Abstract

BELIM, Célia  and  SIMOES, Artur. They Are Represented in the Media; Therefore They Exist: Hong Kong Protests in 2019 in Correio da Manhã and Jornal de Notícias. Comunicação e Sociedade [online]. 2022, vol.42, pp.27-48.  Epub Feb 25, 2023. ISSN 1645-2089.  https://doi.org/10.17231/comsoc.42(2022).4001.

This article seeks to understand how Correio da Manhã (CM) and Jornal de Notícias (JN) represent the Hong Kong protests between March 31 and November 29, 2019, by understanding the agenda surrounding their representation and identifying framings. Through content analysis, the results suggest a mainly neutral perspective of both newspapers, denoting a slight pro-government bias in JN and pro-democracy bias in CM. There is also a difference in the selection of sources: JN included sources in almost 75% of its news pieces, preferring anti-protest sources, whereas CM named sources in almost 60% of its pieces, with a tendency to select pro-protest sources. However, in both newspapers, there is a description of a violent scenario from both protesters and the government. The causes of the protests are almost entirely attributed to the government or individuals in Hong Kong, with rare attributions to external elements. Hong Kong and its citizens are also blamed for resolving the protests. There is a tendency towards a negative description of the government and, to a lesser extent, the protesters. Statistically significant associations are identified between newspaper and source; newspaper and mention of the protest causes; sources and description of protesters’ behaviour; description of protesters’ behaviour and mention of the protest causes.

Keywords : media representation; Hong Kong protests; protest paradigm; Correio da Manhã; Jornal de Notícias.

        · abstract in Portuguese     · text in English | Portuguese     · English ( pdf ) | Portuguese ( pdf )