| dc.description.abstract | Sustainable development and environmental awareness have gradually been gaining more interest. These issues are often associated with political liberalism: “modern environmental issues […] for the most part coalesce around the premises of liberal state theory” (Hobson 57). Since The Guardian openly advocates “liberal values,” it covers a lot of environmental news (The Guardian). Therefore, a food production scandal such as the discovery of horsemeat in beefburgers, which came to light on 15 January 2013, inevitably takes up a great deal of The Guardian’s agenda. The newspaper’s role in representing the horsemeat scandal is, in the first place, providing the reader with trustworthy and objective news. The Guardian preserves its credibility by following the standpoint “comment is free, but facts are sacred,” therefore presenting news without being influenced by the political ideology they support (The Guardian). However, in portraying the discourse of the horsemeat scandal in its entirety, The Guardian establishes a certain frame for which its journalistic ideology is the basis. This thesis concentrates on the frame created by news writing and features. Textual and contextual aspects of news writing and features on The Guardian’s website will be analysed using Van Dijk’s and Fairclough’s Critical Discourse Analysis. The analysis of these factors will depict how The Guardian has interwoven its ideology in representing the horsemeat scandal. | |
