Browsing by Subject "Framing"

Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
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    African American celebrity dissent and a tale of two public spheres: a critical and comparative analysis of the mainstream and black press, 1949-2005
    (2010-12) Jackson, Sarah J.
    This dissertation examines news coverage, from mainstream and African American print media, of black athletes and entertainers who inserted themselves into public debates about race and nation through non-traditional forms of dissent at various points in U.S. history. The way media makers, serving particular publics, understood and constructed the role of African American celebrities in discourses of race and nation is examined through a theoretical lens that combines public sphere theory, framing scholarship, critical race theory and questions of celebrity. This research contributes to understanding journalistic norms for covering intersecting issues of controversy and celebrity while complicating and advancing our understanding of how mass media construct political and social dissent levied by raced figures. At the same time, important questions regarding the agency of African American celebrities to influence media discourse and the limitations placed on this agency are addressed. Results suggest that while historical moment and intersections of identity play an important role in the construction of dominant media frames, little has changed over time in the ideological undermining and reprimanding of African American celebrities who express dissent. At the same time, discourse in the black press has become less inhibited in criticisms of the status quo over time while consistently framing African American celebrity dissent within both counter-narratives to mainstream discourse and internal community debates.
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    Anti-discrimination policy backlash: Title IX as a Mass Communication case study.
    (2009-03) Kaiser, Kent Luther
    Anti-discrimination policies often generate opposition from people who disagree with how the policies are being implemented and from people who disagree with how resources and power might be reallocated if the policies are implemented. This opposition can shift the focus away from the core issues like equity, discrimination, and barriers to equal access, toward issues that undermine the policy, like reverse discrimination, survival of tradition and traditional values, and effects on the status quo. It can also pose a threat to the timing and effectiveness of anti-discrimination policy implementation. This dissertation begins by offering a concept explication of the term "backlash" that could be used in future social science research. Then, using as a case study the 35-year conflict over the implementation of Title IX as it relates to women in sports, this dissertation explains how the opposition to Title IX has exemplified backlash. This dissertation uses frame analysis of major newspapers and of legal and legislative sources to suggest a model for how a conflict featuring backlash is likely to evolve when the mass media are involved. It builds descriptively and theoretically on existing scholarly work, especially that related to frame theory, cultivation theory, and conflict theory. It helps to explain the conditions under which backlash frames emerge in a policy conflict and migrate to the mass media; it articulates the role of the mass media vis-à-vis the conflict over the implementation of Title IX, providing a predictive model for how backlash might appear in other public policy conflicts; and it contributes ideas that could be used in the construction of a comprehensive theory of conflict transformation involving backlash. This dissertation concludes that backlash is part of a dynamic process that involves responsive argument adaptation and deliberate shifts in framing strategy on the part of the disputants in an anti-discrimination policy conflict.
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    Exploring the Intermedia Agenda-Setting Relationships and Frames in the High-Choice Media Environment
    (2017-05) Lee, Magdalene
    This study seeks to better understand the role of intermedia agenda setting in the current “high choice” media environment. Going beyond traditional news providers, it examines agenda-setting influences during the 2016 presidential campaign across three distinct types of media: mainstream news media consisting of national newspapers, digital native news sites, and late-night comedy programs. Quantitative and qualitative content analyses were conducted to examine the issue agendas and the specific news frames used by the three media types. Spearman rank-order correlations revealed that the three issue agendas converged. Findings also showed an association between media types and frames used. Therefore, this study suggests that mainstream news media still play a dominant agenda- setting role despite the fragmenting of audiences. By ignoring the usual distinction between news and entertainment and focusing instead on what Williams and Delli Carpini refer to as politically relevant media, this study seeks to extend agenda-setting theory in the digital age.
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    For the Bible tells us so: the persuasive effects of religious framing on policy attitudes and cognitive processing.
    (2009-08) Peterson, Jonathan Robert
    Political elites regularly try to frame issues in terms that will gain them the most public support, invoking values that have popular appeal. One of these values, religiosity, has a long history in American politics. But considering the abundance of religious framing in political speeches and writings, very little has been done to study its persuasive effects. This dissertation explores how religious framing has been used, who is persuaded by it (and who resists it), and how it affects cognitive processing. I hypothesize that the effectiveness of religious framing is moderated by the religious affiliation and commitment of the framing recipient. I also hypothesize that religious framing encourages peripheral rather than central cognitive processing. To test these and other hypotheses, I conduct a survey experiment in which participants are exposed to different value frames both in support and opposition to a public policy issue. I find that religious framing has little to no effect on changing attitudes among most religiously affiliated individuals. However, religious framing is effective at turning off the religiously unaffiliated, causing them to reject arguments made by the individual offering the frame. Further, I find that religious framing both organizes and simplifies the decision-making process, leading recipients to think about issues in religious terms (i.e., to place more importance on religion when thinking about the issue) and encouraging peripheral rather than central information processing.
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    Framing citizen journalism in mainstream news coverage: a quantitative and qualitative analysis (1999-2012)
    (2014-08) Hong, Ye Jin
    Due to the public's participation in the journalistic production process a variety of tensions likely exist between established journalism and citizen journalism. Like any occupation with professional objectives, professional journalists continually shield and protect their territory from potential competitors and legacy media try to fortify the privilege and special position of professional journalism. The main goal of this study is to investigate how mainstream journalism responds to the growth of citizen journalism, its participants and the power of citizen journalists' contribution on news content.Reviewing professionalism and framing theory as the theoretical foundations, this dissertation specifically addressed the following objectives in the context of citizen journalism: (1) examine major news frames, topics, and tones; (2) explore representation of citizen news participants and citizen journalism with regard to role and values of professional journalism; (3) identify whether citizen journalism is undermined or professional journalism is legitimized in media coverage. 308 news articles from eight major U.S. newspapers for past fourteen years were analyzed through a mixed-method approach combining quantitative and qualitative analysis. As a result of the content analysis, it appears that professional journalists approved of the positive value of citizen journalism in society and journalism field, and recognized the synergy between traditional journalists and citizen news participants. Mainstream news articles have represented citizen journalism as a valuable phenomenon and a comparatively new phenomenon. The data clearly unveiled that mainstream news coverage included discussions of citizen journalism from a variety of topical perspectives. However, the qualitative textual analysis revealed that mainstream news articles routinely placed citizen journalism and citizen journalists outside the boundaries of professional journalism. Regardless of how citizen news participants were identified, professional journalists distinguished themselves from citizen journalists, effectively helping mainstream reporters to reinforce and legitimize their professional status in society. In addition, by emphasizing harmful outcomes and dangerous side effects of citizen journalism, professional journalists found ways to justify why citizen journalism remains inferior to professional journalism and why professional journalism is still significant in society. Even in news articles with positive tonality, journalists attempted to legitimate their status while downplaying the status of citizen journalism.
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    How law matters to ecosystem restoration.
    (2012-02) Enzler, Sherry Anne
    The 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment reported unprecedented degradation of ecosystems and the services they provide to human well being which, if allowed to continue, could adversely affect human health, security and welfare. Our environmental legal authorities and policies, however, are not well designed to protect the health of our nation's ecosystems focusing instead on clean air, clean land and clean water as single medium, often referred to as the silo approach to environmental protection. Protecting ecosystems requires that we move away from this silo approach to a multi systems approach to environment and ecosystem management in both policy and law. How can we motivate the necessary changes in our legal constructs and political systems? This is a question posed by a number of communities and states struggling with the concept of ecosystem protection. Applying a Modified Destabilization theory this research explores whether and under what conditions the strategic use of litigation by environmental social movements can destabilize established legal constructs to protect ecosystems. Using the Mono Lake and Everglades' restoration event histories the Modified Destabilization Model is used to examine the role law played in struggles to change the political and social systems necessary to protect, restore and rehabilitate ecosystems. This analysis increases our understanding of the elements necessary to move to change the political and social structures to achieve systems approach to ecosystem management and the ability of social movements to mobilize law and litigation to accomplish the political and social change necessary to protect ecosystem.