The Visual Framing of Romanian migrants in the national press. A social semiotic approach

THE VISUAL FRAMING OF ROMANIAN MIGRANTS

IN THE NATIONAL PRESS:

A SOCIAL SEMIOTIC APPROACH

Understanding Transition III,

Technique and technology in social and intercultural practices

Bucharest, 1-3 July 2015

Bianca-Florentina Cheregi, Doctoral School in Communication Sciences, N.U.P.S.P.A., Bucharest

Ana Adi,Quadriga University of Applied Sciences, Berlin

* The research has been supported by the project “Doctoral and Postdoctoral Fellowships for young researchers in the area of Political Sciences, Administrative Sciences, Communications Sciences and Sociology” (http://postdoctorat.snspa.ro/), taking place at N.U.P.S.P.A., with the financial support of European Social Fund, contract POSDRU/159/1.5/S/134650

http://postdoctorat.snspa.ro/

CONTEXT

Understanding Transition III,Technique and technology in social and intercultural practices,

Bucharest, 1-3 July 2015

CONTEXT


Bucharest 1-3 July, 2015

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

• RQ1: How do the Romanian journalists construct the

social issue of migration visually?

• RQ2: What are the main semiotic resources employed

in the visuals and how are they organized?

• RQ3: What stereotypes about Romanians are

embedded in the news photographs?



ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK

• Migration: a public problem discussed in the media (Boltanski, Cefaï,

Gusfield, 2001);

• Politics of belonging (Yuval-Davis, 2011);

– Research on framing from a visual perspective (Coleman, 2010;

Messaris & Abraham, 2001; Rodriguez and Dimitrova, 2011): media

content that is processed by the eye alone;




• Images – “largely analogical system of communication” (Messaris

& Abraham, 2001);

• Framing - the selection of one view, scene, or angle, when making the

image;

– Most research on visual news frames - visual framing of war (Aday,

2005; Dimitrova & Stromback, 2005; Griffin, 2004; Hartley Major &

Perlmutter, 2005; Pary, 2010; 2011; Schwalbe, 2006; Schwalbe,

Silcock, & Keith, 2008) or natural disasters (Borah, 2009).




• The social semiotic approach to visuals (Bell, 2001; Jewitt & Oyama,

2001; Kress & Van Leeuwen, 1996; Van Leeuwen, 2001) - the inter-

personal semiosis of images;




• Semiotic resources:

– the products of cultural histories and the cognitive resources used

to create meaning in the production and interpretation of visual and

other messages;

• Visuals: independently organized and structured messages;

– 3 ‘metafunctions’ of the visual resources (Kress & van Leeuwen,

1996/2006):

- (1) ‘representational’;

- (2) ‘interactive’ ;

- (3) ‘compositional’.



METHODOLOGY

• Qualitative and social semiotic approach;

– Social semiotic analysis (Bell, 2001; Kress and van

Leeuwen,1996/2006);

• Data collection during 1st of January 2013 – 31st March 2014

– 101 press photographs and captions depicting Romanian

migrants, published in three of the most read Romanian

newspapers (online editions):

- Adevărul (N=74);

- Gândul (N=13);

- Jurnalul Național (N=14);



METHODOLOGY

• 3 categories to analyze news photographs:

1) social distance (Hall, 1966):

- intimate distance (face or head only);

- close personal distance (head and shoulders);

- far personal distance (another person from the waist up)

- close social distance (whole figure);

- far social distance (whole figure and the space around it);

- public distance (torso of at least 4 or 5 people);

2) visual modality (Kress & van Leeuwen, 1996/2006):

- high/medium/low (saturated colors)

3) contact (Kress & van Leeuwen, 1996/2006):

. - ‘offer’/ ‘demand’.



RESULTS – THE VISUAL FRAMING OF ROMANIAN MIGRANTS



Public Security Frame

Economic Frame Employment Frame

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

RESULTS – THE PUBLIC SECURITY FRAME



RESULTS – THE ECONOMIC FRAME



RESULTS – THE EMPLOYMENT FRAME



RESULTS – SOCIAL DISTANCE (CLOSE PERSONAL)



RESULTS – SOCIAL DISTANCE ( PUBLIC)



RESULTS – VISUAL MODALITY



High modality Medium modality

Low modality

RESULTS – CONTACT



‘Offer’ visual frame ‘Demand’ visual frame

DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION

• 3 dominant visual frames of migrants emerging in the Romanian

national press:

– public security (images of homeless Romanians rough sleeping),

– economic (images of pauper Romanian villages) and

– employment (images of job seekers and unemployed) frames;

• Adevărul newspaper: the economic frame (32 news images out of

74);

• Gândul newspaper: the employment frame (7 news images out of

13);

• Jurnalul Național newspaper: the public security frame (9 news

images out of 14). Understanding Transition III,Technique and technology in social and intercultural practices,



• The majority of the news photographs represent Roma people - anti-

Roma discourses found in the Romanian society;

• Romanian migrants are positioned in the shot’s middle and foreground

(especially in the close personal distance frame);




• Under which conditions does a news image work more powerful?

• How do the Romanian journalists visually frame a public issue

(transnational migration) that impacts both the individual and

the society?





Thank you for your attention!

Bianca-Florentina Cheregi,

National University of Political Studies and Public Administration, Bucharest

Email: [email protected]

Ana Adi,

Quadriga University of Applied Sciences, Berlin

Email: [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

The Visual Framing of Romanian migrants in the national press. A social semiotic approach

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