MASARYK UNIVERSITY BRNO FACULTY OF EDUCATION Department of English Language Serial killers in the British press Diploma thesis Brno 2020 Supervisor: Author: Mgr. Renata Jančaříková, Ph.D. Bc. Lukáš Kačinetz 1 Deklarace „Prohlašuji, že jsem diplomovou práci vypracoval samostatně, s využitím pouze citovaných pramenů, dalších informací a zdrojů v souladu s Disciplinárním řádem pro studenty Pedagogické fakulty Masarykovy univerzity a se zákonem č. 121/2000 Sb., o právu autorském, o právech souvisejících s právem autorským a o změně některých zákonů (autorský zákon), ve znění pozdějších předpisů.“ V Brně dne 30.3.2020 ……………………………….. Bc. Lukáš Kačinetz 2 Acknowledgement I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor Mgr . Renata Jančaříková, Ph.D. for her patience, kind and tolerant guidance and her support and help through the process of my writing. 3 Annotation The aim of this thesis is the analysis of the medial image of British serial killers. The analysis is conducted through the research of contemporary articles from newspapers, which report about three British serial killers - so called “Jack the Ripper'', Peter Sutcliffe (“The Yorkshire Ripper”) and Steve Wright (“The Suffolk Strangler”). The thesis describes briefly the case and its media portrayal, leading to the comparative analysis of the described cases. The thesis is divided into theoretical and practical part.The theoretical part describes medial English, news values and other phenomena, used by news reporting (Binary opposition, apeal of the negative news). The theoretical part also describes the research questions that the thesis focuses on. The practical part describes the three cases and comments their medial image. The frequential analysis is also presented. The outcome of the practical part is comparative analysis. Keywords Media, English, Serial Killers, Newspaper, Jack the Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe, Steve Wright Anotace Cílem diplomové práce je analýza mediálního obrazu britských sériových vrahů. Analýza je provedena skrze výzkum článků z dobového tisku, které informují o 3 sériových vrazích - “Jacku Rozparovači”, Peteru Sutcliffovi (“Yorkshirský Rozparovač”) a Steve Wright (“Suffolský Škrtič”). Diplomová práce stručně popisuje tyto případy a jejich mediální obraz a vede k porovnávací analýze zmíněných. Diplomová práce je rozdělena na teoretickou a praktickou část. Teoretická část popisuje angličtinu v médiích, zpravodajské hodnoty a další jevy, používané ve zpravodajství. Teoretická část také pokládá rétorické otázky, na jejichž odpovědi se soustředí. Praktická část popisuje zmiňované případy a komentuje jejich mediální obraz. Součástí je také frekvenční analýza. Výstupem praktické části je srovnávací analýza. Klíčová slova Media, angličtina, sériový vrah, noviny, Jack Rozparovač, Peter Sutcliffe, Steve Wright. 4 Table of Contents Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..………..7 1.1 Language of news………………………………………………………..……………….10 1.2 News values theory……………………………………………………..……………….14 1.3 Appeal and likeability of the negative news…….…….…………...……………….…...16 1.4 Definition of a serial killer…………………………….…………………………..…….18 1.5 Binary oppositions……………………………………………………………………....21 1.6 Formulation of the research questions…………….……………………………………...22 2.1 Corpus description…………………………………………………………………….….26 2.1.1 Resources for the analysis (The Corpus).............................................................26 2.1.2 Methodology of the analysis…………………………………....……………...28 2.2 “Jack the Ripper” case……………………………….…………………………………29 2.2.1 A brief history of the case…………...……...………………………………….29 2.2.2 Medial image of the murderer……………………………………………….....30 2.2.3 Medial portrait of the victims…………….......……………………………...…32 2.2.4 Medial image of the police…………………………..…………………………33 2.2.5 Media and the community…………………………...…………………………35 2.2.6 Concept of the articles…………...……………………...……………………...38 2.3 “Yorkshire Ripper” case………………………………………………………..………39 2.3.1 A brief history of the case…………………....……………………………….39 2.3.2 Medial image of the murderer…..………………………………………….....47 2.3.3 Medial portrait of the victims………….……………………………………..49 2.3.4 Medial image of the police……………………………………………………51 2.3.5 Media and the community…………….………………………………………52 2.3.6 Concept of the articles………………………………………………………...53 2.4 “Suffolk strangler” case………………………………………………………..……….54 2.4.1 A brief history of the case…….………………..……………………………...55 2.4.2 Medial image of the murderer..……..…………………………………………56 2.4.3 Medial portrait of the victims…………………..……………………………...56 2.4.4 Medial image of the police…………………….………………………………58 2.4.5 Media and the community…………………..…………………………………58 5 2.4.6 Concept of the articles…………………..……………………………………...59 2.5 Comparative analysis…………………………………………………..………………60 2.5.1 Frequency analysis of the used vocabulary…………………………………….59 2.5.1.1 Frequency analysis of the Jack the Ripper case………………...59 2.5.1.2 Frequency analysis of the Yorkshire Ripper case………....…….63 2.5.1.3 Frequency analysis of the Suffolk Strangler case……..……...….65 2.5.1.4 Commentary on the change of the analyzed vocabulary…………….66 2.5.2 Changes in the medial image of the killer……………………………………...67 2.5.3 Changes in the medial image of the victim…………………………………….69 2.5.4 Media and the police…………………………………………………………...71 2.5.5 Media and the community……………………………………………………...72 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………....74 Bibliography….……………………………………………………………..………………..76 Appendices……………..………………..…………………………………………………...79 6 Introduction Serial killers have always been among top selling topics of the press and there is a strong connection maintained between the killer, the press and the public. It may seem that the press and media are obsessed with serial killers and they take their own part in shaping the image of the serial killer. The gruesomeness of violence, combined with repeated crime acts usually leads to medial exposure and accentuation of negative messages and connotations. The mishandling of the topic or the case by the media can lead to chaos, public panic and thanks to the media exposure of the case it can be viewed as counterproductive by the police. The press and newspaper reporting can be considered vital both for the police and for the killer suspect as the reporters can create panic and mass hysteria. The opinion of the reporters and the way of the crime reporting can have major effect on the public population. The existence of serial killers of course pre-dates the infamous “Jack the Ripper” case, but it was the first time when the media started an uproar and created mass hysteria and panic. The combination of speculations, improper newspaper reporting and vivid description of the murders created paranoia, chaos and disorder and also gave birth to the iconic “Jack the Ripper”, which still resonates in culture and society. One of the culprits of this can be clearly identified (Goodbody 141) - The Star magazine is considered as a part of “the new journalism” and its sales were one third bigger than usual, raising from 190,000 in mid-September to 300,000 after Mary Kelly´s death (Curtis 59) Since then, it is not unusual that in a killer case, media play an important role as well as in the other criminal cases and investigations. In my thesis I attempt to analyse and compare the medial picture of three British serial killers with a similar profile. All of them committed the act of murder without a reasonable motive. All of them repeatedly assaulted women and all of them targeted prostitutes or other “street working” women. All of them also expressed unnatural violence and usually mutilated the bodies of the victims as a part of the process. Two of the chosen subjects also taunted the police by communicating with the officials or with the press itself. The criminal cases are separated by adequate chronological gap - 1888 (Jack the Ripper), 1981 (Peter Sutcliffe) and 2006 (Steven Wright). This chronology can provide 7 contemporaneous media samples for the diachronic analysis. The medial portrait of the killer, the victims, the focus of the media, the presentation of the murder and the supported follow-up steps or instructions of the police will be analyzed and compared. The hypothesis is “The medial image of the serial killer has changed over last hundred year and description and reporting is more objective and less frantic through the general press.”. In this paper, I demonstrate how the change in trend of media coverage style has shifted from frantic towards descriptive and "objective" on the example of reporting serial killer cases." In the theoretical part of the thesis the basic medial values theory is presented, the key concepts of medial English are addressed and the methodology of the analysis will be set up. The part will also contain the basic definitions from criminology - the definition of phenomenon called “serial killer” and it defines the differences between a mass murderer and a serial killer. Also the difference between two basic types of the serial killers are explained. The psychological effect of attractiveness of negative news is also briefly explained through the theory of the news values by Galtung and Ruge. The theoretical part further focuses on supplementary questions considering the style and the medial image of the parties involved in the picture of the serial killers in the press. These research questions are answered in the practical part and they create a methodological foundation for the practical part in order to execute a complex comparative analysis of the three cases. The practical part also includes