The discourse of climate change: a corpus-based approach

Abstract

Based on Goffman’s definition that frames are general ‘schemata of interpretation’ that people use to ‘locate, perceive, identify, and label’, other scholars have used the concept in a more specific way to analyze media coverage. Frames are used in the sense of organizing devices that allow journalists to select and emphasise topics, to decide ‘what matters’ (Gitlin 1980). Gamson and Modigliani (1989) consider frames as being embedded within ‘media packages’ that can be seen as ‘giving meaning’ to an issue. According to Entman (1993), framing comprises a combination of different activities such as: problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation for the item described. Previous research has analysed climate change with the purpose of testing Downs’s model of the issue attention cycle (Trumbo 1996), to uncover media biases in the US press (Boykoff and Boykoff 2004), to highlight differences between nations (Brossard et al. 2004; Grundmann 2007) or to analyze cultural reconstructions of scientific knowledge (Carvalho and Burgess 2005). In this paper we shall present data from a corpus linguistics-based approach. We will be drawing on results of a pilot study conducted in Spring 2008 based on the Nexis news media archive. Based on comparative data from the US, the UK, France and Germany, we aim to show how the climate change issue has been framed differently in these countries and how this framing indicates differences in national climate change policies.

Divisions: College of Business and Social Sciences > School of Social Sciences & Humanities > Sociology and Policy
College of Business and Social Sciences > School of Social Sciences & Humanities
College of Business and Social Sciences > Aston Business School
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Additional Information: Copyright © 2010
Uncontrolled Keywords: Goffman,media coverage,frames,journalists,problem definition,causal interpretation,moral evaluation,treatment recommendation for the item described,corpus linguistics-based approach,comparative data,US,UK,France,Germany,climate change,national climate change policies
Publication ISSN: 1752-3079
Last Modified: 09 Oct 2024 07:11
Date Deposited: 05 Jan 2011 09:38
Full Text Link: http://www.cada ... olume_4_issue_2
http://cadaad.n ... 10_Grundman.pdf
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PURE Output Type: Article
Published Date: 2010-09
Authors: Grundmann, Reiner
Krishnamurthy, Ramesh

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