Media, Politics & Conflict - Queen's University Belfast

WEEK SIX, Mar. 4-8 th
TOPIC: From Entrenched Conflict to Media Spectacle: the Middle East, Northern Ireland and
the First Gulf War
LEARNING OUTCOMES: Students will discuss, and how the media subsequently covered
the entrenched conflicts in the Middle East and the Troubles in
Northern Ireland, and explore how this changed with the 24/7
reporting of the First Gulf War
REQUIRED READINGS:
1.) Greg Philo & GMG, ‘The Israeli-Palestine Conflict: TV News and Public Understanding’
Chapter 9 (pp. 133-148) in Thussu, Dayan Kishan & Freedman, Des, Eds., War and the
Media (London: Sage, 2003) [SL / Online (LR)]
2.) Cooke, Tim, ‘Paramilitaries and the Press’ Chapter 5 (pp. 75-90) in Norris, Pippa; Kern,
Montague; & Just, Marion, Eds., Framing Terrorism: The News Media, The Government
and the Public (London: Routledge, 2003). [SL & Online (LR)]
3.) Douglas Kellner, ‘The Persian Gulf TV War Revisited’ Chapter 7 (pp. 136-54) in Allen,
Stuart & Zelizer, Barbie, Eds., Reporting War: Journalism in Wartime (London: Routledge,
2004) [SL] also available online at
http://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/papers/gulfwarrevisited.htm
WEEK SEVEN, Mar. 11 th – 15 th
TOPIC: Causality and Reporting War in the Balkans
LEARNING OUTCOMES: Students will analyse two recent conceptual approaches to the
media and war: the CNN Effect and Compassion Fatigue; they
will apply both to media representations of the Balkan Conflict
REQUIRED READINGS:
1.) Robinson, Piers, ‘The CNN Effect: Can the News Media Drive Foreign Policy’?, Review of
International Studies, 25(2): 301-09 [EJ]
2.) Carruthers, Susan, ‘Other People’s Wars: Interventions in Real Time’, Chapter 4 The
Media at War, 2 nd ed. (Houndmills: Palgrave, 2011) [SL & Online (R)]
WEEK EIGHT, Mar. 18 th – 22 nd
TOPIC: Media Constructions of Africa & Forgotten Wars
LEARNING OUTCOMES: Students will examine how Western media outlets have
constructed conflict in Africa, and analyse the different ways
that the media forgets about both long-standing conflicts and
‘small wars’
REQUIRED READINGS:
1.) Carruthers, Susan L. ‘Tribalism and Tribulation: Media Constructions of ‘African Savagery’
and ‘Western Humanitarianism’ in the 1990s’ Chapter 8 (pp. 155-173) in Allen, Stuart &
Zelizer, Barbie, Eds., Reporting War: Journalism in Wartime (London: Routledge, 2004)
[SL / Online (R)]
2.) Berstein, Noah, ‘A Media Eclipse: Israel-Palestine and the World’s Forgotten Conflicts’,
OpenDemocracy, 18 th March 2010, available at
http://www.opendemocracy.net/opensecurity/noah-bernstein/media-eclipse-israelpalestine-and-worlds-forgotten-conflicts
and [Online link]
PAI1005 Media, Politics 7 Conflict (2012-13) 12