Abstract
Mass media news on certain country itself can affect their image on society. image that will appear could be positive, negative or neutral depending on the content in it. This study employs content analysis of Agenda Setting of image in Malaysian English newspapers indicated that NSTP and the Star. In total, 535 articles and news stories were obtained from three periods before, during and after the occupation of Iraq. Findings showed that the Agenda Setting for NSTP focused on the issue of The Malaysia’s policy towards Iraq, The US policy and the occupation of Iraq and The impact of war on Malaysia. While, the Star focused on Iraq’s needs and suffering. In summary, the newspapers seem to take great care in transmitting images of other countries particularly the Islamic country, which could affect Malaysia and its neighbors politically, economically and socially. Thus it can be concluded that the media’s ownership position plays vital role in shaping countries image in media coverage. current study indicated that the positive and neutral image of in NSTP are considered important to the Malaysian government to advance its domestic and foreign policies to Malaysians, and also due to its political and economic interests with which is a Muslim country. Contrarily, the Star seemed to oppose government policies but this opposition is marginal and issue specific in nature depending upon the involvement of Malaysia interests and intensity of the government media differences on those issues.
Highlights
The occupation of Iraq in 2003 had resulted in the emergence of some images about Iraq in the media (Mockaitis, 2007)
The study aims to reveal the image of Iraq as portrayed by the Eastern media through the two Malaysian English newspapers, NSTP and the Star, which belong to two different political parties
As a result of the military disaster which have taken the lives of a number of innocent civilians, Iraqis needed food, shelter, medicine, sanitation, electricity, safety and security; “The Malaysia’s policy towards Iraq” refers to Malaysia rejecting the US policy towards the Middle East, and to show support for Iraq and Palestine, Malaysia is against the war and occupation of Iraq; and “The impact of war on Malaysia” refers to the impact of the Iraq war on the Malaysian economy and Malaysians living in Iraq and the neighboring countries of Iraq
Summary
The occupation of Iraq in 2003 had resulted in the emergence of some images about Iraq in the media (Mockaitis, 2007). Even though there are studies that had looked at the image of Iraq, it is still worth noting that these studies had focused on the major role played by the Western media in shaping the issues of Iraq. Issues such as saving the Iraqi people, weapons of mass destruction were the focus of news in the Western media. This study was built upon the Agenda Setting function of media suggests that the more important the news media present a particular issue as being the more important that issue becomes for media consumers (McCombs as cited in Holody, 2011). Vol 11, No 2; 2015 media’s ownership position plays vital role in shaping countries image in media coverage
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