Search results

Domestic & international newspapers' coverage of the 1998 US Embassy bombings in Kenya & Tanzania & the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against the US is studied to determine whether local & cultural determinants affected the media's use of news frames in reporting these events. An overview of various potential influences on media coverage of terrorist attacks, eg, whether the event affected a local/domestic or international audience, is presented. Newspaper articles published in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Nairobi News Nation, & the Dar Es Salaam Daily News that covered the 1998 & 2001 terrorist attacks were analyzed to determine the extent of coverage dedicated to each event, the location of such news stories within their respective publications, & the cultural influences upon news coverage. Several findings are presented; for instance, it is revealed that all newspapers provided greater coverage for local terrorist attacks & that the US news media generally emphasized how these events, especially the 1998 terrorist attacks, affected the US while overlooking their impact upon African politics. In fact, it is concluded that both the US & African newspapers' coverage of the aforementioned events exhibited signs of ethnocentrism. 3 Tables, 3 Figures, 21 References. J. W. Parker

In the modern era, presidential public addresses have become important political tools, but need favorable media coverage to succeed. Yet little is known about how media cover these events. This study examines New York Times coverage of State of the Union Messages to test four sets of possible influences on the press—objective reality, liberal bias, the "credibility gap," and "news" biases toward the "game" of politics. It finds the news biases to be the most powerful explanation, indicating that the political "state of the President" determines the tone of coverage more than a liberal bias, the "credibility gap" of recent years, or even the "actual" state of the union itself.

Abstract
This study utilizes a comparative, content analysis of coverage of the Obama 'Birther' controversy from 2008 to 2012 in newspapers from relevant geographic locales – Hawaii, Kenya and Washington, DC – in order to determine whether and how localism impacted the framing and portrayal of the dispute to different audiences, as well as to see how responsibly journalists treated this topic. There were geographic differences in the amount and nature of coverage, though all the outlets gave more space to the anti-Obama side than the President's. In other respects, however, the Kenyan and Hawaiian papers appeared to be more factual and responsible in debunking the false claims about Obama's birthplace, while the DC papers viewed it more as a political conflict. The article concludes that while localism can lead to more responsible journalism, the case may instead suggest that media organizations are driven by audience more than truth concerns, even in coverage of conspiracy theories.