NEGATIVITY WITHIN THE NEWS A FRAMING-BASED INQUIRY INTO ROMANIAN NEWS DISCOURSE
NEGATIVITY WITHIN THE NEWS A FRAMING-BASED INQUIRY INTO ROMANIAN NEWS DISCOURSE

Summary/Abstract: In an era when propaganda, disinformation, and fake news place increasing pressure on the reliability of journalism, viewing news discourse as part of a broader process of production and consumption allows for more realistic expectations and encourages the development of critical thinking in news consumption. This perspective follows a Discourse Analysis theoretical framework, particularly Teun A. van Dijk’s (1988) work on news discourse, where “news is not characterized as a picture of reality, which may be correct or biased, but as a frame through which the social world is routinely constructed” (p. 7). Within media research, this analysis follows David L. Altheide’s work, particularly his characterization of media—especially electronic media—as “part of a ‘problem-generating machine’ geared to entertainment, voyeurism, and the ‘quick fix’ rather than to understanding and social change.” Building on this perspective, we argue that the fragmentation of media platforms over the past two decades has contributed to an intensification of negativity within news discourse. We approach our research inquiry from a diachronic perspective through a qualitative analysis, aiming to identify the changes in Romanian news discourse at the beginning of the transition to the digital environment. To illustrate these developments, we examine a sample of texts published in the Romanian news outlet Adevărul between 2000 and 2010, in both print and electronic formats.

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