Framing and Ideology in the English Newspapers’ Coverage of the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake in Korea and the U.S.

Abstract

This paper examines how English language newspapers in Korea and the U.S. covered the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and explores how the media frame events and issues according to their own ideology and perspective. The data is drawn from newspaper articles published in the Korea Times and the New York Times from March 11 to April 21, 2011, amounting to 265 articles and 207,233 tokens. The results indicate that, in line with ‘ideological square’ by van Dijk (1998), the Korea Times and NY Times frame their countries as a ‘good neighbor’ and a ‘close ally and friend’, respectively. However, the vulnerable ‘good neighbor’ frame, because of deep-rooted historical animosity, changes or is discarded when Japan ‘betrays the trust as a neighbor’. On the other hand, it seems that the ‘close ally’ frame is chosen strategically, and appears not to be easily swayed by emotion. These results confirm that even news reports on natural disasters, supposedly relatively neutral events, frame what we see and what we read.