The construction of Islam in the British and American Press

1998-2005

A corpus-based (keywords and collocates) analysis

Tony McEneryLancaster University

Objectives How do news stories construct Islam? Have there been any (recent) changes over time? Are there differences between reporting on Islam

(as a religion) and Muslims (as a people)? Are there any differences/similarities between

tabloids and broadsheets Are there any differences/similarities between

American and British newspapers? How can corpus-based methods be used

alongside CDA or moral panic theory?

Why Islam? Post WWII – demand for unskilled labour

results in migration of Pakistani and Bangladeshi Muslims to the UK

April 2001 Robin Cook reports that Britain’s national dish is chicken tikka masala

September 2001 – terrorist attacks on US July 2005 – terrorist attacks on UK

Data 87 million words of British news

Broadsheets: The Business, The Guardian, The Independent & Independent on Sunday, The Observer, The Times & Sunday Times, Daily Telegraph & Sunday TelegraphTabloids: The Daily Express & Sunday Express, The Daily Mail & Mail on Sunday, Daily Mirror & Sunday Mirror, The People, Daily Star & Sunday Star, The Sun

40 million words of American news: Financial Times, New York Times, Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle

Freqencies of articles over time

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3500

4000

1998-01 1998-11 1999-09 2000-07 2001-05 2002-03 2003-01 2003-11 2004-09 2005-07

Analysis WordSmith 4 used: 1. Keywords analysis of UK broadsheets

vs. UK tabloids 2. Collocational and concordance analysis

of Islam, Islamic, Muslim, Muslims 3. Keyword analysis of pre and post 9/11

articles in UK and US news

Broadsheet vs. Tabloid KeywordsBroadsheets (65 million words)

Tabloids (22 million words)

The Business Independent GuardianObserverTimesTelegraph

The Sun Mirror Star People ExpressMail

WordSmith settings 2 Frequency lists compared together p value was set at 0.0000000001 2180 keywords found

Findings: Style and spelling Tabloids

Pronouns: I, my, me, myself, we, he, she Emphatic adjectives: stunning, fantastic, terrible, wonderful

BroadsheetsConjunctions/determiners: the, that, which however, thus, than Formal terms of address: Mr, Ms

(See for example Biber et al 1998: 148)

Moslem – key in the tabloids 7,282 tabloid uses 4,834 in the Daily Mail 2,208 Daily Express

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98-01

98-05

98-09

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01-Jan

01-Ma

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02-Ma

02-Sep

03-Jan

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04-Ma

04-Sep

05-Jan

05-Ma

Moslem(s)

Muslim(s)

Bin Laden powerful (mastermind, terrorist godfather,

millionaire, Al Qaeda leader) warrior leader (chief, warlord) outcast (dissident, exile, fugitive) insane (maniac, twisted) evil (gloating menace, evil, terrorist,

murderous) fanatical (extremist, fanatic, fanatical)

Tabloid villains Direct references to terrorist attacks:

terror, terrorists, Taliban, Osama, Bin, Laden, bomb, bombs, bomber, bombers, plane, suicide, killers, attack, crash, hijack, September, twin and towers

Emotive/evaluation reaction: atrocity, atrocities, tragedy, carnage, horror, terrible and evil

Other tabloid categories Brainwashing: lure, rant, rants, spew, rouser,

brainwashed

“Children are being brainwashed into becoming Islamic extremists at 300 "Taliban schools" in Britain, it was reported last night. Youngsters are being indoctrinated with radical Islamic ideals by militant groups across the country, said leading British Muslim Dr Zaki Badawi.”

The Sun, December 28, 2001

Also,’scrougerphobia’ and political correctness

Types of belief In the tabloids, Muslims are fanatics and

extremists

In the broadsheets, Muslims are radicals, fundamentalists, separatists but also moderates and progressives

Broadsheet keywords More focus on Islam The media: book, novel, television, film, poetry Other religions: Hindu, Christian, Buddhist,

Judaism World events: Iran, Iraq, Iraqi, Arab, Israeli, Israel,

Palestinian, Baghdad, Jerusalem, Lebanon, Syria War and conflict: military, conflict, army,

resistance, violence, occupied, ceasefire, genocide, peace, invasion

Muslim(s) vs. Islam(ic) Tabloids – more focus on Muslims (the

people); Muslims as terrorists; evil preachers, Muslims as British and desiring peace, women as victims (honor killings, arranged marriage, hijab), men as potential terrorists or victims of racism

Broadsheets – more focus on Islam (as a religion) - stories on terrorism restricted to the word Islamic.

UK and US keywords before/after 9/11

Moral panic categories developed by McEnery (2005)

1. consequence 2. corrective action3. desired outcome4. moral entrepreneur5. scapegoat6. rhetoric

UK Keywords post 9/11Category Positive Keywords in that Category

Consequence anger, angry, bad, bombing, bombings, conflict, crime,dead, death, destruction, died, evil, fear, fears, injured, kill,killed, killing, murder, terror, threat, victims, violence, wounded, wrong

Corrective action

arrested, fight, fighting, invasion, jail, justice, moderate,occupation, police, revenge, troops

Desired outcome

best, better, freedom, good, peace, support

Moral entrepreneur

America, American, Britain, British

Object of offence

atrocities, attack, attacks, bomb, bombs, criminal,extremism, failed, hatred, illegal, jihad, radical, regime,terrible, terrorism, weapons

Scapegoat Arab, (suicide) bombers, enemy, extremists, immigrants,Iran, Iraq, Iraqi, Islam, mosque, Muslim, Muslims,Pakistan, Palestinian, religious, suicide, terrorists

Rhetoric question, need, must, why

US keywords post 9/11Consequence attacks, sept

Corrective action

American, Americans, forces, intelligence, marine, marines,military, officials, (war on) terror, war (on terror)

Desired outcome

NONE

Moralentrepreneur

Bush, pentagon, (United) States, United (States), US

Object of offence

terrorism

Scapegoat (al) Qaeda, afghan, Afghanistan, al (Qaeda), bin (laden),(Saddam) Hussein, Hussein’s, insurgents, Iraq, Iraq’s, Iraqi,Iraqis, (bin) Laden, Saddam (Hussein), Shiite, Shiites, Sunni,Taliban, terrorist, terrorists,

Rhetoric NONE

Conclusions Muslims as victims or villains Moral panics, PC, scroungerphobia Few distinctions made or explanations

given More neutral global ‘reporting’ stance in

the broadsheets Focus on small number of villains in the

tabloids

Other areas to focus on Additional data – BBC news, Al Jazeera Close examination of stories – e.g. Abu

Hamza or types of Muslims (young women)

Comparison between right/left political stances

Examination of agency, metaphor, presupposition etc.

Issues to address What is bias? What is fair? Does lexical priming work in the same way

for everyone? Need to consider readership and audience

response Is news the only way that people are

informed? Bias of the researcher?