The great Syrian exodus: A discourse-historical approach to Syrian asylum seekers in the Turkish press coverage (2011–15)

Abstract

This study aims to critically analyse the representation of Syrian asylum seekers in the Turkish print media. Taking into consideration their circulation numbers, ownership and political stance, five national newspapers were examined (Hürriyet, Posta, Sabah, Sözcü and Zaman). The data covers all news reports, columns and op-eds relating to Syrian asylum seekers, published between 15 March 2011 and 31 December 2015. Based on this time sample, the representation of Syrian asylum seekers in the Turkish press was first analysed by content analysis and then by employing critical discourse analysis, drawing on the discourse-historical approach of the Vienna School. The article aims to reveal the most common discursive strategies of representing Syrian asylum seekers in the Turkish press. The overall data suggest that Turkish newspapers instrumentalized Syrian asylum seekers while positioning their editorial stance in political affairs. According to the findings, the Turkish print media most commonly represent Syrian asylum seekers with the words ‘Mülteci’ (refugee) at 53.81 per cent and ‘Sığınmacı’ (asylum seeker) at 37.44 per cent. When the labels are considered, it was seen that the Turkish press refers to ethnic identities more than religious or sectarian characteristics. Evaluating all of the quantitative and qualitative data, the article suggests that the pro-government titles deomonstrate more friendly coverage for Syrian asylum seekers. Among the papers in the sample, Sözcü disassociates itself with a clear anti-Syrian approach. Other papers have a mostly positive tone, especially if the issue is assessed in a humanitarian aspect. However, the overall positive tone should not be evaluated without the reality of ‘political parallelism’ in the Turkish media atmosphere.