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Cop Killer Or Political Prisoner? a Case Study of the Role of Philadelphia’S Print Media in Developing the Dominant Narrative of Mumia Abu- Jamal

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Cop Killer Or Political Prisoner? a Case Study of the Role of Philadelphia’S Print Media in Developing the Dominant Narrative of Mumia Abu- Jamal Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 1 Senior Thesis Barrie M. Adleberg Advisor: Dr. Joseph Richardson, Professor African- American Studies, University of Maryland, College Park 2007-2008 Cop Killer or Political Prisoner? A Case Study of the Role of Philadelphia’s Print Media in Developing the Dominant Narrative of Mumia Abu- Jamal Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 2 Chapter 1 Problem Statement The Philadelphia media has played an influential role in conjuring support and opposition in the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal since the night of his arrest on December 9, 1981. The publicity and news coverage surrounding his arrest, death row sentence, and subsequent court appeals are responsible for building a narrative which mainstream media purports to be truth and alternative media continues to scrutinize. When Mumia Abu- Jamal was arrested he was known as a civil rights journalist, who also moonlighted as a taxi cab driver. Following his arrest he was suddenly transformed into a political prisoner, cop killer, martyr, and threat to the free world. The culmination of all these factors resulted in his indictment of guilt by the media long before the criminal justice system delivered its ruling. On the night of December 9, 1981 an altercation left 26 year old Police Officer Daniel Faulkner with a fatal gunshot to the head and political journalist Mumia Abu- Jamal in critical condition from bullet wounds. The details surrounding the altercation, as well as forensics extracted in the autopsy and witnesses to the incident, are all subjective depending on the source. The news articles documenting the events of this tragic night provide contradictory character analyses of the slain officer and the radical journalist. In many respects, it is through the lens of Philadelphia print media that the populace has come to understand the case of Mumia Abu- Jamal. While mainstream papers convicted him as a cop-killer months before his June 1982 trial, alternative sources continued to demand due process. Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 3 In the case study of Mumia-Abu Jamal, the perspectives presented by Philadelphian mainstream and alternative media are divergent in their representations of the same man. The alternative and national media provide two contrasting portraits of Mumia Abu- Jamal: one a Nationalist political prisoner and the other an unruly black cop killer. This thesis will explore the influence of Philadelphia print media coverage in sculpting Mumia’s public identity, by investigating several questions: 1) How did the Philadelphia municipality initially react to his incarceration and subsequent appeals? 2) To what extent has each media source illuminated race politics? 3) To what extent did Mumia’s role as an author and journalist effect his public perception? This thesis will illuminate the relationship between race, politics, and journalism. Historical Background: Mumia v. the Philadelphia Police Department Mumia Abu-Jamal has been confined to a Pennsylvania state cell for 26 years. His incarceration in 1982 for allegedly murdering Officer Daniel Faulkner sparked both local and international controversy and his case continues to generate scrutiny and attention to social justice issues often propagated by the media, political activists, and Mumia’s own commentary on systemic oppression. This murder case is one of the most widely publicized death row cases in the past decades in America. Mumia has been placed on and taken off of death row three times. Primarily as a response to political pressure and swaying public opinion, this see-saw of fatality has grabbed the interest of many political agencies, activists, journalists, and citizens. His incarceration has spurred criticism of the United States penal system, questioning the role of capital punishment in this country. Mumia’s case stretches beyond the confines of guilt vs. innocence. His Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 4 case and imprisonment are illustrative of two oppositional movements. One movement is working to silence Black Nationalist resistance by amplifying race politics. The second movement exposes the corruption in Mumia’s trial and ongoing racism that continues to impede his pursuit of vindication. The print sources examined in this thesis study represent several of the media outlets in Philadelphia which framed the details of Mumia’s arrest, incarceration, and ongoing case. The use of print media news often subliminally encourages readers to internalize the news with biases. It is the evolution of journalism from perceived impartial fact to a medium of communication impressionable to societal influence that has outlined the discourse on how media shapes public opinion. Berkowitz (1997) contends, journalists are not objective bearers of truth, but are instead makers of a product shaped through a variety of social forces. The mainstream print media often represents the ideals and opinions of the status-quo, powerful corporations, and government entities including the police force. In the Philadelphia mainstream print media, Mumia has been depicted as a cop-killer, racist, and social deviant. And while mainstream print continued to assail the public with bylines pronouncing unquestionable guilt, alternative papers, which typically reach a much narrower readership, focus their commentary on examining nuances which question the print media’s dominant narrative of the case. Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 5 Chapter 2 Literature Review The role of media in shaping public opinion is a study that revolves around the dynamic relationship between the news source and its readership. Biases in print have the potential to translate to widespread public sentiment based on the dissemination of media outlets. The literature examined in this section explores the role of media in shaping the perceptions of a concentrated populace by analyzing ideological biases, journalistic objectivity, article framing, and resonance in print that contribute to the creation of a dominant narrative and often to propagate popular myth. Philadelphia print media coverage of Mumia Abu- Jamal is analyzed as a case study exposing corruption in journalistic objectivity in a standardized mainstream narrative that permeated public consciousness. Scholars recognize and understand the evolving notion that “People’s reasoning about divisive political issues may be shaped by the mass media’s depiction of the issues because both journalistic norms and market forces dampen strong ideological biases within most news organizations”.1 Many critics, including Bennett (1996) note that “The restriction of media coverage within a narrow liberal- conservative latitude is itself a kind of status-quo bias”.2 Consequently, there is no definitive method of measuring journalistic status-quo biases; however the power of journalism is in its ability to shape society and public perception. Mead (1925) asserts news is a way in which people create 1 Nelson, Thomas E., Rosalee A. Clawson, and Zoe M. Oxley. 1997. “Media Framing of a Civil Liberties Conflict and Its Effect on Tolerance.” American Political Science Review 91(Sept):567-583. 2 Ibid., 1997. Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 6 order out of disorder by transforming knowing into telling.3 Print media is written authority as the structure in which fact is served to the public. Soloski (1989) purports that “Events can be safely presented as a series of facts that require no explanation of their political significance by presenting the news as a series of facts”.4 Therefore, the theories referenced in this study construct the discourse on how underlying social agendas are embedded in the news delivered to the public as fact. Analyzing Ideological biases Lule (1995) contends local news implicitly traces the symbolic boundaries of the community.5 As members of society who author this thought shaping mechanism, local news reporters are thus involved in the cyclical relationship of the story teller and receiver. Soloski (1989) debates that “While it is true that news legitimizes and supports the existing politico-economic system, it is not true that journalists’ selection of news stories reflects a conscious desire on their part to report the news in such a way that the status-quo is maintained”.6 Gans and Tuchman (1978,1979) substantiate Soloski’s claim by presenting the natural place to find newsworthy sources will be in the power structure of society because journalists see the current politico-economic system as a naturally 3 Bird, S. Elizabeth and Robert W. Dardenne. 1997.“Myth, Chronicle and Story: Exploring the Narraive Qualities of News.” In Social Meanings of News: A Text-Reader, edited by D. Berkowitz, 333-347. Thousand Oaks: Sage. 4 Soloski, John. 1989. “News Reporting and Professionalism: Some Constraints on the Reporting of the News.” In Social Meanings of News: A Text-Reader, edited by D. Berkowitz, 138-152. Thousand Oaks: Sage, pg. 144. 5 Lule, Jack. 1995. “The Rape of Mike Tyson: Race, the Press, and Symbolic Types.” In Social Meanings of News: A Text-Reader, edited by D. Berkowitz, 376-392. Thousand Oaks: Sage, pg. 380. 6 Soloski, 1989, pg. 143. Barrie Adleberg Senior Thesis Pg. 7 occurring state of affairs.7 Journalists are just as likely to be receptors to news as general body citizens. Therefore, the facts presented in mainstream print are automatically contorted by an objective perspective because journalists are human. Sears (1988) offers commentary on an example of racism embedded in print. Sears (1988) asserts, “One hallmark of modern racism is that overly racist rhetoric often is absent while muted racist beliefs are proffered in shadows and shades of expression”.8 And because of the subliminal bias of the writer, Lule (1995) pronounces, “Stereotypes precede reason and thus unavoidably shapes the story of the story teller”.9 Journalistic objectivity Berkowitz (1997) claims that because news is the result of social processes, then journalists can never discard their socially learned beliefs about society and how the world works.10 He builds this theory on the pretense that journalists are not objective bearers of truth, but are instead makers of a product shaped through a variety of social forces.11 Roscho (1975) discusses journalistic integrity.
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