Media plays a significant role in people’s daily life, as it is the first lens through which people see events and phenomena happening worldwide. This research aims to investigate how Al-Jazeera (AJ) and Le Monde (LM) portray and frame the victims and perpetrators of the Charlie Hebdo attack on the 7th of January 2015. The process of framing and representation are investigated as to whether there are similarities and/or differences in the identities of victims and perpetrators between AJ and LM. Adopting a social constructivist perspective and by using Entman’s framing theory, along with both social representation theory and social identity theory. A qualitative content analysis is conducted. The findings indicate certain similarities in how these two media outlets frame the victims and the perpetrators of the terrorist attack on Charlie Hebdo such as arguing that the perpetrators’ action does not represent Islam. Both medias also try to create a certain level of proximity with the victims. When it comes to the framing of the perpetrators, more differences appear: while AJ frames them as heroes avenging the prophet, LM framed them as stupid people making unprofessional mistakes.

A Research Report submitted to the Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, Applied Ethics for Professionals, September 2017 / The cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad on the front cover of various issues of the French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, leading up to the 2015 terrorist attack have been seen by many to be harmful and offensive. This report argues that, from a liberal perspective, the cartoonists did not do anything morally wrong by publishing these cartoons. In fact, it is argued that the cartoonists were morally justified in publishing these cartoons because they were protecting the liberal value of free speech. I argue that both the act of publishing these cartoons, as well as the actual content of these cartoons were morally justifiable. Arguments against the cartoons pertaining to both harm and offence are proven to be unsound. Furthermore, when balancing the seriousness of the offence with the reasonableness of the cartoons, it becomes clear that the offence is not as serious as some may think. / XL2018