers is articulated in the discourse, whether

implicitly or explicitly. Olac0ledge (#$$@' highlighted that intensification or mitigation

strategies can be used to express involvement in, or detachment from the sense of the

text/ (p. #@'. ?or example, it is the mitigation strategies that are often used by spea0ers

or writers to find their way to the mainstream discourse to convey what is typically

regarded as unacceptable idea (Olac0ledge, #$$@'. Mitigation strategies can be realized

through lexicalization such as the use of phrase such as thin0/, assume/, it seems/

as well as the use of mitigating verbs such as probably/, fairly/ 5uietly/ and others,

-ust to list a few (Olac0ledge, #$$@'.


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The next section reviews the coverage of 1harlie "ebdo attac0 by several 7.> media

outlets.

2. .S )edia coera$e of Charlie Hebdo *ttack

)anohar (#$$M' describes media coverage in terms of how they present a particular

part of information either as news, entertainment or as infotainment. )anohar (#$$M'

further elaborates that media coverage can be distinguished based on two crucial

aspects namely type of mass media used and the style of coverage. Type of mass

media can be divided into four main categories which are newspaper coverage,

television coverage, radio coverage, and internet coverage. )eanwhile, the style of

coverage of media is generally categorized as biased coverage, unbiased coverage

and interactive coverage. Oasically, biased coverage refers to the biased manner in

presenting information in which the coverage is in favour of a particular idea or against a

particular idea. En the other hand, unbiased coverage refers to a manner in which the

media do not ta0e any particular stance with regards to a particular idea. nteractive

coverage is the type of coverage that present an information and ta0ing audience views

at the same time in the presentation of the information hence ma0ing the coverage

interactive ()anohar, #$$M'.

1oherently, in the event of 1harlie "ebdo attac0, a few 7.> media were criticized for

their bias and pre-udiced reporting generally by positioning the act of the perpetrators as

slamic terrorist attac0, lin0ing terrorism and violence to )uslims and the faith of slam

rather than depicted the perpetrators as crazed, misguided bigots who acted alone/

()ohamad, #$%@, p. #'. ?or example, 1** has come under fire when one of its

reporters, during an interview with a )uslim human rights lawyer, as0ed if he is a

supporter of >> even after the lawyer has publicly condemned the 1harlie "ebdo

attac0 ()intz, #$%@'. Thus, this incident demonstrated how terrorism has become a

stereotype and pre-udice towards all the practitioners and believers of the slamic faith.

As a repercussion, )uslims are not only being bombarded with this stereotype and


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pre-udice but are made obliged to answer for those socalled slamic terrorist attac0s

()intz, #$%@'.

1orrespondingly, Hodugu (#$%@' accentuates that the representation of )uslim

perpetrators in Destern media, including during the 1harlie "ebdo attac0, is rarely

constructed independent of their religious belief which resulted in the strengthening of

the association between the act of terror and the faith of slam and its believers, the

)uslims and this is the representation of )uslims and slam that has been fed to

Americans predominantly since the =F%% attac0, almost to the extent that slamic

terrorism/ is the only 0ind of terrorism that Americans are being exposed to through their

media (Hodugu, #$%@'. As a conse5uence, the word terrorists/ and terrorism/ are

started to become synonymous with the faith of slam and its practitioners due to the

fre5uent association between the acts of terror with the religious belief of the suspects

during the media coverage of events involving )uslim suspects.

Chapter 3

Research )ethods

3. Research methods


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1orrespondingly, the selected news reports are accumulated from three 7.> news

websites Koogle *ews, "uffington Host, and ?ox *ews. The chosen of these three

news websites are driven by two factors< their high estimated uni5ue monthly visitors

and their political ideology spectrum.

Koogle *ews, "uffington Host and ?ox *ews are selected as the news sources for this

study due to the fact that they are listed as among the ten most popular and most

visited 7.> news websites as of April #$%@ (Top %@ most popular news websites,

#$%@'. The number of uni5ue monthly visitors of each news websites and their ran0ing

trac0ed by Alexa Klobal Traffic Ran0 and 7.> Traffic Ran0 is outlined in Table % below2

*ews website Nstimated uni5ue visitors Ran0ing

Koogle *ews %@$ $$$ $$$ #

"uffington Host %%$ $$$ $$$ &

?ox *ews +@ $$$ $$$ +

Table %2 Nstimated uni5ue visitors and ran0ing of three chosen news sources

The high number of uni5ue monthly visitors indicates that these media and their

contents have the capacity to reach more people. T. A 9an :i-0 (%==@' highlights that

the more people affected, the larger the scope of the enactment of discursive power/

(p. %&'. 8arger scope of the enactment of discursive power entails that the news

producers would have wider access to the public thus might be able to influence more

media consumers with their ideology. Thus, as these media sources have more power

in influencing the media consumers compared to the other media sources due to their

high number of readership, it is even more crucial to investigate how these media

outlets influence the consumers’ interpretation of their media texts ( Ang, #$%$' which

could simultaneously shed lights on how these powerful news outlets produce and

reproduce ideology through their news texts.

Another factor that governs the selection of these three news sources is their political

polarization. According to Nngel (#$%4', "uffington Host is deemed as a leftleaning


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media (:emocratic' while ?ox *ews is s0ewing towards the right (Republican'.

)eanwhile, Koogle *ews is placed in the almost neutral spot along the political

ideology continuum. The political polarization of these news sources is ta0en into

consideration during the selection process due to the fact that the view and attitude

towards slam and )uslims can be characterized by the political ideology of an

individual. A poll investigating American views on Arab and )uslim Americans finds out

that Americans’ views towards Arab and )uslims can be grouped according to the

respondents’ political ideology. ?or example, Republicans have more unfavourable

attitudes towards ArabAmericans and )uslim Americans compared to the :emocrats

(>iddi5ui, #$%4' as shown in the Table # below2

Republicans (S' :emocrats (S' ArabAmericans @4 &$

)uslimAmericans +& &&

Table #2 7nfavourable ratings towards ArabAmericans and )uslimAmericans

1orrespondingly, Republicans are more li0ely to hold a view that ArabAmericans and

)uslimAmericans are unable to hold a position in the government without being

influenced by their ethnicity or religion. En the other hand, :emocrats believe that Arab

Americans and )uslimAmericans would be able to do their -ob without beinginfluenced. >imilarly, a poll conducted by Arab American nstitute finds out that

generally, the :emocrats are more li0ely to have a positive attitude towards slam and

)uslims compared to the Republicans. This is reflected in the responses of the

respondents leaning towards either one of both parties on a few 5uestionnaire items as

listed in the Table & below2

Juestionnaire item

Agree responses (S'

Republican

s

:emocrats

slam teaches people to lead good and decent lives && 3%

slam is a religion of peace %+ +#

slam teaches hate 34 ##

)uslims tend to be religious fanatics +$ #%


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Table &2 Holitical divide of American views towards slam and Arab and )uslim

Americans

(Pogby, #$%$'

Dith the political ideology as one of the variables that differentiate the Americans’ view

towards slam and )uslims, believe that it is interesting to investigate whether the

analysis of the news reports from three political ideologically different news sources will

reflect the findings of the aforementioned polls.

3.2 )ethods of 'ata Collection

The newspapers reports are collected from the archives of chosen news websites

respectively. The time frame of the collected newspapers reports starts from 3 Ianuary

#$%@ which mar0s the day of the attac0 until two wee0s after the 0illing of the suspects.

Then, the newspapers

Documents

REPRESENTATION OF ISLAM AND MUSLIMS IN U.S MEDIA