Roma people in French and Swedish newspapers : An analysis of Roma's issue in France

• Main Author: Karimunda, Belyse
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Stockholms universitet, Institutionen för journalistik, medier och kommunikation (JMK) 2011
• Subjects: Roma people; Media and communication studies; Medie- och kommunikationsvetenskap
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-59222

The expulsion of Roma people from France during summer of 2010 was one of the most broadcasted events in media around the world. Since the 19th of August, several hundreds of Roma have been forced by the French government to return in Romania and Bulgaria. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how the issue of Roma in France has been conducted in the French newspaper “Le Monde” and in the Swedish newspaper “Dagens Nyheter” from July 16 to September 19, 2010. This study proposes the use of a quantitative content analysis and the qualitative critical discourse analysis as research methods in order to achieve the objectives of this thesis. Several earlier academic researches confirm that Roma’s discrimination started a long time ago. And this thesis has procured facts that allowed me to make a generalisation about this specific issue around Roma people in France. This thesis concludes that there was not a reporting balance in how the two studied newspapers presented the main actors who were involved in the Roma’s issue since the journalists relied mostly on the official sources. This situation led to a more or less biased coverage of the issue where the voices of French authorities and official sources were overrepresented more than Roma people. Consequently, the Roma minority’s voice was not heard in media even though powerful institutions were involved in the issue by taking their side. Moreover, my study shows that it is difficult to have a balanced media reporting during an ongoing conflict especially between one majority group with power and access to media and another group of minority without power and access to media.