The Dialogue of the Deaf: a Discourse Analysis on the Construction of the Catalan and Spanish Identities in News Media a THESIS
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The Dialogue of the Deaf: A Discourse Analysis on the Construction of the Catalan and Spanish Identities in News Media A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA BY Clara Juarez Miro IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS Adviser: Prof. Giovanna Dell’Orto May 2018 Clara Juarez Miro May 2018 © i Acknowledgements This work would not have been possible without Prof. Giovanna Dell’Orto, from who I learnt so much and from who I know I will continue to learn for the years to come. Thank you so much for your advice, your patience and for knowing that I could do more than I thought—and for a sense of humor that made this process much more enjoyable. I also would like to thank Profs. Sid Bedingfield and Mary D. Vavrus for serving in my advising committee. I am highly indebted to the staff working at the archives of RTVE and CCMA, for their guidance and help during the phase of data collection. I also would like to thank the faculty, staff and colleagues at the Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication for their encouragement and assistance. In that sense, I am especially grateful to the staff at Sevareid Library. Finally, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my friends, those here and those home, for supporting me always. A loving acknowledgement goes for my roommates, who literally lived with me the process of building this project. In addition, I would like to thank my family. Special thanks to my family in the United States, who gave me advice and support that took me where I am today. And since I do not want to forget anyone, I would like to extend my thanks to those I asked for help, those who read my work, those who gave me feedback on it, those who questioned it, and those who listened to me. ii Dedication I dedicate this thesis to my mother and my father. Thanks for giving me everything you had and more, your unconditional support, your attention and your love. And to my brother, for his support and advice and for paving the way for me in so many aspects of life. iii Abstract This study analyzes the role of the media in the relationship between Catalonia and Spain, a prototypical case study for secessionism among developed countries. Despite the secessionist claims by part of the Catalan people, attempts to find a solution that satisfies both have failed, and the situation has gotten significantly worse in 2017-18. Moreover, most of the communication between the respective governments is mediated, so their images of the other are the ones portrayed in media. Hence, framing and discourse theory inform a content analysis to answer the following research questions: (1) How do national media construct Catalan identity in Spain? (2) How do national media construct Spanish identity in Spain? (3) How do Catalan regional media construct Spanish identity in Catalonia? (4) How do Catalan regional media construct Catalan identity in Catalonia? (5) How is the secessionist movement framed in both nation-wide and Catalan media? The analysis focuses on news at three milestones in Spain’s history: The autonomic pacts in 1981, which informed the current distribution of central and regional powers; the secessionist demonstration in 2012, which resulted in the Catalan government’s taking a pro-independence stance; and the ISIS terrorist attacks in Catalonia in 2017, which elevated the political tension between administrations. Key words: secessionism, national identity, identity politics iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements .............................................................................................................. i Dedication ........................................................................................................................... ii Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iii Table of Contents ............................................................................................................... iv Chapter One: Secessionism in Spain ............................................................................... 1 Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 1 Literature Review .......................................................................................................... 22 Theoretical Framework ................................................................................................. 39 Method .......................................................................................................................... 47 Analysis ......................................................................................................................... 53 Chapter Two: First Autonomic Pacts ........................................................................... 61 Catalan press coverage of the autonomic pacts: La Vanguardia .................................. 64 Spanish press coverage of the autonomic pacts: El País .............................................. 79 Spanish TV coverage of the autonomic pacts: TVE1 .................................................... 89 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 91 Chapter Three: Pro-independence Demonstration ..................................................... 95 Catalan press coverage of the demonstration: La Vanguardia ..................................... 98 Spanish press coverage of the demonstration: El País ................................................ 118 Catalan TV coverage of the demonstration: TV3 ........................................................ 133 Spanish TV coverage of the demonstration: TVE1 ..................................................... 148 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 157 Chapter Four: ISIS Terrorist Attacks in Barcelona and Cambrils ......................... 164 Catalan press coverage of the attacks: La Vanguardia ............................................... 167 Spanish press coverage of the attacks: El País ........................................................... 182 Catalan TV coverage of the attacks: TV3 .................................................................... 201 Spanish TV coverage of the attacks: TVE1 ................................................................. 215 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 229 Chapter Five: Conclusions ........................................................................................... 236 v Catalan and Spanish Identities .................................................................................... 237 Inclusion of Spain in the European Union .................................................................. 244 An influence of media in Catalan and Spanish identities............................................ 251 Limitations and future directions ................................................................................ 255 References ...................................................................................................................... 258 1 Chapter One: Secessionism in Spain Introduction In recent decades, national economies have experienced dynamics of globalization in order to keep being competitive. Several countries are bounded nowadays by shared production processes, trade agreements and even debt. Like virtually all other industries, the media industry has also reached a global status, after a necessary process of growing democratization of media technology. Media globalization has resulted in the creation of a multinational audience that consumes content from beyond the borders of its nation-state and demands first-hand information from around the world (Norris & Inglehart, 2009, p. 9). For many years, it seemed that the evident economic and media globalization dynamics, paired with the establishment of supranational entities such as the United Nations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the European Union, were leading to an equivalent movement of globalization in the political sphere (Norris & Inglehart, 2009). However, there has been an emergence of nationalistic right-wing parties in Europe (and the United States) in recent decades that support strengthening border control and promote nation-first ideologies (Hollifield, Martin & Orrenius, 2014). Public support for these parties has experienced a rise after the refugee and migrant crisis in Europe in 2015 (mainly resulting from the violent conflicts in Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, among other countries) and the wave of ISIS-inspired terrorist attacks in Europe that started the same year. As a result, the idealized borderless Schengen area in the European Union, which once promised the free movement of people inside the countries signatories 2 to the agreement, is now challenged by a climate of insecurity (Cierco & da Silva, 2016; Fijnaut, 2015) or, as Almond (2016) has called it, border anxiety. This project is informed by the assumption that the constitution of the European Union did not handle well the identities of (and inside) the member states, which did not accept a European identity that was too weak in comparison with their own. Hence, as result of this, we might see a further dispute of the current