National News Magazines Research Articles

Mud, metaphors and politics: Meaning-making during the 2021 German floods

On 14 July 2021, the western states of Germany, Rheinland Palatinate and North-Rhein-Westphalia experienced major flash floods and about two hundred people died. This article explores how those affected and journalists they spoke to created meaning from the mayhem of an unprecedented disaster and how social representations of flooding emerged in which language, politics and values were intimately intertwined. Combining thematic analysis with elements of social representations theory, and analysing a sample of articles from a national news magazine, we show how social representations of the floods were shaped by the objectification of the floods through metonymy (mud and debris) and the anchoring of the floods through personification and metaphors (natural and mechanical forces), thus adding a new dimension to the existing body of work on flood and metaphors. We claim that the immediate focus on the extreme force of the 2021 floods, on the one hand, and the weakness of political response, on the other, may entrench feelings of helplessness and divert attention away from more systematic and long-term engagement with flood dangers in the context of climate change, including extreme weather events.

Does media coverage of fake news affect citizens’ reactions to misinformation and its correction?

During the 2016 US presidential election campaign, interest in fake news surged among political elites, media, and mass publics. This raises the question of how general awareness of fake news affects information processing by citizens. We address this deficit by theorizing about the consequences of awareness of fake news for receptivity to misinformation. We hypothesize that individuals induced to be more aware of fake news will be less likely to update beliefs and attitudes in response to information from news media. We test this theoretical expectation in a pre-registered experiment in cooperation with a national news magazine in Denmark. Results suggest that contrary to the hypothesis, primed and unprimed respondents react similarly. In both groups, misinformation affects approval of a fictional politician in the predicted direction, and a subsequent correction fully cancels out the initial effect of misinformation. The results suggest that the risk of fake news fatigue is limited and media outlets can discuss the phenomenon of fake news in general as well as present concrete factual corrections with little risk of engendering additional media skepticism.

Stakeholders’ Perceptions of Chinese Takeovers: The Case of Germany and Italy (Evidence from the National Press)

Objective: Italy and Germany are two large economies of the European Union. However, they differ with regard to culture, business environment structure, as well as social and political concerns. This paper focuses on how Chinese takeovers are perceived by stakeholders as reflected in the national press in Italy and Germany, and compares stakeholders’ perceptions in two major national news magazines. Method: Stakeholders’ perceptions were retrieved by adopting a qualitative approach which unfolds in a detailed and specific procedure. The textual elements referring to perceptions were categorized on the basis of specific questions. To ensure objectivity, the authors carried out independent reading and rating and the assessment of positive, neutral, and negative perceptions. Results: The German government highlights the growing awareness of a one-sided technology drain, while the Italian tends to perceive China as a negative investor. German and Italian shareholders have positive perceptions due to economic benefits. However, employees seem to have no voice. Conclusions: Factors related to national culture and business environments may be due to the fact that employees have no voice in the national press articles. Contributions: This study contributes to interpreting the phenomenon host country stakeholders, especially employees, who are under-represented.

Skating on White ice: the US media’s representation of Asian/American and Asian female skaters from the mid-2000s to the early 2010s

This article examines how some in the American media covered the emergence of Asian and Asian American athletes in the historically White-dominated sport of figure skating. Utilizing McDonald and Birrell’s Reading Sport Critically approach, we analyzed a variety of major national newspapers, news magazines, sports magazines and periodicals to determine what narratives and beliefs were conveyed to explain the successes of Asian and Asian/American skaters, and the subsequent decline of American skaters. Our results show that some American media members struggled in describing this phenomenon, in that they utilized an essentialist racial lens and viewed the sport as a White space that was experiencing an ‘Asian Invasion’. The findings of this paper add to the race and gender discrimination in sport literature by describing the process that a historically dominant power group (Whites) employed as Asian and Asian American figure skaters started to dominate their White space.

HALAMAN MUKA MAJALAH TEMPO (Studi Analisis isi Perbedaan Halaman Muka Sebagai Representasi Tajuk Utama Majalah Tempo Edisi Tahun 1993/1994 dengan Tahun 2009/2010)

Abstrak Tidak ada yang lebih penting dari sebuah majalah selain halaman mukanya. Sebuah halaman muka menentukan pandangan pertama yang nantinya juga akan mempengaruhi minat baca dari khalayak. Bagi media cetak yang sadar akan arti pentingya, halaman muka didesain sedemikian rupa hingga menjadi sebuah desain sederhana namun kompetitif dan menarik sekaligus mencerminkan filosofi dari media tersebut. Selanjutnya, sebuah teori pendekatan lingkungan menyatakan bahwa sampai pada tingkat tertentu, sistem politik berpengaruh pada komunikasi begitupun sebaliknya. Teori semacam ini menjelaskan bahwa dengan kebijakan-kebijakan yang dilahirkan pada sebuah sistem politik, hingga tingkat tertentu berpengaruh pada pemberitaan sebuah media. Berdasarkan uraian tersebut, masalah yang diangkat dalam penelitian ini adalah bagaimana kecenderungan pemberitaan majalah berita nasional Tempo yang dapat dilihat dari bagian halaman mukanya pada dua periode yang memiliki karakteristik sistem politik yang berseberangan di Indonesia Kata kunci: Media, Politik, Konten Analisis. Abstract None of the magazine’s part which as important as its cover. The magazine covers determine the people’s first impression futhermore will influence their interest to read. For the press media who realize the importances, the covers will be designed as a simple but competitive and interesting design which representating the media’s philosophy. Futhermore, the theory of Environment states that until specific level, political system influences communication vise versa. This theory describes that the governement policy which is born in a political system, until a specific level, influences the news release. Base from the states, the problem of this research is the preference of Tempo the national news magazine’s news release which can be seen from its covers at two periods which has different political system’s characteristic in Indonesia. Keywords: Media, Politik, Content Analysis

Verbal and visual signifiers of advertising shares offers in Nigeria’s 2005 bank recapitalisation

This article examines the interactions of verbal and visual signifiers to advertise shares offers in the 2005 bank recapitalisation in Nigeria. It considers such signifiers as rhetorical devices to influence the prospective subscribers to invest in shares, thereby saving for the proverbial rainy day. Data for the study comprise eight adverts culled from some of Nigeria’s national daily newspapers and news magazines between March and December 2005. Lemke’s multimodal semiotic theory and Barthes’ conception of the interaction of signs as encapsulated in the concepts of ‘anchorage’ and ‘relay’ provide the theoretical perspective for the data analysis. The study reveals that the advertisers creatively blend verbal and visual cues in the discourse largely to elicit certain sensibilities in the readers so as to make them think and act in the direction of the investment offer being touted. Generally, the advertisers’ appropriation of culture-specific issues in the Nigerian context, building a strong and credible brand to enhance the integrity of the respective banks and harping on the exigency of keying into the investment offers, serves as useful rhetorical appeals for the effectiveness of the multimodal semiotic resources in the discourse.

“A Victory for Secular India”? Hindu Nationalism in the 2004 Election

AbstractAt least since the last decade of the 20th century, there has been strong scholarly interest in a perceived global wave of religious nationalism. Critical to that movement was the most important recent development in Indian politics, the rise of the Hindu right. Commentators lamented a fundamental change in the Indian body politic, the demise of India's celebrated secularism. However, others predicted that the Hindu nationalists would be forced to move to the center to gain votes, jettisoning much of their peculiar ideology in the process. The 2004 national parliamentary election was a crucial test of these contending interpretations. Would the Bharatiya Janata Party rely on its established arsenal of communally controversial issues? Would it emphasize themes designed to appeal to a broader audience? Analyzing reports published in national newspapers and news magazines, I will reach the surprising conclusion that the answer to both of these questions is yes.

Overlooking Evidence: Media Ignore Environmental Connections to Breast Cancer

In this article, the author reviews seven years' worth of major news media coverage of the role of environmental pollutants in the etiology of breast cancer. The time frame was 2002-2008 and the outlets studied included prominent newspapers, national news magazines, and network television news programs. Noting that a growing body of private, university, and government environmental health research has implicated a variety of common chemicals and radiation in the disease, the author looked for quantity and quality of coverage of two scientific metastudies during the specified time frame: State of the Evidence: The Connection Between Breast Cancer and the Environment and Environmental Pollutants and Breast Cancer: Epidemiological Studies. She also examined reporting on breast cancer in the month of October ("National Breast Cancer Awareness Month") during the seven years. Despite recent scientific findings, the news media have downplayed and frequently overlooked the evidence. None of the outlets studied covered the State of the Evidence report, and only one covered the Environmental Pollutants report. Breast Cancer Awareness Month similarly saw few articles or newscasts about environmental connections. The author attributes the dearth of coverage to several factors: journalists' lack of awareness about environmental health science, the seemingly higher standards of proof for research findings that implicate chemicals in disease than for other types of scientific research, establishments' lack of acceptance of environmental theories of breast cancer, and economic pressures on news outlets not to alienate their advertisers.

Challenging Islamophobia Through Visual Media Studies: Inquiring Into a Photograph of Muslim Women on the Cover of Canada's National News Magazine

Diane Watt is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Education at the University of Ottawa. She spent much of the decade of the 1990's living with her husband and children in Pakistan, Syria, and Iran. Her research interests include intercultural education, curriculum studies, and media education. Funding for her research has been provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Anointing a New Enemy

Do nations require an adversary? US media coverage of China, as reflected in national news magazines, was analyzed before and after the breakup of the Soviet Union to determine how media portrayed this global power change. China received significantly more coverage after the Soviet Union breakup, and the post-breakup themes and frames about China were significantly different and more negative. This study of coverage related to global power shifts suggests that adversarial political relationships are mirrored in a nation's domestic media and may be necessary for national unity.

US news media coverage of tobacco control issues

Objective: To characterise the relative amount and type of daily newspaper, local and national TV newscast, and national news magazine coverage of tobacco control issues in the United States in...

Psychiatry in the News

Psychiatry in the News

The Movement and the Media: Framing the Debate Over Animal Experimentation

Mass media play an important role in determining both what type of activities a social movement organization engages in and the timing of those activities. In addition, the media help to set the context in which audience attitudes regarding movements are formed. This article examines the connections between the mass media and the animal rights movement in the United States. After discussing media practices and their role in movement activities, the article examines national newsmagazine and television coverage from 1984 to 1993 regarding the debate over animal experimentation. Newsmagazines and television news granted less political standing to challengers and framed events in the same way. However, newsmagazines were more likely to place incidents in broader context and draw connections between events; television presented them in a more isolated manner.

Lesbians' Sexual Activities and Efforts to Reduce Risks for Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Introduction: Little information is available regarding the specific sexual practices of lesbians, and whether these activities may carry an associated health risk. Methods: Self-identified lesbians from all U.S. states (N = 6935) responded to a questionnaire that was printed in a national biweekly gay, lesbian and bisexual news magazine. Items included sexual practices engaged in with women during the past 1 and 5 years, past history of a sexually transmitted disease (STD), number and gender of lifetime and recent sexual partners, concerns regarding STDs, and risk reduction behaviors. Results: Lesbians engaged in a variety of sexual activities with female partners including orogenital sex, use of a dildo, and anilingus. Seventeen percent reported a lifetime diagnosis of an STD. Women with a history of an STD were more likely to be concerned about STDs, to ask questions of their new female sexual partners, and to have had an HIV test. Conclusions: Lesbians participate in a variety of sexual activities with their female partners that involve the exchange of body fluids, potential exposure to blood, and genital and anal stimulation that may put them at risk for STDs.

Influence of Agricultural Trade Publications on the News Agendas of National Newspapers and News Magazines

Influence of Agricultural Trade Publications on the News Agendas of National Newspapers and News Magazines

Lesbians' sexual history with men: implications for taking a sexual history.

Health care providers may not solicit a comprehensive sexual history from lesbian patients because of provider assumptions that lesbians have not been sexually active with men. We performed this study to assess whether women who identify themselves as lesbians have a history of sexual activities with men that have implications for receipt of preventive health screening. To convey the importance for health care providers to know their patients' sexual history when making appropriate recommendations for preventive health care. A survey was printed in a national news magazine aimed at homosexual men, lesbians, and bisexual men and women. The sample included 6935 self-identified lesbians from all 50 US states. The outcomes we measured were respondents' number of lifetime male sexual partners and partners during the past year, their lifetime history of specific sexual activities (e.g., vaginal intercourse, anal intercourse), their lifetime condom use, and their lifetime history of sexually transmitted diseases. Of respondents, 77.3% had 1 or more lifetime male sexual partners, 70.5% had a lifetime history of vaginal intercourse, 17.2% had a lifetime history of anal intercourse, and 17.2% had a lifetime history of a sexually transmitted disease. Exactly 5.7% reported having had a male sexual partner during the past year. These findings reinforce the need for providers to know their patients' sexual history regardless of their reported sexual orientation, especially with regard to recommendations for Papanicolaou smears and screening for sexually transmitted diseases.

The Persian Gulf Conflict and the Vanishing Hostages

After the Gulf War of 1991, no one bothered to formally announce the public disappearance of the American hostages held in Iraq and Kuwait. A courageous group, they had numbered more than 3,000. Many of pictures had appeared in national news magazines. While held, yellow ribbons had temporarily sprouted for them on trees, mailboxes, In store fronts, on light posts. Their stories were often told,(1) especially when they could relate a story of terrified hiding and resourceful escape.(2) They all returned by the Christmas season of 1990 and have thereafter remained invisible.(3) Americans cared about them while they were in danger, thrilled at the occasional story of escape, experienced relief at their safe return during Christmas season of 1990--then seemed to quickly forget them. Saddam Hussein had apparently intended to use them as human shields for a few weeks during critical stages of preparation for battle, then responded to worldwide pressure for their release.Even those who had been mere children just a decade earlier could remember the Iran Hostage Crisis of 1979-81, when daily expressions of outrage constantly interrupted network television programming. Adults would remember the 52 returning embassy personnel who were welcomed and housed at West Point, displayed at a massive White House reception, interviewed on talk shows, paraded through their home towns and invited to give inspirational speeches or to write books.Not this time. The yellow ribbon loyalties had moved on by the time the Gulf hostages came home. The successful military support group Operation Yellow Ribbon had already begin to use the symbol to show emotional support for the armed services and to rally contributions for a national 800 hotline.(4) When Franklin Mint fired its numbered, 24-karat gold Home Coming Limited Edition Collector Plate, with its long Yellow ribbon and American flag, it was strictly a tribute to the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces.(5) People magazine's Commemorative Issue, festooned with a yellow ribbon, featured Heroes of the War: The Fifteen Most Intriguing People. Not a hostage among them.Following more than ten years of civilian service, one of our most distinctive and unifying patriotic symbols had thus been recalled for military duty as quickly as the war front itself had appeared. The hostages received, so to speak, an honorable discharge from the duties performed by the hostages who had come back from Iran, from TWA Flight 847 (1985), from the Achille Lauro cruise ship (1985), and from Lebanon at various times during the 1980s. The latest captives from the Gulf were loved, welcomed locally, well thought of, but they were no longer national heroes. Culturally speaking, they were dead.If they felt confused about their evaporated fame, the rest of us can also admit disorientation. Hostages had become such familiar part of our public space. How could they so quickly disappear from their dominance in our journalism, in our hearts, and in out civic rituals? The puzzle intensified when the returning hostages of Lebanon--Alann Steen, Terry Anderson, Thomas Sutherland--were all invited to a White House Christmas tree ceremony in December of 1991. They continue to be cast in 1992 as parade marshalls and other roles that make them ceremonial centerpieces.To explain this anomaly, and to account for the fading of the Gulf hostage, I present a brief chronology of some important events that have defined the status of the civilian hostage in recent American ritual life. I end with a description of how the military, at the moment of their danger and victory, overshadowed the hostages. Yet the nation's way of representing and responding to the military experience borrowed liberally from the hostage tradition of the 1980s.1. CAPTIVITY AS AMERICAN NATIONAL STORYCaptivity has always been a gripping story for us. Our national literature began with the narratives of Mary Rowlandson and John Williams, who described their experiences of being held among Native Americans. …

The Ambivalent Minority: Mexican Americans and the Voting Rights Act

In the countless conversations about U.S. immigration policy that I have had with Mexican Americans of varied backgrounds and political orientations, seldom have my interlocutors failed to remind me that “We were here first,” or that “This was our land and you stole it from us.” Even a moderate Mexican American politician like former San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros sounds the same theme in a national news magazine:It is no accident that these regions have the names they do—Los Angeles, San Francisco, Colorado, Montana.…It is a rich history that Americans have been led to believe is an immigrant story when, in fact, the people who built this area in the first place were Hispanics.

The Future of news: television-newspapers-wire services-newsmagazines

Will shrinking budgets and growing competition force network television news to compromise program quality? Can big-city newspapers improve circulation in the audiences advertisers want to reach? Will the wire services diversify into other areas of communications technology? What changes lie ahead for nation newsmagazines? In The Future of News, top media experts offer a probing analysis of the news business today and its place in American culture tomorrow. Charting the past decade's media trends, the authors show how an increasing segment of the population is rejecting broadly targeted media packages in favor of more focused, specialized information. Television network news producers, for example, face a growing viewer preference for cable news services, attention-grabbing local news programs, and lurid infotainment shows often broadcast by the networks own affiliates. At the same time, urban newspapers and national newsmagazines are losing readers-and revenues-despite increased news and feature coverage and frequent graphic makeovers. And with the advent of new, competing technologies, the nation's wire services also face an uncertain future. Analyzing these and other trends, The Future of News offers a thoughtful and provocative preview of the media's role in the coming century.

Reel Life Performance: The Disney-MGM Studios

In May 1989, with much fanfare, including a prime-time television special and features in the national newsmagazines, The Walt Disney Company opened its newest attraction at the sprawling Disney World complex in central Florida. The Disney-MGM Studios is the first theme park that is also a functional motion picture studio. In a meticulously rendered environmental homage to the art deco/art moderne architecture of Hollywood in the 1930s, the park presents a mixture of performances, rides, tours, films, and demonstrations of movie technology and its by-products. The MGM part of the park's name would seem to imply ajoint venture, but is merely part of a licensing agreement permitting Disney to utilize characters and scenes from MGM films. The park's design and execution was done almost entirely by Disney staff, except for two attractions designed with the assistance of George Lucas and his special effects company, Industrial Light and Magic. Disney-MGM Studios is divided into two sections, with the conventional theme park portion occupying approximately 40 percent of the space and the working studios making up the balance. Although it is a working film and television production facility, with huge soundstages, backlots, and postproduction spaces, the studios are set up to allow for a constant flow of tourists, who view both prearranged events and actual film and tape work. Judging from the length of the lines during my visit, Disney was right to assume that its production work would be of great interest.