‘A Night of Shame’: A Quantitative Content Analysis of Newspaper Narratives of the Mass Molestation Event in Bangalore, India (original) (raw)
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Poetics, 2019
, a young girl was brutally gang-raped on a bus in New Delhi, the capital city of India. In the aftermath of this event, reporting and discourse on sexual harassment surged within the media there. This study uses topic modeling, a type of statistical model in machine learning, to conduct a longitudinal analysis comparing the framing of rape in the English language press in India before and after the 2012 gang-rape. Especially relying on the difference between 'episodic' and 'thematic' frames, the study finds a significant rise in 'episodic' frames in the immediate aftermath of this trigger event. However, it also observes 'thematic' frames and an evolution to more accurate reporting on causes of gender violence in the long run. The study further presents a discussion on the various factors that may have influenced frame-building over time. 1. Introduction A group of young girls in a medical college in Mumbai, India's financial capital, sat around a cafeteria table in December 2012 discussing the latest event in the news 1. A 23-year old girl had been gang-raped in a moving bus in the capital city of New Delhi by six men, and had died 13 days later due to the physical abuse inflicted upon her. The girls in the college discussed how such an incident could have easily happened to any of them-like the victim, they too were students, lived in a big Indian city, and could have been returning home on the bus after watching the latest English movie, Life of Pi. According to the National Crime Records Bureau of India, approximately 88% of rapes in India take place in rural India 2 , and hence normally receive little attention in the English press. India's stark rural-urban divide manifests itself in various aspects, including in the media. Nearly 70% of the population lives in the villages, speaks in over 700 languages, and reads a variety of regional and local newspapers 3. The English-speaking population is almost entirely focused in urban India, where the middle to upper class study in English-medium schools and speak this as their first or second language. Thus, it is no surprise that 70% of the readership for the largest English newspaper, the Times of India, comes from the 8 largest cities 4 , and largely focuses urban issues.
A Media Framing Analysis: The Coverage of Rape in Indian and Western News Sources
Journal of South Asian Studies, 2018
The media is an integral segment of public knowledge sources and can wield powerful influence, particularly in the dissemination of political and legislative information. The purpose of this study is to acknowledge the essential nature of the media, and to provide awareness that all media information contains subjective judgments, some of these judgments arising from media framing techniques, or the context and rationale provided by news sources that account for and help explain the purpose for the event that is being reported or commented upon. This investigation analyzes a selection of news sources from within India as well as correlating western sources (United Kingdom, United States) from December 2012 (starting with the original reporting of the New Delhi rape case) to February 2014, for the purpose of identifying the media framing techniques that were developed during and after the New Delhi case. This paper also asks how those techniques have contributed to progressive legisl...
Asian Review of Social Sciences, 2019
Newspapers are considered the important platforms to mobilise and sensitise the people regarding different social issues. The issues of the women, their rights and atrocities meted out against them, need to be raised in various forums including the newspapers. This study is aimed at understanding news media's agenda on issues related to women with specific reference to sexual violence meted out against them. To analyse the coverage of the issues relating to sexual violence against women, two mainstream national English dailies. The Indian Express and The Times of India were purposively chosen. The systematic random sampling technique was employed to select the contents published in the newspapers between 01 January to 30 June 2017. It was revealed that the newspapers had given more prominence to negative aspects of women's issues and presented their image as a consumable product. There has been a little variance in tonality and resonance of reporting between the two newspapers under study. The findings also reveal that there are numerous incidents of sexual harassment against women to which the newspapers paid scant attention and it seems that they are not in the news agenda. Most of the times, the news stories pertaining to women's rights were presented in negative frames. Keywords: Women’s Rights, Content Analysis, Framing, The Times of India, The Indian Express, Sexual Violence
Coverage of Rape Cases in Media with Special Reference to ‘Nirbhaya’ Gangrape
Dialogue Quarterly, 2020
Press is considered the fourth pillar of any democratic setup. India is a democratic country; therefore, newspapers in Delhi play an agendasetting role in the country. The cases of rape are ubiquitous phenomenon and reported every day in newspapers. A 23-year-old female was brutally raped and murdered by six adult men and one 17 years old juvenile in the year 2012 in Delhi. This brutal gang rape attracted media headlines not only in India but across the world due to its horrific nature in which the crime was committed. The present research paper attempts to understand the representation of rape in newspapers with special reference to Delhi gang rape case. The researcher has also conducted comparative analysis of representation of high-profile rape cases and normal rape cases. To analyze the reports the data were collected from three Hindi and three English newspapers namely Dainik Jagran, Hindustan, Dainik Bhaskar, The Times of India, The Tribune and The Hindu published from Dehradun. The researchers used electronic version of editions for the study. All the news items were read and re-read carefully and analyzed thematically. The study shows that newspapers highlight those stories and give extensive coverage to those rape incidents which have elements of sympathy, public apathy and exposure of such incidents by means of protests.
Indian Media Framings of Rape and Sexual Violence in the Aftermath of the 2012 Delhi Gang Rape
My thesis investigates media narratives that shape four high profile rape cases from 2012 - 2014, beginning with the 2012 Delhi gang rape. Through a content analysis of English-language print news articles, I examine trends that arise in the midst of intensifying national debates surrounding women’s roles in India. Mass media is complicit in certain framings by finding relevance in “rape exceptionalism”, constructions of the “victim” and the “rapist”, and politics of the “blame game” surrounding these cases of sexual violence.
Representation of Crime against Women in Print Media: A Case Study of Delhi Gang Rape
Anthropology, 2013
The cases of rape and other crimes committed against women are reported in media every day. The fatal gang rape of a 23 year old woman on a moving bus in the National capital of India captured media headlines not only in India but across the world due to the horrific manner in which this crime was committed. The present research paper attempts to understand the representation of crime against women in print media with special reference to Delhi gang rape case and also how the young Indian women feels about representation of such incidences in media. The data is collected from four newspapers, The Times of India, The Tribune, Indian Express and Hindustan Times published from Chandigarh from the first reporting of case till date. All the news items were read and re-read carefully and analysed thematically. The primary data was also collected among the 50 young women studying at Panjab University, Chandigarh, India to know about their views regarding the portrayal of crime against women in Indian print media with special reference to Delhi gang rape case. It can be concluded that media needs to be more sensitive towards coverage of crime against women and general public needs to be more vocal and aware to deal with these cases in more effective manner.
Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, 2017
The way in which the news media frame child sexual abuse can influence public perception. This content analysis of the child sexual abuse coverage of eight national news organizations in the United States from 2002 to 2012 includes the two dominant events of the Catholic Church and Pennsylvania State University child sexual abuse scandals. Census and systematic stratified sampling techniques were applied to articles obtained from the Lexis/Nexis Academic database, resulting in a sample of 503 articles. Intercoder reliability was ensured by double coding a randomly selected sample. Study findings indicate a shift in the attribution of responsibility of child sexual abuse among news organizations over the past decade from an individual-level problem with individual-level solutions to a societal-level problem with institutional culpability. Nevertheless, individual-level solutions continue to be framed as the best possible solution.
Notes for the Media: Ordinary Indians, on the reporting of sexual violence
2020
That said, there is still no comprehensive book or report that analyses how the media in India cover these subjects and how reporters and editors themselves, through inherent or unconscious bias, perpetuate the status quo. This book, therefore, is the first of its kind. Notes for the Media is a highly readable compilation of a wide cross-section of opinion on sexual violence, how the media cover it, and what needs to be done. I hope it helps young journalists to reexamine the concept of rape culture in India and reassess their approach to covering sexual violence-to go beyond spot reporting the immediate story and beyond clickbait to embrace empathy, neutrality, sensitivity, and context. The approach is neither preachy nor overly instructive. It is an attempt to hold up a mirror to those of the journalistic tribe who like to tell society what it looks like. In this book, it is journalists who are subject to scrutiny, warts and all. Let the chips fall where they may.