How do three different types of reports of the death of Tony Nicklinson compare and reflect their different audiences?

Authors Avatar by speedzz12 (student)

Word count:1957 – excluding headings and tables

Aim

How do three different types of reports of the death of Tony Nicklinson compare and reflect their different audiences.

Introduction

For my Language Investigation, I have chosen to focus on how the news uses various linguistics according to the audience. The news plays a vital role informing us about the modern society and most people believe everything they read and hear from the news. The news is something which most people watch everyday, a source of which they find out what’s going on around them. So finding out what language they use to accommodate their audience and help them understand is why I have decided on the particular area to investigate. Crystal and Davy has pointed out the “audiences” envision by different types of newspapers concerned are different, therefore they use different language and style, maintaining it by keeping the subject matter constant. I plan to investigate what linguistics devices are used according to the targeted audience. Does the writer use emotionally filled words to make the reader sympathetic? Do they balance both sides of the argument or is visible bias? Does the paper have more images when they are targeting at a younger audience? Is the paragraphs larger if the audience is old and more educated? Overall, I will be looking at the languages used for different audiences.

Hypothesis

I think that the lexis for The Telegraph will have more educated words because their reports have always seen to be aimed at an older, business related audience. The Sun will have some obvious bias points and have the most hyperbole, because as a tabloid paper they’re generally known to exaggerate topics and gossip. Therefore, Newsround will use more basic and semi formal lexis  and use sensitive terminology because its trying to get a message across to children as well as inform them of this tragic loss. For graphology, the Telegraph typeface will be classical but its level of pictures will not be as much as Newsround. The Sun will have semi complex wording as they tend to entertain as well as inform, with a subtle amount of pictures. However, I think that Newsround will contain the most pictures because they’re aimed at younger people and pictures appeal to young people more than words.

Methodology

During my investigation to find the articles, I used Google search engine and found out the different types of newspapers; tabloid, broadsheet etc because having two papers that were tabloid would mean that they were similar in certain aspects and aiming at the same audience. Out of the different types, I choose news sources that had high viewing ratings their targeted audience, this way I know that the devices that they use to target their audience works.

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Analysis & Results

For my investigation, I have collected three different types of newspapers - tabloid, broadsheet and childrens news sources. I’ve collect my data from websites which may differ from newspaper articles. Also my childrens news source is a spin off the television version. The reports on the data collected varies in length; the Tabloid newspaper which is the The Sun happens to be 4 pages long, however the text:images ratio is quite unbalance with the the majority of the information being images.

Looking at my results, there is quite a bit of differences from each ...

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