Durham E-Theses `Slobs and yobs': representations of youth in the UK newspapers 1st January to 30th June 2005 Robson, Elaine M. How to cite: Robson, Elaine M. (2008) `Slobs and yobs': representations of youth in the UK newspapers 1st January to 30th June 2005, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/2227/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 "Slobs and Yobs": Representations of Youth in UK Newspapers 1st January to 30th June 2005 By Elaine M Robson. The copyright of this thesis rests with the author or the university to which it was submitted. No quotation from it, or information derived from it may be published without the prior written consent of the author or university, and Volume One any information derived from it should be acknowledged. This Thesis is submitted as a partial requirement for the Degree of: Doctor of Philosophy, School of Applied Social Sciences, Durham University 2008 0 7 OCT 2008 I wish to clarify that this thesis is my own work. The data presented are original and were collected by me over a six month period between 1st January 2005 to 30th June 2005. Abstract Many authors have pointed to the ways in which newspapers negatively stereotype young people. This thesis aims to engage with and contribute to this debate through a contemporary discursive analysis of newspaper representations of youth, in The Guardian, The Daily Mail and The Daily Mirror during the period I st January to 30th June 2005. My aim is to make explicit the discourses, both contemporary and historical, that circulated in the press during this period. It is through such discourses that young people were identified, explained and represented at this juncture. It will be argued that those young people deemed problematic by the press are represented in particular classed ways and understood through a discourse of 'underclass'; by which young people are constructed as victims of their families. Further, in 2005, as in the nineteenth­ century, the poor working-class (understood as uncultured/uncivilized) are blamed for societies ills and such a discursive configuration has inevitable consequences and effects for both young people and their families. Acknowledgements: I would like to express my gratitude to my Supervisor Dr Steph Lawler (University ofNewcastle) for her support and guidance through the duration of this PhD. I would like to thank the administrative staff and Dr Jo Phoenix (University of Durham) for their assistance. I would also like to thank the ESRC for their support, financial and otherwise. Index Page: Chapter One Introduction, Background, Arguments and 1 Method Chapter Two Newspapers, News-Making and Representations 18 of Youth Chapter Three Definitions of Youth 69 Chapter Four Discourse, Analysis and Newspaper 114 Representations of Youth Chapter Five Discourses on Youth; Historical Antecedents 185 Chapter Six The Anti-social Representation of Yobs 255 Chapter Seven Reproducing Vulnerable Young Women 326 Chapter Eight 'Slobs and Yobs': Stereotyping (Working-Class 381 Youth) Chapter Nine Conclusion 427 Appendices 442 Bibliography 483 Chapter One: Introduction, Background, Arguments and Method In the UK today young people are seen as 'problematic': the young person is either a threat or a victim. The understandable 'respectable fears' surrounding young people's involvement in anti-social behaviour, violent crime, drug abuse and theft become, in the hands of the media and politicians, conclusive proof that 'fings ain't wot they used to be' and that society is on the edge of collapse (Garratt, Roche and Tucker, 1997, p1). Ten years on, the above sentiments still apply. And nowhere is the 'problem of youth' more apparent than in newspapers. Many authors have pointed to the ways in which newspapers negatively stereotype young people (e.g.: Cohen, 2005, Davis and Bourhill, 2004, Hall et al 2002, Muncie, 2004, Neustatter, 1998, Porteous & Colston, 1980, Scraton, 2004). This has caused concern for many including youth groups and charities. Indeed, in 2004 the publication 'Young People Now' 1 launched a campaign to improve the portrayal of young people in the media, as they argued: Yobs, thugs, louts, monsters, scum, brutes, crooks. Just some of the terms used to refer to young people in the media in the last few years. The media presents young people at best as problems and at worst as criminals: 71 per cent of stories about them are negative and one in three focus on crime. 1 1 hnp://www.youngpeoplenow.com/cwnpaign/index.cfm This thesis aims to engage with and contribute to this debate through a contemporary discursive analysis of newspaper representations of youth, in The Guardian, The Daily Mail and The Daily Mirror during the period 151 January to 30th June 2005. My aim is to make explicit the discourses, both contemporary and historical, that circulated in the press during this period. It is through such discourses that young people were identified, explained and represented at this juncture. This thesis does not undertake audience research. The study of representations is an important sociological project because representations circulate culturally and thereby contribute to the ways in which individuals understand themselves and others. Culture enables communication. Communication is the generation of meaning: 'meaning is produced -constructed­ rather than simply found', inherent in the elements (Hall, 2003a, p5). Representation constitutes things. Culture is a constitutive process. Meaning is constantly produced in a variety of sites and circulated via a variety of practices from everyday micro practices to macro mass media technologies. Thus culture is a 'theatre where various political and ideological causes engage one another' (Said, 1994:xiv). There are many cultural apparatuses (libraries, cinemas, schools, magazines, films, T.V.) of which newspapers are but one. Singularly, the power of each is questionable, yet the combined 'weight of their social gravity is manifested in how they are inscribed on the body, move people to social action, and set limits to the possibilities through which individuals negotiate their identities and sense of social agency' (Giroux, 1994:27-28). 2 The cultural meanings produced are not innocent but have real practical effects. Meanings are regulatory; they structure and regulate our conduct and practices. Kellner (2003:9) argues that the products of media culture provide the: Materials out of which we forge our identities; our sense of selfhood; our notion of what it means to be male or female; our sense of class, ethnicity and race, of nationality, of sexuality; and of "us· and "them". Media images help shape our view of the world and our deepest values: what we consider good or bad, positive or negative, moral or evil. Media stories provide the symbols, myths, and resources through which we constitute a common culture and through the appropriation of which we insert ourselves into this culture. Consequently the media is a profound source of 'cultural pedagogy'; which instructs us in ways of being: whether this be in the performance of gender, age, class, race, nationality; in consumption and leisure, or in conformity to a dominant system of norms, values, practices and institutions. That is, the media instructs in ways of performing within 'white patriarchal capitalism' (Meyers, 1999, p7). It is in this context that the study of representations becomes an important sociological project. It is my contention that a sociological examination of newspaper representations of youth is particularly important because: 1. Newspapers are a key medium through which people gain information about and knowledge of the world in which they live. It is especially important in describing events outside of the individual's personal experience. 3 2. Newspapers are central in the communication between those who govern and those who are governed. That is newspapers are central in communicating politics to the public, and vice versa, they are equally important in communicating (so-called) public opinion to politicians and policy makers. 3. Newspapers (therefore) play an important role in the definition/ construction of social problems, as well as in influencing solutions. 4. The ways in which newspapers interpret and communicate events involve processes which pull-on, perpetuate and exploit various, but limited and pre-existing, discourses and frameworks of understanding (ideologies, narratives, latent mythologies, popular assumptions and stereotypes). 5. Rather than enlightening us, the mechanics of the journalistic field inevitably result in simplification, homogenisation and mental closure (Bourdieu, 1998). Moreover, through the course of this thesis I will argue that newspapers play a constitutive and constituent role in the construction of social problems and the solutions to these. However, this is done in ways that delimit the field of possibilities, and thus sustain social order. 4 I will argue that adherence to news values means that only certain activities are judged newsworthy, these tend to be those that can be perceived as a threat to social order. In this way newspapers present a distorted vision of youthful behaviour. I further argue that the use of inferential structures by journalists means that the vast majority of activities judged newsworthy are accredited to certain (classed) young people.