Textual Analysis and Comparison

In this piece of work I will be comparing two articles from newspapers. Both the articles are about the same story and were printed on the same day; however they are from two different newspapers. One of them is from The Sun and the other from The Times, the main difference between these two papers is that The Sun is a tabloid and The Times is a broadsheet. I will be comparing two British newspapers, The Sun and The Times. I will be comparing the way they both present the news and how each newspaper creates the stories meaning within its own ideological framework.

Rupert Murdoch owns both The Sun and The Times. Rupert Murdoch first came to prominence in 1968 when Murdoch beat Robert Maxwell to buy London's News of the World. He later incorporated the Sun, the Times and the Sunday Times into his News International group. The Sun targets the group labelled C2DE, the working class, and to do this they use topless women on page three and uses more pictures and is cheaply priced at £0.35 making it affordable it also uses its own marketing device of bingo which is looked upon as the working classes game (McDougall, 2006). On the other hand, The Times has a completely different audience. Their target audience, the ABC1 group, tends to be middle to upper class with a perceived higher intellect (Branston et al, 2006). The marketing devices used are very different compared to The Sun which uses sex where as The Times has expectations of factual writing and is priced at £0.70 during the week which rises to £1.40 for the weekends making it less affordable. The expectations of the audience of The Times differ in that they expect a factual story with little bias and will have a greater awareness of the issues raised in the paper (Branston et al, 2006).

The biggest difference between the sun and the guardian is its news values and its stories. The sun bases its self upon gossip and any thing which would attract their target audience of c2de (Branston et al, 2006). For example, we can see how serious public interest items such as the heater ban lose out to stories that will entertain the desired reader. We can see this on two examples with the inclusion of a humorous story about a squirrel and another item using a celebrity and their sex appeal.

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The Times on the other hand uses its main headlines for a reflection on international events. The language tends to give more information and dedicates more space to world events and only a small space for area for gossip. However, this is not quite the case in the patio heaters article. The ideological positioning of the Times may have had a heavy influence over the composition of the item. The chairman of the paper is Rupert Murdoch and he has been widely reported as to not supporting British entry into the EU. Even though this article presents a balanced view and is put across in a formal style; the article is still dwarfed by a colourful advertisement from Waterstone’s for half price books. It could be that the advertisement is strategically placed to get readers to miss the main issue of the article in favour of the interesting offer held in the advert, so as not to gain a balanced opinion on the EU’s stance but rather be swayed by the paper’s position on the issue.

A typical tabloid article has a simple, sensational headline, sometimes in the form of a pun, which grabs the reader’s attention. The first striking point of the article is the bold headline which fills approximately the same amount of space as the actual written content of the article. Accordingly, the ideology of the paper is available to see through the use of the headline ‘Pubs rage at heater ban by EU’. With the Sun’s ideology comprising of an anti-EU stance and its majority readership being within the working class boundaries, the article is able to illicit an immediate response and allows the reader to form a judgement on the headline alone. The Sun’s ideology will be anti-EU and the article will be in line with similar items on the subject matter. The Sun plays on the fears of its perceived readers such as those of immigration and the general consensus that the EU means Britain losing its sovereignty. With an anti-EU undertone running throughout the paper, the headline can be seen to further strengthen this with its message by implying that this conclusion has already been formed and the ban is already in place. It uses the text to influence its audience who can be deemed as impressionable to the article through their general low standard of education. For example, an individual will take the article on face value and will structure their political stance in line with the papers message. Furthermore, the headline can be seen as more of a statement rather than one of neutral journalism, featuring sensational language such as ‘rage’ which allows for a strong emotive response within the reader. Also, the headline suggests a very clear meaning which in turn draws readers away from the truth, showing how the polysemy of the text is exploited in correlation with the readers who need an immediate grasp of the story.

Another key feature used within the Sun’s article is the use of quite deliberate overstatements such as ‘Pubs and restaurants will lose £250 million a year’ and that the ban would have ‘virtually no impact on climate change and greenhouse gas emissions’. Not only do these appear as overstatements but they seem to be confirmed as the key ideas to be taken and understood by the reader due to them being displayed in bold text, allowing readers to get key information first through the use of pyramid journalism. The main article is constructed in a monosyllabic style which allows for easy reading. Similarly, many of the paragraphs used are no longer than one sentence and are delivered in short bursts, ideal for keeping the attention of the key readership.

When looking at the image used in the Sun’s article it seems that the article has been cropped so that it fits in line with the papers message. Firstly, the people within the image come across as being stereotypically middle class, not the type of person that would normally fit into the perceived readership. Furthermore, the picture resembles that of a private household garden rather than that of a pub. The image could be portrayed in this way as a play on class issues, showing the middle classes ruining it for the working class. With patio heaters being seen as vital to many pubs livelihoods, it suggests an unnecessary luxury of the middle classes at the expense of the working class. This can be reinforced by saying that it is ‘another blow to boozers’ which would cost ‘up to £250 million in lost business’, suggesting that this typically lower class boozer community will be paying solely for the loss.

A typical broadsheet article, on the other hand, is completely the opposite, as it can tackle more serious topics about current world affairs. The headline used within the Times sets out the argument formally and in a balanced viewpoint, giving a better representation of views and is more accurate to the intention of the EU. The article also has a further representation of views surrounding the issue and invites a number of leading authorities to give their opinion on the matter such as the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

The sub-headings have plenty of detail to keep the reader interested by giving them an accurate account of the intended actions by the MEP’s. Furthermore, the sub headings imply that the ban will have similar consequences to that proposed in the Sun but ‘bistros’ and ‘cafes’ will be hit rather than pubs, reflecting the image of the middle class readership.

One of the standout issues of the article is the choice of the main image. On first appearance, it has a very similar look to that of a nuclear bomb mushroom cloud but a closer inspection reveals it to be a thermal image of a heater. However, the picture is very misleading as the paper is usually associated with an objective, balanced and formal tone but the image used would be more at home in a tabloid paper as it is quite dramatic and sensationalised. The image seems to contradict the balanced opinions associated with the Times and could have an influence over how the reader interprets the article, shaping their opinions to those of the paper.

The article includes a sophisticated vocabulary, comprising of longer sentences accompanied by a formal tone indicating that the reader must have a high level of intellect to understand the information presented. Polysyllabic text is used frequently which allows for greater accuracy in the coverage and reporting of the story with emphasis on fact rather than entertainment. Furthermore, statistics are used frequently which enable readers to understand the points being made in a wider context. For example, a Dr Jones is quoted as saying that patio heaters account for only ‘0.002 per cent of total emissions in Britain’ and the ‘overall impact of heaters is minimal’. However, it is key to understand the ideology of the paper before taking the true value of Dr Jones’ input. The Times has an anti-EU undertone and this expert is more than capable of putting little value on the intentions of the EU. Furthermore, the people against the ban are presented as experts within their field with an insightful opinion. However, opinions against the ban are from smaller companies which do not have such public recognition which consequently implies that their views do not hold as much importance or relevance. Additionally, when the article closes out, it uses DEFRA to do so as they are seemingly the most authoritative organisation which could hold most influence over the reader’s stance on the issue. Not surprisingly, DEFRA had ‘little enthusiasm for a ban’.

In conclusion, it can be seen that throughout The Sun’s depiction of the event that the article has selected a lot of different elements to give a very emotive and sensational appearance to what happened. You can clearly see the moment you look at the headline whose side the paper is on and can determine its ideological beliefs. On the other hand The Times has produced a much more informative view on the issue. Although most of the information given is the same it is told in a different way and it is harder to see if this paper is on any particular side. Use of straight forwards facts and not mixing any emotion or opinion in with it aids this.

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