The purpose of this study was to examine how the Swedish sports journalism, tabloids and local newspapers, portrayed the Swedish national football team during the 2018 Russia World Cup and Malmö FF in the 2015/2016 Champions League competition. The main purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between sports journalism and nationality. The question formulations to this study were: how does the sports journalism portray the Swedish national team and Malmö FF, and what are the similarities and differences between Aftonbladets and Sydsvenskans portrayal of the teams?   I made a discourse analysis out of twelve chronicles, six from Aftonbladet and six from Sydsvenkan. For each of the three group stage games Sweden played in the World Cup, I analyzed one chronicle from both Aftonbladet and Sydsvenskan. Further, I analyzed one chronicle from Aftonbladet and one from Sydsvenskan for each of the three home games Malmö FF played in the Champions League. It turned out that Aftonbladet portrayed Sweden with a lot of metaphors and wrote about the Swedish national team as if the readers were a part of the team. Aftonbladet had more distance and caution when portraying Malmö FF. With Sydsvenskan it was the contrary. Sydsvenskan portrayed Malmö FF as if they were a part of the team and occasionally seemed to be biased. Sydsvenskan portrayed the Swedish national with more caution, distance and did not portray Sweden with the same empathy as Malmö FF.

The purpose of the study was to examine how Sweden’s two biggest tabloids, Aftonbladet and Expressen, frame spectacular crime and specifically how they covered the Helicopter robbery that occurred in 2009. We identified three main participants in the story, the police, the culprits and the victims. We examined how much and what kind of space the identified participants were given and how the two newspapers constructed the participants in a dramaturgic sense.   Using a quantitative content analysis method we found that the time period included 433 articles in both newspapers. From the original articles, we picked and examined 19 articles with a qualitative content analysis method and also used framing theory in order to be able to examine how the participants were portrayed in Aftonbladet and Expressen.   The culprits were given far most space in both Aftonbladet and Expressen. The study show that the police was given second most space and that the victims were hardly ever written about at all, in contrast to recent studies showing that victims of crime often are depicted as the main character in articles regarding crime. The results also show that the story as a whole carried a lot of resemblance to the classic Hollywood movie plot. The police were portrayed as incompetent, creating a conflict within the justice system community. The culprits were portrayed as the protagonist of the story with highly competent features, whilst the victims were portrayed as scared and helpless.

The purpose of our study was to examine how the newspaper Aftonbladet reported about the murder of Kim Wall. The questions in focus were; how are Kim Wall and Peter Madsen being represented in Aftonbladet? And how are the representation of them changing throughout time? In the study we have made a discourse analysis where eleven news articles were analysed. The result is presented in themes of discourses constructed of Wall and Madsen in Aftonbladet. Our results showed that Kim Wall was represented as a helpless woman, a brave journalist and an invisible individual. Peter Madsen was represented as a talented inventor, a cold-hearted monster and a crazy man. The results also showed that the tabloid journalism Aftonbladet had about the murder of Kim Wall were in a sensational and detailed way.

<p>This thesis explores the social semiotic relationship of visual and verbal signs of the Daily Voice tabloid as a way to show how the social context influences meaning of the signs used in its multimodal frontpages. The Daily Voice tabloid largely uses Kaapse English/ Afrikaans as spoken by Coloureds on the Cape Flats on its frontpages rather than standard English or standard Afrikaans associated with White people. The study assumes that the meaning constructed by and through the verbal and visual signs on the Daily Voice frontpages is interdependent on the relationship the multimodal texts have with the largely Cape Flats readership. This study maintains the importance of the idea of the localisation of meaning in socio-cultural specific contexts throughout. I conclude that Kress and Van Leeuwen&rsquo / s (1996/2006) design could be extended beyond Westernised contexts and that marginalised discourses such as those unique to the Cape Flats are not static, but indeed dynamic. I also extend the appraisal theory by Martin and White (2005) to marginalised bilingual discourse and establish that Appraisal theory can be used to not only evaluate verbal discourse but also that visual discourse needs to be considered as a tool within the appraisal framework. I also conclude by suggesting a monolectal view of Kaapse English/Afrikaans discourse. That is, the meaning potential of Kaapse English/Afrikaans by Cape Flats speakers would be lost if perceived or analysed as emanating from two languages, (White) English and (White) Afrikaans. Therefore the conclusion is that the Daily Voice uses Kaapse English/Afrikaans as is used in Cape Flats socio-cultural contexts to construct meaning-making options across its frontpages.</p>

This dissertation analyzes the discourse of three infotainment television shows built around their hosts – characters who have gained considerable importance and influence in their respective countries: American Jon Stewart (host of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart); British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen (the actor who incarnates the popular characters Borat, Bruno, and Ali G in the Da Ali G Show), and Peruvian Jaime Bayly (host of the Peruvian TV show El Francotirador/The Sniper). These three shows responded to their specific national, cultural, social, and political contexts, while simultaneously demonstrating important similarities: they parody journalistic genres while questioning traditional journalism authority and arbitrary media norms; they use humor to develop political, social, and cultural critiques; and they revolve around a talented character who is a media celebrity. Drawing upon theory and literature related to media spectacle, infotainment, tabloidization, celebrity, and the carnivalesque, this research analyzes the three media characters’ discourse and critiques within their respective national and cultural contexts in order to understand their role in those societies and how they negotiate discursive power in the public sphere. This analysis also seeks to reveal how Stewart challenges the mainstream news media by exposing the difficulties of debate in the U.S.; how the subaltern voices of Ali G, Bruno, and Borat position Sacha Baron Cohen to confront hegemonic culture and identity; and how ambiguity and contradiction allow Bayly to be a transgressor in a society where entertainment has a particular political history. This research establishes commonalities and differences among these three representative cases in relation to the broader, global phenomenon of satiric infotainment, and introduces the notion of “critical infotainment” to characterize this satiric trend that combines entertainment, comedy, journalism, popular culture, and politics to develop social critique. Critical infotainment is interpreted as a result of and a transgressive reaction to the process of tabloidization and the cult of celebrity in the media spectacle era. Finally, this dissertation includes recommendations for future critical infotainment experiments to fill the gap left by the traditional press in today’s mediascape. / text

As our society moves into a more technical era, journalism and the reporting of culture have had to follow. But where has that left the cultural critique, and journalist/reviewers, in our local newspapers? This bachelor thesis will try to map and explain the change of the cultural presentation in the local newspapers from the day it was firstly introduced as a genre in the modern journalistic world until today – 1840 and onwards. Whether it has turned into complete tabloid journalism or if it's methods are used to expand the knowledge about the cultural object, it shall be discovered with the help of an analysis of the cultural sections in some newspapers – both from the last quarter of 2012 (October - December) and one date from two years prior to that. One of the answers provided by the analysis, and perhaps the most relevant to this thesis, is that by adding features of tabloid journalism in reports of cultural news, culture journalism can better adapt its contents according to academic and social preferences of what is considered important aspects of information in the news, as it positions itself according to the technological fields and the changes within the cultural area itself.

<p>This thesis explores the social semiotic relationship of visual and verbal signs of the Daily Voice tabloid as a way to show how the social context influences meaning of the signs used in its multimodal frontpages. The Daily Voice tabloid largely uses Kaapse English/ Afrikaans as spoken by Coloureds on the Cape Flats on its frontpages rather than standard English or standard Afrikaans associated with White people. The study assumes that the meaning constructed by and through the verbal and visual signs on the Daily Voice frontpages is interdependent on the relationship the multimodal texts have with the largely Cape Flats readership. This study maintains the importance of the idea of the localisation of meaning in socio-cultural specific contexts throughout. I conclude that Kress and Van Leeuwen&rsquo / s (1996/2006) design could be extended beyond Westernised contexts and that marginalised discourses such as those unique to the Cape Flats are not static, but indeed dynamic. I also extend the appraisal theory by Martin and White (2005) to marginalised bilingual discourse and establish that Appraisal theory can be used to not only evaluate verbal discourse but also that visual discourse needs to be considered as a tool within the appraisal framework. I also conclude by suggesting a monolectal view of Kaapse English/Afrikaans discourse. That is, the meaning potential of Kaapse English/Afrikaans by Cape Flats speakers would be lost if perceived or analysed as emanating from two languages, (White) English and (White) Afrikaans. Therefore the conclusion is that the Daily Voice uses Kaapse English/Afrikaans as is used in Cape Flats socio-cultural contexts to construct meaning-making options across its frontpages.</p>

The subject for our bachelor thesis is how sugar is portrayed in Aftonbladet. By analyzing newspapers from 1995 and 2013 we wanted to research if the portrayal of sugar has changed during the years. We have noticed that there is a trend of being healthy and fit today. “Strong is the new skinny” is a quote we can see in social media and on blogs today. In the humans pursuit of becoming healthy and strong the sugar has become the villain in todays society. In 2014, many cookbooks with sugarfree recipies have been published and the media can’t seem to stop writing about new diets and how to loose weight. To analyze the difference in how sugar is portrayed in Aftonbladet between 1995 and 2013 we made a quantitative content analysis. A conclusion of our analysis shows that there are more texts about sugar in 2013 than in 1995 and that the recipies are the dominant kind of texts in the latter. Most texts in 1995 was recipes and texts about the risk of sugar came second. In 2013 the recipes had decreased but there had been an increase in dietary recommendations. The authors behind the texts are mostly the writers or celebrities, but when it comes to the texts about the risks of sugar it’s usually a researcher who is the author. 2013 there was only written about one celebrity who lost weight, while in 1995 it was the individuals behind the texts. There is a mixed message about sugar, it is written about both as an ingredient in a recipe at the same time as critical voices warning the reader about the same type of foods are heard.

The study seeks to interrogate the gender constructions in the Daily Sun’s “Charter for a Man” campaign which ran from 7 November to 7 December 2007. It coincided with the 16 Days of Activism against gender violence and was designed to lobby support for this campaign and discourage men from physically abusing women. The “Charter for a Man” listed nine principles that signatories were to abide by. It included a section to be signed by men to be submitted to and collected by the Daily Sun. The campaign was constructed as an intervention into the issue of gender violence. Consequently, the 30 news stories, four editorial pieces and 11 letters to the editor that were published during the campaign period make up the textual data analysed in the study. The news stories consisted of testimonies from abused women and some women abusers. In addition, celebrity signatories were selected to endorse the campaign and encourage other men to follow suit. In the editorials, the campaign was consistently flagged as a nation building initiative which all men were supposed to support. The letters to the editor consisted of readers who either supported or rejected the campaign. The study takes place against the context of a patriarchal society characterised by high levels of violence. Given this scenario, the study is informed by a concern with gender justice and therefore considers whether such a campaign, ostensibly aimed at eradicating gender violence, has the potential of being transformative of gender inequalities. The study set out to establish the kinds of masculinities and femininities that were variously constituted in the campaign as well as the gender discourses that were privileged. It is informed by the theories of feminist poststructuralism and Foucault’s conceptualisation of discourse. As the campaign is the initiative of a tabloid newspaper, it is also considered within the framework of newspaper campaigns and arguments about tabloids and the public sphere. As text based research, the study employs critical discourse analysis as a qualitative procedure of textual analysis. It makes use of an eclectic approach to textual analysis that draws on linguistics, narrative and argumentation. The texts are analysed according to the categories of news texts contained which includes the Charter itself, signatory articles, testimonies, vox pops and letters to the editor. The overarching theme of nationhood projected in the editorials and other categories is also discussed as part of the analysis. The study concludes that the Daily Sun campaign might be a seemingly progressive action at first glance. However, it does not challenge the existing gender order but rather maintains and sustains patriarchal attitudes through the repeated representation of women as weak and in need of patronage and men as their protectors and providers. In some instances, women are constructed primarily as sexual beings as their physical attributes are emphasised, while men are constructed as working class citizens and rational beings. The study therefore proposes that the Daily Sun fails as an alternative public sphere that might make visible the concerns of women as a marginalised group in society. The campaign, it is argued, is self-serving in its promotion of the Daily Sun’s image as the “People’s Paper” rather than serious concerns about gender violence.

This essay aims to investigate how female murder victims are portrayed in Swedish newspapers. By analyzing how the murder of the two Swedish women, Tova Moberg and Kim Wall, are portrayed in four of Sweden’s biggest newspapers; Aftonbladet, Expressen, Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet we aim to understand if, and how, they differ. Four research questions have therefore been conducted: 1) What are the similarities and differences between Aftonbladet, Expressen, Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet’s way of portraying female murder victims? 2) What meaning does the genre, for example type of newspaper, the editorial department and type of article have in the depiction of female murder victims? 3) What meaning does the production of the male suspects (in these two specific cases) have for the portrait of the female murder victims? And lastly 4) How can our results be connected to previous research, in terms of media representations of women as crime victims? The theoretical framework was used to answer these four questions, and involves the social constructionism perspective, genre theory, gender theory and a combined chapter of media rethorics, media logic and media dramaturgy. The material consists of articles from the four newspapers, and the chosen method is textual analysis. The results show, that there are explicit examples, and implicit tendencies of victim blaming in both murder cases, but not in all four papers. In conclusion, the tabloids tend to write in a way to intrigue and interest, while the daily newspapers seem to write in more of an objective and neutral manner. This essay is partly built upon previous studies on victim blaming in british newspapers. Previous research about the phenomena of victim blaming or ideal victim has not been conducted in swedish press and this essay can therefore serve as a contribution to the scientific field of media and communication and journalism in Sweden.