The colour-line of journalism

Camilla Dindler,Bolette B Blaagaard

doi:10.7146/journalistica.v15i1.124927

Abstract

This article argues that Danish journalistic boundary producing practices and principles uphold a representation of racial disparity. Based on critical theories of race and racism in journalism and a boundary work framework, we conduct a discursive analysis of two collective case studies that encompass 56 articles and 23 Facebook posts. Focusing mainly on 1) the construction of knowledge about potential racism, 2) who are positioned as authorities on the topic of racism, and 3) who are missing among the potential actors in the stories, we identify meta-journalistic discourses and the (re)establishment of journalistic principles and practices. We conclude that journalistic norms and practices, for now, withstand the challenges posed by minority media’s call for the recognition of race as structure by applying discursive strategies of firstly rejecting racism as structure and secondly asserting principles and practices of specific kinds of objectivity, utilising, for instance, elite sources.

Highlights

This article departs from the journalistic representation of two disparate incidents in Denmark during the summer of 2020
Following the theoretical discussions above, we proceed to answer the question: How are race and racism expressed as boundary objects in the cases of the death of the Danish-Tanzanian man on the island of Bornholm and in the study on the racially charged remarks by sports commentators? As collective, critical cases, these two events may be generalised to the extent that, if the conclusions hold true in such high-profile cases, they may hold true for journalistic principles and practices more generally (Flyvbjerg, 1991, p. 146)
Race and racism are expressed as boundary objects that challenge the journalistic discourse of mainstream, objective, and universal news

Summary

Introduction

This article departs from the journalistic representation of two disparate incidents in Denmark during the summer of 2020. These sentiments are echoed in work by Danish scholars, exploring the history of representation of visible minorities in the Danish national newspapers and tv-stations (Andreassen, 2007), the discursive constructions of racist attitudes in the Danish public sphere (Hussain, 2000), and migrant media consumption (Christiansen, 2004) These studies position minorities in the role of ‘a societal problem’ and opposition to a national construction of ‘us’, i.e. the white majority The relationship between minority voices and the minority and the mainstream press continues to be relevant to understanding the performative process of journalism and how common sense is constructed – even if it remains invisible to many journalistic practitioners and scholars Understanding this relationship as boundary work enables us to look at our chosen cases as possible boundary objects that are “at once something shared among disparate groups while holding sometimes radically different meanings” Racism as structure renders visible the contingent nature of journalism’s representations of the world and may play a critical role in the necessary developments of the “hows and whys of journalistic practice” (Zelizer, 1992, p. 67)

Method

Findings

Concluding discussion