Theorizing Roles for Online News Media in Representation of Risks: The Case of Malaysia

SHARAFA DAUDA & NIK NORMA NIK HASAN
University Sains Malaysia, Malaysia

Abstract
This paper theorizes a model for the representation of risks in online news media. Its practicability is demonstrated using Malaysian alternative online newspapers. Anxiety and uncertainty about a risk event are naturally rooted in discourse a count as discursive event because they appear on the discourse planes of politics and the media intensively and extensively. These discourses are pervasive on the Internet, which is used by over 20 million Malaysians. Furthermore, alternative newspapers flourish in online forms in Malaysia largely due to government press law inhibitions on mainstream print and broadcast media. The popularity of alternative online newspapers in Malaysia is also demonstrated by their ranking within the first three most visited web entities in the April 2015 Media Matrix rankings of Malaysian web entities. The model is used to provide presumptions on how risks can be spread or weakened. It also provides conjectures on how multiple semiotic resources in the composition, content and design of online news media like colour, gesture, image, layout, writing, etc can be used to amplify or attenuate risks from meanings that are conveyed using “tools shaped by cultural and social factors to mediate interests of members of social groups…” Thus, the model proposes a digital social amplification of risk communication model on the role of the news media in the representation of risks, and in negotiating socio-cognitive processes, behaviors and responses to risk events.

Keywords: News media, amplification, attenuation, technology, hazards

References

Baehr, C.& Schaller, B. (2010). Writing for the Internet: aguide to real communication in virtual space. California: Greenwood.
Binder, A. R., Cacciatore, M. A., Scheufele, D. A., & Brossard, D. (2015). The role of news media in the social amplification of risk. In H. Cho, T. Reimer & K. A. McComas (Eds.), The sage handbook of risk communication(pp. 69–85). Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Boholm, A. (1996). Risk perception and social anthropology: Critique of cultural theory. Ethnos, 61(1-2), 64–84. doi: 10.1080/00141844.1996.9981528
Bradsher, K. (2011, March). Taking a risk for rare earths. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/09/business/energy-environment/H., & Knox, J. S. (2015). A framework for the multimodal analysis of online news galleries: what makes a “good” picture gallery? Social Semiotics, 1–30. doi: 10.1080/10350330.2014.1002174
Department of Statistics Malaysia. (2015). Population Statistics. Retrieved from https://www.statistics.gov.my/dosm/uploads/files/3_Time%20Series/Malaysia_Time_Series_2015/22Perangkaan_Penduduk.pdf
Desmond, N. (2015). Engaging with risk in non-western settings: an editorial. Health, Risk & Society, 17(3-4), 196–204.
Dunwoody, S., & Peters, H. P. (1992). Mass media coverage of technological and environmental risks: a survey of research in the United States and Germany. Public Understanding of Science, 1(2), 199–230. doi: 10.1088/0963-6625/1/2/004
Hansson, S. O. (2009). Risk and safety in technology. Philosophy of technology and engineering sciences: Vol. 9. Handbook of the philosophy of science (pp. 1069–1102). Amsterdam:
Elsevier B.V.
Hansson, S. O. (2012). A panorama of the philosophy of risk. In S. Roeser, R. Hillerbrand, P. Sandin & M. Peterson (Eds.), Handbook of Risk Theory(pp. 27–54). London: Springer Netherlands.
Harcup, T. (Ed.) (2014).Oxford Dictionary of Journalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hove, T., Paek, H.-J., Yun, M., & Jwa, B. (2015). How newspapers represent environmental risk: the case of carcinogenic hazards in South Korea. Journal of Risk Research, 18(10), 1320-1336. doi: 10.1080/13669877.2014.923025
Jenkins, H. (2008). Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New York: New York University Press.
Jönsson, A. M. (2011). Framing Environmental Risks in the Baltic Sea: A News Media Analysis. AMBIO, 40(2), 121-132. doi: 10.1007/s13280-010-0124-2
Kasperson, R. E. (2012). A perspective on the social amplifications of risk. Fall Issue of the Bridge on Social Sciences and Engineering Practice, 42(3), 23–27. Retrieved from http://www.nae.edu/Publications/Bridge/62556/62562.aspx
Kasperson, R. E., Renn, O., Slovic, P., Brown, H. S., Emel, J., Goble, R., Kasperson, J. X., & Ratick, S. (1988). The social amplification of risk: a conceptual framework. Risk Analysis, 8(2), 177–187. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.18419/opus-7221
Klymanska, L. D. (2015). “The role of media in the mechanism of the social amplification of risks”. MEDIA I SPO£ECZEÑSTWO, 5. Retrieved from http://www.mediaispoleczenstwo.ath.bielsko.pl/art/05/05_klymanska.pdf
Kress, G. (2010). Multimodality: A Social Semiotic Approach to Contemporary Communication. London: Routledge.
Kress, G. (2012). “Multimodal discourse analysis”. In J. P. Gee & M. Handford (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Discourse Analysis(pp. 35–50). London: Routledge.
Leeuwen, T. V. (2015). Multimodality. In D. Tannen, H. E. Hamilton & D. Schiffrin (Eds.), The Handbook of Discourse Analysis(pp. 447–464). New York: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
Lichtenberg, J., & MacLean, D. (1991). The role of the media in risk communication. In R. E. Kasperson & P. J. M. Stallen (Eds.), Communicating Risks to the Public(pp. 157–173):Springer Netherlands.
Ling, S. (2003). The alternative media in Malaysia: Their potential and limitations. In N. Couldry & J. Curran (Eds.), Contesting Media Power: Alternative Media in a Networked World (pp. 289–299). Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission. (2015). Internet users survey 2014. Selangor Darul Ehsan: Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission. Retrieved from http://www.skmm.gov.my/skmmgovmy/media/General/pdf/Internet-Users-Survey-2014.pdf.
Malaysian Digital Association, & comScore. (2015). MDA and comScore Release Rankings of Top Web Entities in Malaysia for July 2015. Retrieved from https://www.comscore.com/Insights/Market-Rankings/MDA-and-comScore-Release-Rankings-of-Top-Web-Entities-in-Malaysia-for-July-2015
Metag, J., & Marcinkowski, F. (2014). Technophobia towards emerging technologies? A comparative analysis of the media coverage of nanotechnology in Austria, Switzerland and Germany. Journalism, 15(4), 463–481. doi: 10.1177/1464884913491045
Mo¨ller, N. (2012). “The concepts of risk and safety”. In S. Roeser, R. Hillerbrand, P. Sandin & M. Peterson (Eds.), Handbook of risk theory (pp. 56–82). London: Springer.
Nik, N. N. H. (2012). Where there is risk, there is opportunity: Environmental risks and violent conflict in Malaysia.Paper presented at the International Conference on Communication, Media and Civil Violence, Surakarta, Indonesia.
Pidgeon, N., & Barnett, J. (2013). Chalara and the Social Amplification of Risk. Retrieved from https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/200394/pb13909-chalara-social-amplification-risk.pdf
Romanach, L., Carr-Cornish, S., & Muriuki, G. (2015). Societal acceptance of an emerging energy technology: How is geothermal energy portrayed in Australian media? Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 42(0), 1143–1150.
doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2014.10.088
Siew, C. B. (2015, September). GNMM rubbishes claims of receiving RM3m from PM for rally. The Sun Daily. Retrieved from http://www.thesundaily.my/news/1556989
Singer, J. B. (2015). Newsrooom go online. In C. Friend & J. Singer (Eds.), Online journalism ethics: Traditions and transitions. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Tong, J. (2014). Environmental risks in newspaper coverage: A framing analysis of investigative reports on environmental problems in 10 Chinese newspapers. Environmental Communication, 8(3), 345–367. doi:10.1080/17524032.2014.898675
WAN-IFRA. (2014). Monopolizing the nation: Soft censorship in Malaysia. In T. R. Lansner (Ed.), (pp. 1–38). Paris: World Association of Newspaper and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) & Centre for International Media Assistance (CIMA).
World Bank. (2015). “Overview”. Retrieved from http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/malaysia/overview
Zaharom, N. (2008). Regime, media and the construction of a fragile concensus in Malaysia. In K. Sen & T. Lee (Eds.), Political Regimes and the Media in Asia. New York: Routledge.
Zaharom, N., & Wang, L. K. (2004). Ownership, control and the Malaysian media. In P. N. Thomas & Z. Nain (Eds.), Who Owns the media? Global Trends and Local Resistance(pp. 249–270). Penang: Southbound Sdn Bhd.
Zhang, L., & Zhong, L. (2010). Integrating and prioritizing environmental risks in China’s risk management discourse. Journal of Contemporary China, 19(63), 119–136.
doi: 10.1080/10670560903335835

Sharafa Dauda is currently pursuing his PhD programme in journalism at the School of Communication, Universiti Sains Malaysia. He also lectures at the Department of Mass Communication, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria. His research interests include: risk communication, online and print journalism, new(s) media, media and society, semiotics and political communication and digital media literacy.
Dr. Nik Norma Nik Hasan is the serving deputy dean (Academics, Students and Alumni) and the immediate past chairperson of undergraduate programme (Journalism section) at the School of Communication, Universiti Sains Malaysia. Her research interests include: media and environmental journalism, risk communication, communicating sustainability and journalism education.