German Newspapers Research Articles

Contrasting discourses: Digital precariat or flexible entrepreneurship? A corpus-assisted discourse analysis of platform work in German and Finnish business newspapers

Platform work as a new form of work is a globally discussed research topic in various research fields, such as social sciences, economics and labour law. Previous research identifies the significant impact platforms have on work, labour market and society. This article brings a linguistic approach to the topic, analyzing and comparing the discussion on platform work in German and Finnish business newspapers in 2017–2021. The corpus-assisted discourse analysis shows that platform work is discussed in both media partly in same contexts, such as in platform work’s effect on labour market and society, the unclear employment status and the need for stronger regulation. However, the analysis is able to tease out aspects and distinctions of platform work in the media not shown previously. Findings show that the German Handelsblatt represents platform work as a challenge to society with strong regulation requests, whereas the Finnish Kauppalehti highlights the possibilities platform work provides to entrepreneurship and labour market.

Economic Forecasting With German Newspaper Articles

Economic Forecasting With German Newspaper Articles

Femicide coverage in German-language news. A content analysis of Austrian, German, and Swiss newspaper articles from 2018 to 2020

ABSTRACT The study examines the coverage of femicides in a period of 3 years (January 2018 – December 2020) in German-language news. The content of 383 articles from 14 different Austrian, German and Swiss quality and tabloid newspapers was analysed, focusing on used labels, the contextualisation as a structural or individual issue, as well as on reported crime scenes, victim–perpetrator relationships, migration backgrounds and religious faith. The results inter alia show that femicides are rather contextualized as an individual tragedy than as a structural problem. Furthermore, the use of euphemistic and sensationalist labels such as “relationship drama” or “blood deed” differ significantly depending on the reported victim–perpetrator relationship. Gender-focusing labels such as “femicide” or “murder of women” were rather used when a perpetrator’s migration background was mentioned.

Society in charge: the connection of artificial intelligence, responsibility, and ethics in German media discourse

AbstractArtificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in society, and applications like ChatGPT and Dall-E, which can produce texts and pictures on their own, are becoming very popular. This development raises questions regarding ethics, values, and responsibility, as AI-generated documents may promote misinformation and erode democracy, while human actors can scarcely be held accountable. AI technology may also support an efficient, rationalized society, which has its advantages and disadvantages. Two main spheres, which influence society’s perspective on the connection between AI, ethics and responsibility, are public media debates and the legal system. Popular newspapers reach broad audiences, so insight is provided into what perspectives on these issues are helping everyday citizens form their opinions. Legal frameworks potentially regulate citizens’ and companies’ dealing with AI technology—and may get included in media discussions on AI. Acknowledging that, this article presents a two-folded analysis. First, the article presents the results of a discourse analysis of 113 articles from German newspapers, ranging from the center-left to the conservative spectrum. The analysis examined how these media frame the connection of AI, ethics, values, and responsibility. The article discusses the discourse analysis together with theoretical assumptions around the question, which actors in society could be counted as accountable in AI regards. Second, a discussion of the European AI legal system is added, to evaluate its connection with the media discourses. The article presents the results of both parts of the analysis together and finally discusses further research perspectives.

Exploring print media coverage of elite athletes' mental illness between 2010 and 2023 in Germany: a quantitative content analysis.

Recently, the stereotype of elite athletes' invulnerabilty has begun to be challenged by an increasing number of elite athletes who talk openly about struggling with mental health. Relatedly, previous research has focused primarily on specific incidents like the media's portrayal of personal disclosures. The purpose of this study was to expand this perspective and give a systematic overview of media coverage related to elite athletes' mental illness by examining more than one decade (2010-2023) of German print media reporting. Specifically, we were interested in changes over time and between broadsheet and tabloid press regarding content-related and formal aspects. Based on a systematic search and screening process in eleven German newspapers and magazines, 699 print media articles were analyzed with a codebook, forming a framework of content-related (reported mental disorder; central thematic focus; sources of comments and quotations; perspectives on the high-performance sports system) and formal categories (article genre; elements of responsible journalism). Univariate analyses and binary logistic regression models were used to examine changes over time (2010-2016 vs. 2017-2023) and differences between types of press (tabloid vs. broadsheet press) regarding content-related and formal characteristics. The results indicate an enhanced awareness towards the topic of mental illness and those affected in recent years within German print media. This was demonstrated by the increased integration of responsible reporting elements, the inclusion of diversified perspectives and the considerate selection of content. Despite this positive trend over time, the findings also suggest that media reporting in the tabloid press bears an increased risk for inappropriate storytelling, focusing primarily on personal tragedies. As personal fate of prominent figures like elite athletes will always meet great interest in the public, it is of utmost importance that the media report responsibly and promote critical thinking in society. The study shows the media's willingness to question conventional ideals embedded in the sports culture and take a more critical approach to the topic of mental illness in high-performance sports. By demonstrating a greater understanding of the importance and the seriousness of the issue, the media might also contribute to improved mental health awareness in society.

DIVERGENT VALUES OF A PARTICULAR CLASS OF OBSOLETE WORDS: HISTORISMEN

The language of German newspapers in Romania exhibits properties which reflect the synergy that led to the genesis of the present form of this variety of the German language. One main trait consists of preserving the stilistic neutrality of words that are now obsolete in Germany or Austria, hence the effortless play of synonyms that belong to different registers throughout the other German-speaking countries. However, the language contact with Romanian may never be underestimated, and is also observable in respect to the norms that shape the way articles are written. Articles about King Michael I of Romania seem to highlight the fact that the culturally-influenced language norms are known and employed deliberately, of which some actually contrast to Romanian language-culture.

JOURNALISTIC USE OF LANGUAGE ON THE CAMPAIGN FOR LOCAL ELECTIONS IN ROMANIA 2020 IN THE GERMAN-LANGUAGE MINORITY NEWSPAPER ADZ FOR ROMANIA

The present paper aims to analyze four journalistic texts belonging to the column Meinung und Bericht of the German newspaper existing in Romania ADZ für Rumänien from pragmalinguistic action theoretical viewpoint. The texts, giving the name of the author on the by line, are about actual events in Romania and they contain many verbal sequences and words expressing their opinion. The article concentrates on how and by which linguistic means of expressions is illustrated the position of the ADZjournalists on the local election campaign in Romania on 27th September 2020.

AI in the newsroom: a collective case study about newsworker-AI collaboration in the German newspaper industry

ABSTRACT The adoption of AI in newsrooms can fundamentally change journalistic processes. Nowadays, AI is increasingly able to fulfil journalistic tasks, evolving the roles and interaction of newsworkers and AI. Given its high impact, the question arises how AI and newsworkers can collaborate productively in the newsroom to maintain or even improve journalistic quality. This study analyses newsworker-AI collaboration at four German newspaper publishers through the lens of Human-Machine Communication (HMC). Based on the data, a model for the evaluation of newsworker-AI collaboration is developed and validated. The results show that the interaction intensity between newsworkers and AI as well as the creation of knowledge in the newsroom can be identified as relevant evaluation criteria for newsworker-AI collaboration.

Intersectional solidarity, empathy, or pity? Exploring representations of migrant women in German and British newspapers during the pandemic

ABSTRACT This research examines migrant women’s representation in British and German news during the COVID-19 pandemic, paying particular attention to expressions of solidarity. While previous research has focused on the representation of women and migrants, studies have largely treated these groups as distinct entities. Combining topic modelling with informed grounded theory, this research compares the representation of migrant women, including women from ethnic minorities, across a diverse corpus covering 2020–21. This two-step methodology facilitates intersectional analysis at the macro and micro level, revealing the salience, topical concentration and context of migrant women’s coverage. Findings show that solidarity emerged through the platforming of migrant women’s voices, and connected to discourses of class, poverty and precarity. Representations containing empathy and pity – less likely drivers of social change – were more prevalent. This research contributes to our understanding of migrant women’s coverage during the pandemic and provides a granular and intersectional lens for analysing minoritized group representation.

Climate summits and protests have a strong impact on climate change media coverage in Germany

Media inform the public, thereby influencing societal debates and political decisions. Despite climate change’s importance, drivers of media attention to climate change remain differently understood. Here we assess how different sociopolitical and extreme weather events affect climate change media coverage, both immediately and in the weeks following the event. To this end, we construct a data set of over 90,000 climate change articles published in nine major German newspapers over the past three decades and apply fixed effects panel regressions to control for confounders. We find that United Nations Climate Change Conferences affect coverage most strongly and most persistently. Climate protests incite climate coverage that extends well beyond the reporting on the event itself, whereas many articles on weather extremes do not mention climate change. The influence of all events has risen over time, increasing the media prominence of climate change.

The media's coverage and framing of hospital reforms: The case of Germany

Abstract Aim In Germany, a long-lasting debate about the need for a hospital reform, including centralisation, now resulted in reform plans. As cutbacks to essential services such as hospitals are an emotional topic, the public should be properly informed, which is a central role of the media. Based on a media analysis of a large-scale hospital reform in Denmark, showing that the media’s reporting might have had an agenda-setting effect, we analysed the media’s coverage and framing of restructuring the hospital landscape in German newspapers. Subject and methods A systematic search identified relevant articles in national and regional newspapers. The coverage between January 2018 and January 2023 was analysed regarding quantity and main theme (agenda-setting). Each article’s title and main text were analysed for tone and whether it focused on episodic (single events) or thematic (broader context) framing. Results A total of 705 newspaper articles (592 regional, 113 national) were included. Both regional and national newspapers mainly used episodic framing. Regional newspapers mostly reported on single closures of hospitals or departments. The tone of the title and main text in national newspapers was mainly negatively depicted, which applied to less than half of the articles in regional newspapers. These differences were, however, not statistically significant. Conclusion Results indicate higher agenda-setting effects in regional compared to national newspapers. However, the overall high amount of episodic framing can result in less attribution of responsibility to policy-makers, thereby conserving the status quo. To succeed, a media strategy might help to raise problem awareness among the public.

»Ta schlehten volk tega ferdirbanega cajta!« Celjski nemški časopis Deutsche Wacht o Ivanu Dečku

At the turn of the 19th to the 20th century, insults and attacks on Slovenian citizens were a regular feature of the Celje German newspaper Deutsche Wacht. Also in this respect, one of the most prominent individuals was the lawyer Ivan Dečko. The article highlights two characteristic events in which he played a major role. The first example took place during the 1901 national elections, when he successfully opposed the German candidate Josef Pommer in the urban curia, while the second was the so-called “Kosem Affair”, which involved damages to the coffers of the district representation and coincided with the pre-election campaign for the 1904 district representation elections. Sometimes, the Deutsche Wacht even mercilessly mocked Dečko’s unfortunate illness.

22 Players Run After the Ball for 90 Minutes, and in the End England Wins. German Views of the 1935 and 1938 Germany–England Football Matches

This article studies the politico-diplomatic dimension of the 1935 and 1938 Germany-England football matches played during the National Socialist era. Despite being represented in both countries as international friendlies, these games proved highly politicized affairs because of the centrality of the British-German relationship in international affairs and the politization and diplomatization of international sport during the 1930s. The 1935 game, played in London, became the focus for a high-profile public campaign, led by trade union, Jewish, and other lobbying groups hostile to Nazi Germany, to ban the match. In turn, the 1938 fixture is famed for the Nazi salute, the ‘infamous gesture’ that British diplomats and Football Association officials instructed the England team to give before the beginning of the match. Using the archives of the Auswärtiges Amt (Foreign Ministry) and Bundesarchiv (Federal Archives) as well as a selection of German newspapers, this article provides an informed German perspective on both matches, which hitherto have been studied principally from a British perspective. Focused upon German aims, perceptions, political influences, and propaganda goals, this case study highlights the ‘soft power’ methods of totalitarianism in terms of both the adaptation of totalitarianism to football and the adaptation of football to totalitarianism.

From Niche Narrative to Audio Blockbusters

From Niche Narrative to Audio Blockbusters

DESCRIPTION OF GERMAN LANGUAGE DICTIONARIES

The functioning of language is associated with the disappearance of certain words, with the emergence of new ones, with the change in the meaning or stylistic status of words. Each of the ways of developing the vocabulary of the German language has its own characteristics. The paper draws attention to these features. The paper describes verbal neoplasms not registered in dictionaries until the middle of the 20th century, selected from the texts of the German newspapers “Süddeutsche Zeitung”, “Frankfurter Allgemeine”, “Der Spiegel”, “Joe”, “Alles für die Frau”, “GEO” and others. The study considers the linguistic material of some dictionaries published in the second half of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries, including dictionaries of colloquial youth vocabulary. So, the main idea of this article is to highlight the peculiarities of word formation in German linguistics through the history.

DESCRIPTION OF GERMAN LANGUAGE DICTIONARIES

The paper defines the ways and peculiarities of word formation in modern German language. The paper deals with one of theways of enriching the verb vocabulary in the modern German language, in particular wordbuilding. In the result of the analysis of the language material, the most productive models and means of the word-building of the verbs are emphasized including word-building models borrowed from other languages. The vocabulary of the language, being a system, is in constant motion. The functioning of language is associated with the disappearance of certain words, with the emergence of new ones, with the change in the meaning or stylistic status of words. Each of the ways of developing the vocabulary of the German language has its own characteristics. The paper draws attention to these features. The paper describes verbal neoplasms not registered in dictionaries until the middle of the 20th century, selected from the texts of the German newspapers “Süddeutsche Zeitung”, “Frankfurter Allgemeine”, “Der Spiegel”, “Joe”, “Alles für die Frau”, “GEO” and others. The study considers the linguistic material of some dictionaries published in the second half of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries, including dictionaries of colloquial youth vocabulary. So, the main idea of this article is to highlight the peculiarities of word formation in German linguistics through the history.

Disclosure of perpetrator origin in crime news: Changing practices in journalism after populist accusations?

If news reports on crime disclose the ethnic or national origin of suspects or perpetrators, severe consequences for audience stereotypes and public policy may arise. Thus, many professional codices advise journalists to limit origin disclosure to rare exceptions. Right-wing populists have, however, accused news media of obfuscating the ‘true dimension’ of immigrant crime. Conducting a content analysis of N = 10,943 crime reports released between 2013 and 2021 by 10 German newspapers, we investigated how journalists reacted to such attempted political influence. Findings show a massively increased frequency of news reports that included explicit or implicit cues to suspects’ or perpetrators’ origin, with a peak in 2018 and a subsequent decline in 2021. We interpret the results as a time-dependent effect of populist anti-media agitation that emerged after a large immigration wave to Germany in 2015 and 2016 but lost much of its impact a few years later, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. Implications for journalism theory and ethics are discussed.

The Socio-Spatiality of Energy Borderlands – Multidimensional Discursive Practices Regarding the Turów Coal Mine Conflict

ABSTRACT An important component regarding the climate and energy crisis and its implications is the upheaval in energy production and supply as a fundamental transition in favor of low-carbon energy. The regions of the German-Polish border area studied in this paper encounter different development paths of coal and renewable energy sources. One emblematic recent case in this context, is the legal dispute over the closure of the Turów coal mine. The authors investigate to what extent these energy spaces develop between European frameworks, nation-state policies as well as regional and local implementations. The analysis is based on regional discourses of German and Polish newspapers with the highest circulation in the border area. The combination of a discourse analysis and a multidimensional, space-theoretical approach overcomes a simplification of socio-spatial strategies and enables a differentiation of the borderlands. Additionally, the examination of the discursive practices provides insights on scaling and network activities as well as on strategies of place-protection in socio-material energy spaces in the German-Polish borderland.

‘One bad apple won’t spoil the bunch’ – Representations of the “sharing economy”

This research examines the public’s common understanding of the sharing economy, specifically its dark sides. If the sharing economy is represented as problematic, managers should reconsider if they want to promote their businesses as part of it or set actions in case it is associated with it. Thus, we examine (i) the public’s representations of the sharing economy, (ii) which industries are associated with it, and (iii) the development of understanding the sharing economy via three different sources: Representative surveys in Germany (N = 604) and the UK (N = 614), 206 articles in German and British newspapers and 150 images posted on Instagram. Participants’ overall evaluation of the sharing economy in the survey and social media was mainly positive, whereas newspapers extensively discuss its downsides. Ecological, social, economic, financial, as well as legal and security issues are associated with the sharing economy with a strong focus on shared accommodation and shared mobility.

THE EVOLUTION AND CHARACTERISTICS OF GERMAN PRESS LANGUAGE: AN ANALYSIS WITH EXAMPLES

This paper provides an in-depth analysis of the evolution and characteristics of the German press language, shedding light on its historical development, linguisticfeatures, and its role in shaping public discourse. By examining the language used in German newspapers, magazines, and online news portals, this study aims to uncover the unique linguistic traits and stylistic conventions that distinguish the German press language from other written and spoken German forms.Drawing on a wide range of examples from prominent German media outlets, the analysis explores the lexical, syntactic, and rhetorical strategies employed in the German press language to convey information, express opinions, and engage readers. Furthermore, the study investigates the impact of technological advancements and globalization on the language of the German press, considering how these factors have influenced its evolution over time.The findings of this research contribute to a deeper understanding of the complex interplay between language, media, and society in the German-speaking world, offering valuable insights into the role of the press language in shaping public perceptions and attitudes.Ultimately, this study seeks to enrich our knowledge of the linguistic and communicative practices employed in German journalism, providing a comprehensive overview of the evolution and characteristics of the German press language.