83. Name: Tobias Gerhard Title: Counter-Discourse in Global News Media: How Al Jazeera English Covers Sectarian Violence in Nigeria University: Central European University Country: Hungary Date: 2010 Language: English Abstract: The discourse of global news networks has been repeatedly criticized for presenting the world in stereotypical ways. This presentation relies on the clash of civilization paradigm as a convenient explanatory framework for the coverage of conflicts, which reinforces existing power dynamics in the world. This study investigates to what extent Al Jazeera English departs from these practices. It does so by analyzing the network’s online news coverage, using sectarian violence in Nigeria as a case study. Assessing the potential of Al Jazeera English to challenge the mainstream news discourse, its online news coverage is compared to that of the BBC by means of critical discourse analysis. Al Jazeera English is examined based the assumption that it represents a southern, human rights, and Muslim perspective. The study also looks at how far the channel applies a conciliatory approach in reporting sectarian violence. It is found that Al Jazeera English’s discourse on recent sectarian violence in Nigeria differs only marginally from that of the BBC. It is argued that both networks exhibit some characteristics of mainstream views, as well as of a potentially challenging counter- discourse.
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