April 23, 2005
The Framing of War Veterans' Homelessness
In its document on media framing and tobacco use, the WHO uses the media’s depiction of homelessness as a paradigm to explain the episodic framing all-too common among both print and broadcast news outlets. It states: “‘Betty Jones and her family of four are braving the elements tonight because the homeless shelter was full,’ begins an episodic news frame on the homeless. Such a news story might go on to describe vividly how the children miss their toys, how cold it is, when they last ate, etc. What it will not describe is how many people are homeless in this city, whether the numbers are increasing or decreasing, or any of the root causes of homelessness.?
The WHO document continues on to explain how issues like homelessness, when framed episodically – that is, when reduced to “a series of disconnected episodes, isolated events or case studies” – tend to cause the public to attribute the problem to individualistic rather than social causes and to thus fail to view the issue as necessitating government policy or some sort of collective action. The WHO’s conclusions can be traced to Stanford University political scientist Shanto Iyengar’s landmark research on framing and its consequences. In the early 1990s, Iyengar conducted a series of experiments in which he and colleagues exposed participants to news stories framed either “episodically” or “thematically” and observed the different effects that each framing method had on its audience’s perception of the issue. Iyengar defined episodic frames as those which focus on “specific evens or particular cases,” and thematic frames as those which give fairly broad background information on the news story, as they place “political issues and events in some general context.” (from Is Anyone Responsible?, pg 4, as cited in Elliott Parker's "Mediating the Media: Frames, attribution of responsibility, and individual media use")
According to Iyengar, the episodic news frame is most frequently used by today’s mass media. Indeed, one study found that episodic news frames are used approximately 80% of the time in newscasts. Another found that out of over 10,000 foreign affairs stories on five local television stations, episodic stories composed 97% of the coverage.
Moreover, Iyengar found that the type of framing employed has a significant effect on the way in which individuals attribute responsibility or causation for the problem presented. Specifically, Inyengar’s study concluded: “The use of either the episodic or the thematic news frame affects how individuals assign responsibility for political issues; ...episodic framing tends to elicit individualistic rather than societal attributions of responsibility while thematic framing has the opposite effect. Since television news is heavily episodic, its effect is generally to induce attributions of responsibility to individual victims or perpetrators rather than to broad societal forces” (from Is Anyone Responsible?, cited by the UCLA Center for Communications and Community). Studies since have further supported Iyengar’s findings.
This research has many implications. As explained by the WHO, the manner in which a problem is presented determines how the public will view that problem and in turn influences public opinion and, to at least some degree, sets the policy agenda. James T. Hamilton, author of All the News That's Fit to Sell, also acknowledges that framing “can have a spillover effect” on politics and policy (244).
To situate all this as it relates to the mass media’s portrayal of homelessness, Iyengar’s studies found that subjects who viewed stories about poverty that featured the personal experiences of homeless or unemployed people (hence, framed episodically) were more likely to attribute poverty to individual failings or misfortune such as laziness, low education or mental illness, whereas those who viewed more thematically framed stories about high poverty/unemployment rates, federal welfare policy, or structural causes of the problem were more likely to blame government policies or national trends.
One example of the media’s framing of the homelessness issue is its recent coverage of the wave of returning Iraqi war veterans – a great number of whom, with no place to go and plagued by psychological trauma, are now living on the streets. The majority of reports I’ve found on this issue are framed in an episodic manner; I found only one which was framed thematically. Each of the episodic stories was centered on the personal experience of one ex-soldier that is currently homeless. For example, CBS’s report, “From Hero to Homeless” tells the story of Private First Class Herold Noel, who, diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, cannot find employment. Democracy Now is especially vivid in its description of this same individual. The article begins as follows: “Four nights before Christmas, former Army specialist Herold Noel huddled for warmth in front of a fire he built for himself in Brooklyn's Prospect Park as temperatures slid toward the single digits. Plagued by nightmares and unable to hold a steady job or get the assistance he needed, he was on the verge of losing his wife and three young children. It wasn't the homecoming he'd expected after serving in Iraq last year.” Finally, the Washington Times focuses on Officer Luis Arellano, who, after returning from Iraq, suffered from a depression which drove him to leave his job at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. It is important to note that each of these stories does indeed broaden its scope to place the issue within some general context – for instance, by incorporating estimates of the total number of US war veterans currently on the streets or the number who have been diagnosed with mental health or substance abuse problems, which, are identified as underlying causes of their destitution. However, these more general statistics are slight in each of the articles, and, to borrow the words of Iyengar himself, the complex issue of veterans’ homelessness is simplified “to the level of anecdotal evidence” (from Is Anyone Responsible?, pg 7, as cited by Scott London in "How the Media Frames Political Issues").
I did come across a Fox News article, however, that framed the issue thematically. By citing expert opinions (for example, executive directors of the National Gulf War Resource Center, the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans, the Council on Homelessness, and Veterans of the Vietnam War) as well as numerous studies, the articles succeeds in conveying the issue as a social as opposed to individual problem. Like the other articles, this one, entitled “Many Homeless in US are Veterans” does include statistics regarding the overall numbers of homeless war veterans. But it goes deeper than the other articles, in its incorporation of contextual information about the causes and characteristics of veteran homelessness at the national level. For example, it cites one study which found that “nearly 85 percent of homeless vets have high school or graduate equivalency degrees, as opposed to 56 percent of non-veteran homeless.” By including this information, the article leads its readers to conclude that veteran homelessness must be attributed to factors other than the individuals’ lack of education. The article also reports that 76% of all homeless veterans have substantial substance abuse and mental health problems, and it cites expert opinions and medical studies claiming that these problems are a direct result of the trauma they experienced while serving our country. Incorporating this information has likely lead Fox’s readership to view the problem as a social one in need of a policy solution. Finally, this Fox article is the only one of the four to provide an in-depth description of what the federal government is currently doing to solve the problem, as well as what remains to be done.
While the CBS, Washington Times, and Democracy Now articles will undoubtedly generate a sympathy among its readers for the plight of the individual ex-soldiers, if the work of Iyengar and his contemporaries is at all correct, the Fox article will be more effective than those episodic representations in driving audiences to view the veteran homelessness as a social problem necessitating government action.
Posted by cscialla at 03:38 AM | Comments (0)
April 18, 2005
Next Generation Media (NGM) from Telekom Austria
As reported by the BBC on March 25th, a small Austrian village is testing technology that "could represent the future of television."
In late 2004, Telekom Austria piloted a net-based television news channel that is filmed, edited, and produced directly by the 8,000 residents of Engerwitzdorf. The news channel covers local events, politics, sports, and pretty much anything that the town's citizens want to film and make available for others to upload and watch on their PCs. Telekom provided the locality with hardware and software which allows its residents to turn their own video footage into edited programs and then upload them to a Buntes Fernsehen portal where others can access them. With this technology, the people of Engerwitzdorf have been able to exchange stories, reports, and information via ADSL. No one has to view all of the stories, and people are free to choose what to watch and when to watch it.
This project goes beyond simply television by broadband, as it is regionally tailored. According to Telekom , it is a completely new kind of local communication - "TV by people from Engerwitzdorf, with people from Engerwitzdorf, and for people from Engerwitzdorf." Rudolf Fischer, head of Telekom Austria's fixed line division, calls it a "kind of democratization of local TV...because none of the bigger broadcasters would ever do anything like this for that region."
This experiment is made possible by Broadband Technology and Telekom's Next Generation Media (NGM) platform, which integrates television, internet, video and e-commerce on a joint platform media, enabling the transmission of diverse combinations of tv programs, videos, music, data, texts, images via the web.
According to Helmut Leopold, head of Platform and Technology Management at Telekom Austria, the convergence of Broadband-based television, video, internet, and telephone will newly shape established market conditions in the media branch. Specifically, Leopold asserts that individual broadband access makes it possible to realize tailored products for small target groups at little cost, saying, "This creates changes for a new local content industry, which is particularly important for a small country like Austria."
Moreover, Leopold claims, "This will equally revolutionize the mobile use of media, because Telekom Austria's NGM will not only transmit content to stationary TV sets or PCs, but to mobile end-devices such as laptops or PDAs."
The BBC reports that the project is growing quite rapidly. Indeed, in the first four months of the Buntes Fernsehen pilot, villagers have created 60 films and put together regular reports on local news items. The project has been such a success, in fact, that Telekom Austria is currently considering instituting other schemes in similarly rural areas. However, it says it plans to do so gradually, due to the work involved in the scheme (i.e. - getting backers from local governments and educating people on how to make programs).
Posted by cscialla at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)
March 03, 2005
Linea Directa
I am currently in Santiago, Chile conducting thesis research. I was flipping through El Mercurio, a popular daily paper, over breakfast this morning, and I was quite intrigued when I found a section in which readers send in consumer and other personal complaints and rely upon the paper's staff to resolve them...
For example, in today's paper, one reader wrote in about problems he was having with the transmission of his brand new Chevrolet Corsa. He'd be trying for months to contact the local dealership to see what could be done to go about fixing it, but the dealership had yet to respond. Upon receiving his complaint, the paper's staff went directly to the dealership, and the owner ensured the reader that the problem would be resovled by the end of the week. Both the reader's written description of his problem and the solution were published. Other cases involved individuals or businesses failing to abide by contracts, issuing bad checks, etc...I talked with my host family about this section, and they said that all the city reads it, as all are interested in the gossip of retail businesses and individual persons! I myself noticed that it was on the inside page of the first section. In fact, my family said that they knew more people who, in order to resolve legal problems, chose to write to the paper instead of involving the justice system...This gives the media's role as a watchdog a whole new meaning!
Posted by cscialla at 03:01 PM | Comments (1)
February 24, 2005
Journalists forced to flee Zimbabwe
Just last week, four journalists working for international news operations were forced to flee Zimbabwe upon being threated with arrest for transmitting "material prejudicial to the state."
An article from CNN.com, "Media Forced to Flee Zimbabwe" shows the trials and tribulations of international reporters. Upon reading this article, I began to wonder about the role of international law in the preservation of independent media. Currently, all broadcast news and daily newspapers in Zimbabwe and in developing countries throughout the world are controlled by the state, and often the only source of autonomous news is the foreign media. What right does a sovereign government have to silence international journalists? What role does or can international law play to preserve and protect such independent news sources? Of course the international community cannot justify the imposition of values of freedom of speech in all corners of the globe. But does not each state at least have the right to use international law as a means of protecting its own citizens working as journalists abroad from such aggression as that demonstrated by Zimbabwe's secret police?
Posted by cscialla at 10:20 PM | Comments (0)
February 21, 2005
Newsday
Newsday was founded, first published, and edited by Alicia Patterson, daughter of Joseph Medill Patterson(the founder of the New York Daily News). Alicia was fired by her father for failing as a Daily News reporter, but her third husband, the millionaire Harry Frank Guggenheim, bought her a newspaper of her own. And so it began...
In 1940, the first 15,000 copies of Newsday were produced from a used press in a converted automibile showroom in Hempstead, Long Island. By 1950, circulation had reached 100,000, making Newsday one of the 10 largest tabloids in the country. It is currently one of the nation's largest newspapers, with a circulation of approximately 480,000 daily, 390,000 Saturday, and 575,000 Sunday papers. In 1970, Guggenheim sold Newsday to the Times Mirror Corporation, and in June 2000, upon the merger of Times Mirror and Tribune Co., Newsday became a subsidiary of Tribune Co., a leading media company with businesses in 23 major US markets, as well as ownership of 11 market-leading newspapers and 26 television stations, including WB11.
Newsday is a premiere source of national and international reporting as well as local news for Long Island and Queens. Newsday CEO recently referred to the paper as the "village square" of Long Island, as it provides local news and information and a venue for New Yorkers to express their views, as well as classifieds, entertainment, shopes of Long Island, real-estate, local business, and many other features like town government, local crime, community life, gossip columnists. Readership is diverse and extends to the youth, as Newsday has become a classroom learning tool in virtually every Long Island school district. To meet the demands of increasingly diverse communities, Newsday has created a Spanish language sister newspaper - Hoy - with circulations of 77,000 daily and 30,000 on Sundays. Finally, to meet the demands for a 24-hr multimedia information source, newsday.com and NYNewsday.com were created.
From the sources I have gathered, Newsday has traditionally been viewed by the public and by its contemporaries as a respectable source of news. It has been awarded 17 Pulitzer Prizes over the course of its 65 years, and has been named by Time Magazine as one of America's ten best newspapers. I found that the newsgathering procedures are similarly respectable, as a staff of almost 100 reporters and columnists are dedicated exclusively to covering the Long Island/Queens region and its communities. Notable is the strength of the paper's foreign reporting, as it has bureaus in Russia, Mexico, South Africa, and the Middle East. Just this January, Newsday opened a new bureau in Islamabad, Pakistan.
Impressive - especially for a newspaper whose target audience is Long Island. But of course, what would a a news organization without its controversies? Firstly, Newsday is often accused of leftist leanings. I found a great blog cite with various commentaries pointing out the democratic bias in editorials as well as hard news stories (a plethora of attacks on Bush, Newsday's inclination for supporting Democrats, etc...).
Finally, Newsday has recently run into controversy regarding circulation figures. In June of 2004, Newsday disclosed that it overstated daily circulation in September by 40,000 copies and Sunday circulation by 60,000. The circulation of Hoy was similarly inflated. Then, in July 2004, Tribune Co. revealed that the paper's circulation totals were inflated over a longer period and at higher levels than Newsday admitted one month earlier. In fact, Tribune said that it found new errors affecting totals reported as far back as 2001. Since this scandal surfaced, Newsday has responded in a respectable manner in efforts to regain its credibility to readers and advertisers alike. It has cooperated fully with the Audit Bureau of Circulations in their extensive reviews of Newsday circulation practices, and it has toughened its ineternal circulation controls.
Posted by cscialla at 01:09 PM | Comments (0)
Journalists, Priests, and Lawyers - What's the difference?
As a result of all this blogging and discussion surrounding the Miller case and the issue of confidentiality of sources, I've been thinking quite a bit about how our society views journalists and journalism...
Granted, in legal terms, the case is fairly straightforward, and I believe that the justices are correct in their opinions that the first ammendment does not allow a journalist to refuse disclosure of sources in such a situation. However, to pose a more hypothetical question - Should Congress enact a law specifically designed to grant journalists this protection? The services journalists provide the public hinge on their ability to attract sources, and without guarantees of confidentiality, certain sources will obviously be discouraged from sharing information. But is public's access to that information from the media important enough to warrant an exception for journalists? In other words, is the work journalists do important enough so as to consider them, in certain situations, above the law? This question becomes less ridiculous when you take, for example, the case of lawyers and priests who are obliged to respect the confidentiality of their clients/parishoners no matter the criminal nature of their actions. Are the services of a priest or a lawyer more noble or valuable than that of a journalist? I, myself, was hard-pressed to see the difference until I read an article by Michael Kinsley of the Washington Post which highlighted an important difference - "these other privileges are about individual rights. The Constitution gives you the right to observe your religion and the right to a lawyer if you're in legal trouble. Those rights would be nearly worthless if your lawyer or pastor could be forced to reveal what you said in confidence." One could not go as far as to say that the services a journalist provides would be worthless if they couldn't guarantee their sources confidentiality. Still, they may not be worthless but one could argue that they would be of higher quality if such a law was enacted. When put this way, it all becomes a question of societal values...
Posted by cscialla at 03:27 AM | Comments (0)
February 06, 2005
Where I Turn for News
In assessing the manner in which I receive my news, I've come to realize that, the majority of the time, I rely on one source and one source only....
As a college student, I, as I'm sure the entire WWS309 roster can sympathize, am always running short on time. I'm always on the run and never watch television, and whenever I'm reading anything, it's sadly always something assigned for class or for my thesis. I do not receive any newspaper or magazine subscriptions, and regrettably, I rarely take the time while I'm in the library to pick up a copy and read one. This given, I tend to rely solely on online sources of news. I find these very efficient in terms of time. I am forever at my computer writing papers, doing research, checking email, etcetera, and online sources are therefore very accessible. Moreover, the manner in which online news sources are organized makes things very easy. Not only do they prioritize news items by listing them atop of the webpage, but they provide easy links to certain types of news. For instance, if I want to know what's going on in a certain section of the world or in a certain discipline, such has health or law, I can easily follow the links and get directly to related stories.
More specifically, I rely mainly http://www.cnn.com, as this is my homepage. Occasionally, I will search around on other sites - a favorite being http://www.bbc.co.uk (when I want more international news - the "World News" section on this site offers a great deal and from a different perspective than that of CNN). Finally, I try to visit two online newspapers - "El Mercurio" and "La Tercera." These are Chilean newspapers. I studied abroad in Santiago last semester and try to keep up with Chilean news. Reading the international news sections of these online papers offers a further perspective on world events, as well. In all honesty, however, I rarely take the time to explore these other online sources. On a daily basis, I rely only on cnn.com.
What implications does this bear for the quality of the information I am receiving? More specifically, if I were to make greater efforts to vary my sources, would this necessarily mean I'd be receiving more objective news? Based upon our class discussion last Monday, I can't conclude that variety automatically translates to objectivity. But I can't help but question - Can more information ever be a bad thing? Even if it is not the most objective or "true" information, as long as I compare sources and am aware of certain biases, I'd think I'd be able to make sense of the information in a beneficial manner. However, the truth of the matter is, in order to gain an awareness of the biases and the legitimacy of a news source, one must understand the process by which the source gathers and presents news items. And sadly I, like most news consumers, neither have the time nor energy to explore this process. Perhaps this is why I've continued to rely upon "brand-name" news corporations like CNN and sometimes the BBC - Although I'm sure their news portrayals are far from bias-free, I can be confident that the facts I'm receiving are coming from sources that have been trusted by the public for many years and must therefore be somewhat credible. At least this has been my logic up until now. I'm sure this may change over the course of the semester...
Posted by cscialla at 07:36 PM | Comments (1)