The events on September 11th have dominated the media. Compare the different ways these events have been presented by television news, British national newspapers and Time magazine.

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The events on September 11th have dominated the media. Compare the different ways these events have been presented by television news, British national newspapers and Time magazine.

The worst terrorist attack in U.S. history, two hijacked commercial jetliners crashed into the World Trade Center in New York City around 9 a.m. Tuesday, September 11th. This caused both 110-story towers to topple. The world trade center contained thousands of innocent people who had just arrived for work.

This event has dominated the media and I have examined three examples of this. Initially I analysed The Independent of September 13th and will include detailed comments on the use of language, pictures, colour, layout and the viewpoint of the newspaper. Secondly I looked at the Time magazine and will later compare this with the Independent. When describing the Time magazine I will go through the use of photos, layout, headlines, choice of language, viewpoint of the writer and the content of the article. In the next section of my essay, I will compare the BBC news and the Channel 4 news of September 12th. Then finally I will give my own opinions about what I have learnt about media coverage and how this event has been reported.

The independent was published for September 13th, two days after the terrorist attack on America. The first thing that struck me was that at the top of every page it said ‘TERROR IN AMERICA’ this is printed on a black background to symbolize death and mourn. The word ‘terror’ is a good choice as it is a kind of pun, as the word is linked with terrorism and fear. To the left of the title it has a small picture of the smoke from the calamity.

On page four there is a tremendous photograph which leads the eye on to the subtitle ‘Hopes of finding survivors among the rubble and metal fade’ this article would not be very popular to be read, and that is why your eye is almost pushed into reading it. The subtitle is linked with the photograph of the catastrophe. The photo is of two firemen on an extension tower spraying water at the rubble.. The spray of the water outlines the silhouette of the firemen trying desperately to ‘find survivors among the rubble.’ A light background helps emphasize the firemen working. The whole of this page is in black and white; this is because the whole page has a much sadder feel than, for example, the previous page which was in colour.

The first five paragraphs are of the rescue which people do want to read about, this encourages them to read on. Metaphors are being used to help us understand a little bit more of the attack. For example ‘the crack spread like zippers though the wall.’ Metaphors could also suggest the event being unreal. As the newspaper is a broad sheet and not designed for the average person, there are quite a number of complicated words like; catastrophe, choreographed, and solace. The following section contains long sentences describing large quantities of construction gear, crews of construction workers and volunteers.

In the next section, there is a quote from George Pakaki, governor of New York, saying that they are not giving up hope. And a volunteer, George Higgins, saying that everyone needs to do their share. These are two different quotes from two completely different people. Pakaki is saying that ‘they’ are not giving up hope. That is that the governors and the people higher up in status are doing their bit, and the other quote from Higgins saying that ‘everyone’, as in the public, should be doing theirs. By having quotes from different people means that the newspaper is writing to a larger audience including the public and the authority. It is also giving a more varied opinion instead of just the opinion of the writer. The emotive text causes us to be depressed due to the uses of quotes from the public, I think that the writer has achieved his aim. He wants us to understand that the workers are not giving up hope on finding the survivors. It also tells anyone that knows someone who is missing that there is still a chance. If you give them a little bit of hope then they will like it and buy the newspaper again.

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The successive segment is about the Pentagon and its witnesses. It also mentions the killed workers and then makes reference to the insecure pieces of the Pentagon which are still standing. The final part of the article is on a sad note and mentions about the deaths of the citizens and how they may be shipped across the Hudson River. The inevitable addition to the article is at the end because, if it was in the middle, then people may not read on. It may also be that if someone is depressed then they may want to read another happier ...

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