Authors
Mellor, NohaAffiliation
Kingston UniversityIssue Date
2009-07-06
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
The debate surrounding the coverage of the Iraq War in Arab and western news media has pinpointed the ethical role of the news media in the mediation of suffering. This article analyses the mechanism of mediating war in the front-page articles from four pan-Arab newspapers, printed during the war in 2003. The article draws on Boltanski's discussion of emotional politics or what he terms politics of pity, the aim of which is to trigger sympathy for the Other. The news texts included here are analysed according to their rhetorical strategies and to whether they aim at consolidating a certain ethical stance towards the war. Finally, the article attempts to answer the question of whether this coverage has contributed with rational arguments to the general public debate about the war, thereby fulfilling its role as mediator to the pan-Arab polity.Citation
Mellor, N. (2009) 'War as a Moral Discourse' International Communication Gazette 71 (5):409Publisher
SAGEAdditional Links
http://gaz.sagepub.com/cgi/doi/10.1177/1748048509104989Type
ArticleLanguage
enISSN
1748-0485ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1177/1748048509104989