Lisa Flower
Associate Professor | Senior Lecturer
Constructing clickable criminal trials: : Framing trials and legal professionals in digital news reports
Author
Summary, in English
Journalistic live blogging entails the conundrum of capturing emotions in a context where they should be absent in order to snap up the sensational in the subtle drama of the courtroom and present it in a way that attracts readers, thus making it clickable.
Applying an inductive frame analysis of live blogs and drawing on criteria of newsworthiness and an emotion sociological framework, this article shows two frames of understanding criminal trials are constructed in live blogs: prosecutorial power and teamwork. These frames serve to construct and reconstruct understandings of criminal trials in Sweden. The frames are partially embedded in the legal sphere thereby reproducing the ideological underpinnings of unemotional rationality whilst concomitantly conveying a more contemporary understanding wherein reason and emotion are conflated. The study shows further that the media frame shapes how criminal trials are reported in live blogs leading to a somewhat distorted understanding of trials being conveyed. Legal professionals are made newsworthy by drawing on news values, in particular on emotionalization, which constitutes a crucial tool for the live blogging journalist.
Applying an inductive frame analysis of live blogs and drawing on criteria of newsworthiness and an emotion sociological framework, this article shows two frames of understanding criminal trials are constructed in live blogs: prosecutorial power and teamwork. These frames serve to construct and reconstruct understandings of criminal trials in Sweden. The frames are partially embedded in the legal sphere thereby reproducing the ideological underpinnings of unemotional rationality whilst concomitantly conveying a more contemporary understanding wherein reason and emotion are conflated. The study shows further that the media frame shapes how criminal trials are reported in live blogs leading to a somewhat distorted understanding of trials being conveyed. Legal professionals are made newsworthy by drawing on news values, in particular on emotionalization, which constitutes a crucial tool for the live blogging journalist.
Department/s
- Department of Sociology
Publishing year
2023
Language
English
Pages
48-66
Publication/Series
Emotions and Society
Volume
5
Issue
1
Full text
- Available as PDF - 218 kB
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Links
Document type
Journal article
Publisher
Bristol University Press
Topic
- Sociology (excluding Social Work, Social Psychology and Social Anthropology)
- Law and Society
- Media Studies
Keywords
- frames
- digital
- criminal trials
- emotionalization
- newsworthiness
Status
Published
Project
- Direct From the Courtroom
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 2631-6897