Imagery and social representations of the Coronavirus pandemic in East African press: A critical content analysis of The East African newspaper
Downloads
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to be a phenomenon intersecting different parts of the world. The East African Community which prides itself for enabling socio-economic, political and cultural integration between its member states has had to deal with uncertainties caused by misinformation about the pandemic, which in turn threaten to derail its objectives. In line with this, The East African newspaper stands out as a leading provider of information concerning each of the countries in the community. And although a report in the MarketWatch (2023) indicates that the World Health Organization expects to declare end of the pandemic some time in 2023 as the virus has become more like seasonal flu, The East African newspaper which has established itself as a leading provider of information covering the five (5) member states of the East African Community has continually reported on the pandemic. How this publication represents the pandemic can influence how its readers understand it. Thus, guided by the Social Representation Theory (SRT) and employing a critical content analysis approach, this paper examines how the newspaper uses imagery in creating social representations about the pandemic. This study contributes to the discourse of media representations of pandemics.
Downloads
Adams, J., G. and Walls, R., M. (2020), ‘Supporting the health care workforce during the COVID-19 global epidemic’, https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2763136. Accessed 18 August 2020.
Ahir, H., Bloom, N. and Furceri, D. (2020), ‘Global Uncertainty Related to Coronavirus at Record High’, https://blogs.imf.org/2020/04/04/global-uncertainty-related-to-coronavirus-at-record-high/. Accessed 18 August 2020.
Bavel, J.J.V., Baicker, K., Boggio, P.S. et al. (2020), ‘Using social and behavioural science to support COVID-19 pandemic response’, Nat Hum Behav, 4:1 pp.460–471.
Billig, M. (1993), ‘Studying the thinking society: Social representations, rhetoric, and attitudes’, in: G.M. Breakwell and D.V. Canter (eds), Empirical Approaches to Social Representations, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 39-62.
Bleiker, R. and Kay, A. (2007), ‘Representing HIV/AIDS in Africa: Pluralist Photography and Local Empowerment’, International Studies Quarterly, 51, pp.139–163.
Cohn, S. K. (2012), ‘Pandemics: waves of disease, waves of hate from the Plague of Athens to A.I.D.S’, Hist. J, 85, pp.535–555.
Crum, A. J., Salovey, P. and Achor, S. (2013), ‘Rethinking stress: the role of mindsets in determining the stress response’, J. Pers. Soc. Psychol, 104, pp.716–733.
Davis, M. (2014), ‘"Is it going to be real?" Narrative and media on a pandemic’, https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01160761/document. Accessed 01 August 2020.
Dor, D. (2003), ‘Newspaper headlines as relevance optimizers’, Journal of Pragmatics, 35:5 pp.695–721.
Dor, D. (2003), ‘Newspaper headlines as relevance optimizers’, Journal of Pragmatics, 35:5 pp.695–721.
East African Community (EAC), ‘Overview of East African Community’, eac.int/overview-of-eac. Accessed 20 April 2020.
Ecker, U. K. H., Lewandowsky, S., Chang, E. P., and Pillai, R. (2014), ‘The effects of subtle misinformation in news headlines’, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 20:4, pp 323–335.
Engel, D. M. (2008), ‘Every picture tells a story: the language and function of French newspaper captions’, http://wjfms.ncl.ac.uk/engel.pdf. Accessed 18 August 2020.
Garza, A. (2020), ‘How Social Media Is Shaping Our Fears of — and Response to — the Coronavirus’, https://time.com/5802802/social-media-coronavirus/. Accessed 18 August 2020.
Graber, D. (1996), ‘Say it with pictures’, The Annals of the American Academy, 546, pp.85-96.
Polli, G. M. and Camargo, B. V. (2015), ‘Social Representations of the Environment in Press Media’, Paidéia may-aug., 25:61, pp.261-269.
Hier, S., and Greenberg. J. (2002), ‘Constructing a discursive crisis: Risk, problematization and illegal Chinese in Canada’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 25:3 pp.490-513.
Höijer, B. (2011), ‘Emotional anchoring and objectification in the media reporting on climate change’, Public Understanding of Science, 19:6, pp. 717-731.
Ifantidou, E. (2009), ‘Newspaper headlines and relevance: Ad hoc concepts in ad hoc contexts’, Journal of Pragmatics, 41, pp. 699-720.
Jacobs, S. and Schillemans, T. (2016), ‘Media and public accountability: typology and Exploration’, Policy & Politics, 44:1, pp.23-40(18).
Jodelet, D. (2008), ‘Social representations: The beautiful invention’, Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 38, pp. 411-430.
Joffé, H. (2008), ‘The power of visual material: persuasion, emotion and identification’, Diogenes, 55, pp.84-93.
Khan, N. and Naushad, M. (2020), ‘Effects of corona virus on the world community’, https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3532001. Accessed 18 August 2020.
Khan, S., Ali, A., Siddique, R. and Nabi, G. (2020), ‘Novel Coronavirus is putting the whole world on alert’, J Hosp Infect, 104:3, pp.252-253.
Ling, G. and Chyong, C. (2020), ‘Effects of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic on Social Behaviours: From a Social Dilemma Perspective’, Technium Social Sciences Journal, 7, pp.312-320.
Logaldo, M. (2017), “The Last Laugh?” A Multimodal Analysis of Captions in Photojournalism’, Pólemos, 11:1, pp.247–266.
Magoti, R. (2020), ‘Responding to the COVID-19 pandemic in Tanzania: The role of solidarity, national unity and peace’, https://kujenga-amani.ssrc.org/2020/07/09/responding-to-the-covid-19-pandemic-in-tanzania-the-role-of-solidarity-national-unity-and-peace/. Accessed: 10 August 2020.
Marková, I. (2003), ‘Dialogicality and social representations. The dynamics of mind’, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
MacGregor, H., Leach, M., Wilkinson, A. and Parker, M. (2020), ‘Covid-19 – a social phenomenon requiring diverse expertise’, https://www.ids.ac.uk/opinions/covid-19-a-social-phenomenon-requiring-diverse-expertise/. Accessed: 20 August 2020.
MarketWatch (2023) Coronavirus Update, accessed from: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/who-expects-to-declare-end-to-pandemic-sometime-in-2023-as-virus-becomes-more-like-seasonal-flu-2bc4b80c
Mejia, C.R, Ticona, D., Rodriguez-Alarcon, J.F., Campos-Urbina, A.M., Catay-Medina, J.B., Porta-Quinto, T et al. (2020), ‘The media and their informative role in the face of the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID19): Validation of fear perception and magnitude of the issue (med-COVID-19)’, Electron J Gen Med, 17:6, pp.239.
Mian, A. and Khan, S. (2020), ‘Coronavirus: the spread of misinformation’, BMC Med, 18, pp.89.
Moscovici, S. (1973), ‘Foreword’, in C. Herzlich (eds), Health and Illness: A Social psychological analysis, London: Academic Press, pp. 13.
Moscovici, S. (2001), ‘Why a theory of social representations?’, in K. Deaux & G. Philogéne, (eds), Representations of the Social, Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, pp.8- 35.
Olausson, U. (2010), ‘Towards a European Identity? The news media and the case of climate change’, European Journal of Communication, 25:14, pp.138-152.
Ogbogu, U. and Hardcastle, L. (2020), ‘Media representations of COVID-19 public health policies: assessing the portrayal of essential health services in Canadian print media’, DOI: https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-32604/v1. Accessed 20 August 2020.
Ross, T. (2019), ‘Media and Stereotypes’, The Palgrave Handbook of Ethnicity, https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-981-13-0242-8_26-1. Accessed 18 August 2020.
Russell, A. (2020), ‘The rise of Coronavirus hate crimes’, The New Yorker, 17 March. https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-the-uk/the-rise-of-coronavirus-hate-crimes. Accessed 16 August 2020.
Saberi, D. and Heng, C. S. (2014), ‘Snapshots of the relationship between photo, caption and headline in news articles on food’, Journal of Language and Communication, 2:2, pp.183-194.
Sambhav, S. (2020), ‘Role of Mass Media & Communication During Pandemic COVID'19’, International Journal of Creative Research Thoughts, 8:5, ISSN: 2320-28820.
Schillemans, T. (2012), ‘Mediatization of public services: How public organizations adapt to news media’, Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
Schudson, M. (2003), ‘The Sociology of News’, New York: W. W. Norton.
Thayer, C. and Skufca, L. (2019), ‘Media Image Landscape: Age Representation in Online Images’, https://doi.org/10.26419/res.00339.001. Accessed: 14 August 2020.
The East African Newspaper. https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/.
The Nation Media Group. https://www.nationmedia.com/brands/the-east-african/
Utt, J. and Short, K.G. (2018), ‘Critical Content Analysis: A Flexible Method for Thinking with Theory’, Understanding and Dismantling Privilege, ISSN:2152-1875, Volume VIII, Issue 2.
Van Dijk, T.A. (2000), ‘New(s) racism: A discourse analytical approach’, in S. Cottle (Eds), Ethnic minorities and the media, Philadelphia: Open University Press, pp. 33-49.
Vinck, P., Pham, P. N., Bindu, K. K., Bedford, J. and Nilles, E. J. (2019), ‘Institutional trust and misinformation in the response to the 2018–19 Ebola outbreak in North Kivu, DR Congo: a population-based survey’, The lancet infectious diseases,19:5, pp.529-536.
World Health Organization (WHOa). (2020), ‘Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) situation reports. 2020’, https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/situation-reports. Accessed 20 April 2020; 31 July 2020; 10 August 2020.
World Health Organization (WHOb). (2020), ‘Mental health and psychosocial considerations during the COVID-19 outbreak. Advice and guidance from WHO on COVID-1’, https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019. Accessed 15 July 2020.
World Health Organization (WHOc). (2020), ‘Communicating risk in public health emergencies. WHO guideline for Emergency Risk Communication (ERC) policy and practice’, https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/259807/9789241550208eng.pdf; jsessionid=D6796FA0ECAD7D6A4E4C5456A762BDB2?sequence=2. Accessed 22 April 2020.
Wong, A. H., Roppolo, L. P., Chang, B.P., Yonkers, K. A., Wilson, M. P., Powsner, S et al. (2020), ‘Management of Agitation During the COVID-19 Pandemic’, The Western Journal of Emergency Medicine, 21:4, pp.795-800.
Copyright (c) 2023 Benard Kodak, Juliet Atieno Oduor
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.