Chutluck
26.09.07, 23:42
British media captain criticizes Turkey's stereotyped image in foreign press
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/photo/92007/m84328.jpg
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/photo/92007/mb84328.jpg
Turkey is stereotyped by the foreign press into just three words , says BBC College of Journalism Editor Kevin Marsh: The headscarf, generals, and the European Union. He is trying to change this through his college's program
YASEMİN SİM ESMEN
ISTANBUL-Turkish Daily News
British media captain criticizes Turkey's stereotyped image in foreign press
There is a mesh filtering out any possible news stories that do not confirm with the stereotyped image of Turkey abroad, said Kevin Marsh, editor of the BBC College of Journalism whose goal is to teach BBC journalists a better understanding of the media, balanced coverage, the public interest, and independence on top of journalistic skills.
Three words and images, namely, the headscarf, generals, and the European Union (EU) are used to stereotype the perception of Turkey, said Marsh. Prior to coming to Turkey to give two speeches in Marketingist, a three day marketing event held last week, he studied the portrayal of Turkey in British and French media. “It was just striking how the same words kept coming up again and again: Islam, headscarf, generals, generals, Islam, headscarf, secular, the EU, the EU, the EU… If a story did not have one of those elements or, more importantly, if you could not put one of those elements in it, it was almost as if it just did not get in the paper,” he said.
Marsh believes such words and the images associated with them create hostile images in the British psyche. He uses the example that the mention of Islam or Muslims has been so skewed by the media that they result in conjuring images of the 9/11 attacks and the London bombings. “I started realizing that these key words were taking the mental picture into really hostile places,” said Marsh. He said a story needed to go through this mesh and confirm with the “key words” to be able to be printed or broadcasted. “And each of the key words, to the majority, has very bad associations,” he said.
The portrayal of Turkey in the Western media has long been a sore spot of both Turks traveling abroad and the country's international image, and confronting the lament is the recently-declared mission of the new head of the BBC College of Journalismwho sees Turkey as a victim of "key word" journalism.
“I was quite surprised once I started looking at the way in which Turkey was reported about in the UK press and some of the French press, too. It is an amazingly stereotyped image. It is almost as if only stories that fit into certain stereotype have been getting into the press, certainly on front pages,” said Kevin Marsh, who worked for years as a television producer before moving two years ago to establish and become editor of the BBC College of Journalism.
The 'key words'
“It was just striking how the same words kept coming up again and again: Islam, headscarf, generals, generals, Islam, headscarf, secular, European Union (EU), EU, EU. If a story did not have one of those elements or, more importantly, if you could not put one of those elements in it, it was almost as if it just did not get in the paper,” he said.
In order illustrate how the media associates images with various “key-words” and communicates ideas through these images, he gives the example of how Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s statement on the constitutional changes regarding the headscarf were reflected through BBC World:
“It was a very short report, probably the only report on BBC World that there will be about Turkey for another three weeks. It had one image, Erdoğan’s speech, and then the other image, women in headscarves, and then the third, the Turkish army marching. Even the BBC, which I think is a lot better than most, can put together these really stereotypical images of Turkey that draw from a very small number of mental images.”
Such observations are common among Turkish media critics, such as Mehmet Ali Birand, Ahmet Sever, and Aslı Tunç. But Marsh’s comments come as a first from a high priest of Western media.
Marsh believes such words and the images associated with them create hostile images in the British psyche. “For example, any mention of Islam or Muslim has been so skewed, especially by popular media in the UK, that the images that immediately come to mind are of 9/11, the 2005 London bombers, Iran. I started realizing that these key words were taking the mental picture into really hostile places,” said Marsh.
“The same with the EU,” he added. Marsh sees the way some British press reported on the European Union enlargement of 2004 as feeding into stereotypes and communicating reports that were not true, such as people coming from Poland sleeping in parks and eating squirrels. “Here is another word,” he said, “If the story is not about EU enlargement and Turkey, it does not get into the paper. But the EU enlargement in the public mind tends to bring up what happened in 2004, or how the media portrayed it.”
Confirming stereotypes
This portrayal of Turkey, Marsh finds, is very unfavorable. “Any story, any report has to go through this mesh, which filters out any story that does not have these key words. And each of the key words, to the majority, has very bad associations,” he said. He believes this portrayal of Turkey can be considered socially irresponsible. “If the representatives of those newspapers were present here now, they would probably say: ‘Well, you cannot expect us to report everything about Turkey. We only report the international stuff, we cannot be too complicated,’ not totally understanding that that kind of reporting is almost socially irresponsible because it is confirming stereotypes,” said Marsh.
Despite this imagery, the British are still moderately pro-Turkish and around 45 percent of the British support Turkey’s EU accession. However, newspapers sustain their negative view. “I suspect that if and when the enlargement process begins to accelerate, the papers will turn their minds to it and you will get a very negative press about the prospect. [Something like] ’75 million Turks standing on your doorstep, presumably all wearing headscarves until the generals come and yank them away.’ This is the image in the press,” he said. He anticipates that this will touch on the sensitive spots in the British psyche, and will start to erode support for Turkey.
Marsh believes the fact that Turkey is rarely portrayed in the British media to be consequential. “When Turkey is pictured in news reports, which is very important because to most people they are the only images they will get, they are not the images of people in Istanbul. They are the images from way in the east. It is women in headscarves. It is the most conservative picture possible of the country,” he said.
The reasons behind this portrayal
Marsh believes this portrayal of Turkey is partially a conscious effort on the part of the media. “Fear, anxiety, prejudice sell newspapers better than broad view and comprehensive understanding do. Particularly in the center- right press, you know your readers have got particular prejudices. Therefore the way to sell newspapers is to support those prejudices,” he said.
Yet, there is also another reason—a human one. “There is a herd mentality in journalism. So, once a critical mass of journalists goes to one side of the boat, then everyone else piles on that side. Either you have to have a mission to report differently or you are stuck in this peer group pressure. Istanbul struck me as a city like Barcelona but with minarets. But if some newspapers would try to get that image across, then they would feel wrong. It is not part of the dictionary,” said Marsh.
The role of journalists
“I think journalists should take responsibility, too. It is one of the things I am doing in the college. It is frightening that, when you talk to journalists in most countries about ethics, standards, or social responsibility, they just want to walk away from that conversation,” said Marsh. He added that the situation is a bit different in the United States (U.S.) where colleges build the debate on ethics into their course work. “So changing slightly there, but again the application of the ethical standards is not as good as it could be. And when it comes to local television, when it comes to the crunch, it will always be the profit motive that wins out,” said Marsh.
He believes that journalists can establish an ethical control mechanism among themselves. “I also think there is a funny sort of attitude among journalists that they do not criticize each other,” he said, adding, “As journalists we have pressure about being the first to do a story, or about having a splash headline, or all sorts of pressures to drive us in a certain direction. But we do not feel a pressure when someone has made a story up; we do not feel the urge to say ‘you made it up.’”
Transparency a problem with the Turkish media
Marsh has met numerous members of the Turkish media and other professionals in Turkey. Through his encounters, he has apprehended that the Turkish media has a problem of transparency. “I think it is great to have a vibrant press. The more newspapers, the better,” he said. “But I think there is a bit of a problem when there is a risk that shareholders, owners, etc. deliberately use the newspaper to support either a particular business attitude or a political attitude, without it being absolutely clear that it is what they are doing.”
He believes that this is a risk for media all over the world, as the division between news and comment is becoming blurred. “Where I think that you get the danger is when an undeclared interest, whether political or economical, starts to affect the news judgment,” he said and added: “If your newspaper supports the government, why not be clear about that? There is nothing wrong with it, it is not illegal.”
He gives examples from the English press: “If you have, and this is a big issue in England, a whole series of business interest that are connected to your newspaper or your channel, then I think you should be clear about that. The Pearson Group owns the Economist. Every time the Economist makes a story about the publishing industry, it always says in brackets ‘the Economist is part of the group that…’ They do that voluntarily,” he said. In fact, only two newspapers in Turkey have a similar policy of disclosure, the Turkish Daily News and the business daily Referans.
Marsh then gives the example of Rupert Murdoch of the News Corporation, known to own the Times and Sky News. “It is only because people know that he owns both that people can see how they are reporting each other. The Sky News never says: ‘Oh, by the way, our owner also owns…’ So that level of transparency is hard to achieve,” added Marsh.
Media’s social responsibility
Marsh believes a lot of responsibility falls on the shoulders of the media to ensure the public is able to understand what they see on television and what they read in newspapers. He spoke at a panel last week during Marketingist about social responsibility in the media. He explains that as part of the BBC’s social responsibility project, next spring the BBC College of Journalism will be launching a Web site accessible to anybody in the world. “It will be a kind of website that tells audiences how we do what we do,” he said. During the project, entitled “Safeguarding Trust,” the techniques used by BBC journalists will be explained to audiences who will be asked, “Do you still trust us now that you know how we do it?” The aim is to make the public understand the message behind the message, not only in news but also in entertainment--to help people understand what a story is really telling them. “This is part of what we see as our social responsibility,” said Marsh. “I think that a lot of the broadcasters do not get this. They think that social responsibility is doing things that are for the social good, in a kind of general, philanthropic sense. They overlook things they could do which are incorporated in their business.”
Marsh foresees that the Safeguarding Trust project will change the way people think about and view journalism. “I think that once we have the website up and running, journalism schools will use us as a resource. I guess that will influence the language in which journalism is taught outside the BBC. It feels to me as if it will become the industry standard, which I think will be good,” he said.
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=84328
“It was just striking how the same words kept coming up again and again: Islam, headscarf, generals, generals, Islam, headscarf, secular, European Union (EU), EU, EU. If a story did not have one of those elements or, more importantly, if you could not put one of those elements in it, it was almost as if it just did not get in the paper,” he said
The same over here...
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/photo/92007/m84328.jpg
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/photo/92007/mb84328.jpg
Turkey is stereotyped by the foreign press into just three words , says BBC College of Journalism Editor Kevin Marsh: The headscarf, generals, and the European Union. He is trying to change this through his college's program
YASEMİN SİM ESMEN
ISTANBUL-Turkish Daily News
British media captain criticizes Turkey's stereotyped image in foreign press
There is a mesh filtering out any possible news stories that do not confirm with the stereotyped image of Turkey abroad, said Kevin Marsh, editor of the BBC College of Journalism whose goal is to teach BBC journalists a better understanding of the media, balanced coverage, the public interest, and independence on top of journalistic skills.
Three words and images, namely, the headscarf, generals, and the European Union (EU) are used to stereotype the perception of Turkey, said Marsh. Prior to coming to Turkey to give two speeches in Marketingist, a three day marketing event held last week, he studied the portrayal of Turkey in British and French media. “It was just striking how the same words kept coming up again and again: Islam, headscarf, generals, generals, Islam, headscarf, secular, the EU, the EU, the EU… If a story did not have one of those elements or, more importantly, if you could not put one of those elements in it, it was almost as if it just did not get in the paper,” he said.
Marsh believes such words and the images associated with them create hostile images in the British psyche. He uses the example that the mention of Islam or Muslims has been so skewed by the media that they result in conjuring images of the 9/11 attacks and the London bombings. “I started realizing that these key words were taking the mental picture into really hostile places,” said Marsh. He said a story needed to go through this mesh and confirm with the “key words” to be able to be printed or broadcasted. “And each of the key words, to the majority, has very bad associations,” he said.
The portrayal of Turkey in the Western media has long been a sore spot of both Turks traveling abroad and the country's international image, and confronting the lament is the recently-declared mission of the new head of the BBC College of Journalismwho sees Turkey as a victim of "key word" journalism.
“I was quite surprised once I started looking at the way in which Turkey was reported about in the UK press and some of the French press, too. It is an amazingly stereotyped image. It is almost as if only stories that fit into certain stereotype have been getting into the press, certainly on front pages,” said Kevin Marsh, who worked for years as a television producer before moving two years ago to establish and become editor of the BBC College of Journalism.
The 'key words'
“It was just striking how the same words kept coming up again and again: Islam, headscarf, generals, generals, Islam, headscarf, secular, European Union (EU), EU, EU. If a story did not have one of those elements or, more importantly, if you could not put one of those elements in it, it was almost as if it just did not get in the paper,” he said.
In order illustrate how the media associates images with various “key-words” and communicates ideas through these images, he gives the example of how Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s statement on the constitutional changes regarding the headscarf were reflected through BBC World:
“It was a very short report, probably the only report on BBC World that there will be about Turkey for another three weeks. It had one image, Erdoğan’s speech, and then the other image, women in headscarves, and then the third, the Turkish army marching. Even the BBC, which I think is a lot better than most, can put together these really stereotypical images of Turkey that draw from a very small number of mental images.”
Such observations are common among Turkish media critics, such as Mehmet Ali Birand, Ahmet Sever, and Aslı Tunç. But Marsh’s comments come as a first from a high priest of Western media.
Marsh believes such words and the images associated with them create hostile images in the British psyche. “For example, any mention of Islam or Muslim has been so skewed, especially by popular media in the UK, that the images that immediately come to mind are of 9/11, the 2005 London bombers, Iran. I started realizing that these key words were taking the mental picture into really hostile places,” said Marsh.
“The same with the EU,” he added. Marsh sees the way some British press reported on the European Union enlargement of 2004 as feeding into stereotypes and communicating reports that were not true, such as people coming from Poland sleeping in parks and eating squirrels. “Here is another word,” he said, “If the story is not about EU enlargement and Turkey, it does not get into the paper. But the EU enlargement in the public mind tends to bring up what happened in 2004, or how the media portrayed it.”
Confirming stereotypes
This portrayal of Turkey, Marsh finds, is very unfavorable. “Any story, any report has to go through this mesh, which filters out any story that does not have these key words. And each of the key words, to the majority, has very bad associations,” he said. He believes this portrayal of Turkey can be considered socially irresponsible. “If the representatives of those newspapers were present here now, they would probably say: ‘Well, you cannot expect us to report everything about Turkey. We only report the international stuff, we cannot be too complicated,’ not totally understanding that that kind of reporting is almost socially irresponsible because it is confirming stereotypes,” said Marsh.
Despite this imagery, the British are still moderately pro-Turkish and around 45 percent of the British support Turkey’s EU accession. However, newspapers sustain their negative view. “I suspect that if and when the enlargement process begins to accelerate, the papers will turn their minds to it and you will get a very negative press about the prospect. [Something like] ’75 million Turks standing on your doorstep, presumably all wearing headscarves until the generals come and yank them away.’ This is the image in the press,” he said. He anticipates that this will touch on the sensitive spots in the British psyche, and will start to erode support for Turkey.
Marsh believes the fact that Turkey is rarely portrayed in the British media to be consequential. “When Turkey is pictured in news reports, which is very important because to most people they are the only images they will get, they are not the images of people in Istanbul. They are the images from way in the east. It is women in headscarves. It is the most conservative picture possible of the country,” he said.
The reasons behind this portrayal
Marsh believes this portrayal of Turkey is partially a conscious effort on the part of the media. “Fear, anxiety, prejudice sell newspapers better than broad view and comprehensive understanding do. Particularly in the center- right press, you know your readers have got particular prejudices. Therefore the way to sell newspapers is to support those prejudices,” he said.
Yet, there is also another reason—a human one. “There is a herd mentality in journalism. So, once a critical mass of journalists goes to one side of the boat, then everyone else piles on that side. Either you have to have a mission to report differently or you are stuck in this peer group pressure. Istanbul struck me as a city like Barcelona but with minarets. But if some newspapers would try to get that image across, then they would feel wrong. It is not part of the dictionary,” said Marsh.
The role of journalists
“I think journalists should take responsibility, too. It is one of the things I am doing in the college. It is frightening that, when you talk to journalists in most countries about ethics, standards, or social responsibility, they just want to walk away from that conversation,” said Marsh. He added that the situation is a bit different in the United States (U.S.) where colleges build the debate on ethics into their course work. “So changing slightly there, but again the application of the ethical standards is not as good as it could be. And when it comes to local television, when it comes to the crunch, it will always be the profit motive that wins out,” said Marsh.
He believes that journalists can establish an ethical control mechanism among themselves. “I also think there is a funny sort of attitude among journalists that they do not criticize each other,” he said, adding, “As journalists we have pressure about being the first to do a story, or about having a splash headline, or all sorts of pressures to drive us in a certain direction. But we do not feel a pressure when someone has made a story up; we do not feel the urge to say ‘you made it up.’”
Transparency a problem with the Turkish media
Marsh has met numerous members of the Turkish media and other professionals in Turkey. Through his encounters, he has apprehended that the Turkish media has a problem of transparency. “I think it is great to have a vibrant press. The more newspapers, the better,” he said. “But I think there is a bit of a problem when there is a risk that shareholders, owners, etc. deliberately use the newspaper to support either a particular business attitude or a political attitude, without it being absolutely clear that it is what they are doing.”
He believes that this is a risk for media all over the world, as the division between news and comment is becoming blurred. “Where I think that you get the danger is when an undeclared interest, whether political or economical, starts to affect the news judgment,” he said and added: “If your newspaper supports the government, why not be clear about that? There is nothing wrong with it, it is not illegal.”
He gives examples from the English press: “If you have, and this is a big issue in England, a whole series of business interest that are connected to your newspaper or your channel, then I think you should be clear about that. The Pearson Group owns the Economist. Every time the Economist makes a story about the publishing industry, it always says in brackets ‘the Economist is part of the group that…’ They do that voluntarily,” he said. In fact, only two newspapers in Turkey have a similar policy of disclosure, the Turkish Daily News and the business daily Referans.
Marsh then gives the example of Rupert Murdoch of the News Corporation, known to own the Times and Sky News. “It is only because people know that he owns both that people can see how they are reporting each other. The Sky News never says: ‘Oh, by the way, our owner also owns…’ So that level of transparency is hard to achieve,” added Marsh.
Media’s social responsibility
Marsh believes a lot of responsibility falls on the shoulders of the media to ensure the public is able to understand what they see on television and what they read in newspapers. He spoke at a panel last week during Marketingist about social responsibility in the media. He explains that as part of the BBC’s social responsibility project, next spring the BBC College of Journalism will be launching a Web site accessible to anybody in the world. “It will be a kind of website that tells audiences how we do what we do,” he said. During the project, entitled “Safeguarding Trust,” the techniques used by BBC journalists will be explained to audiences who will be asked, “Do you still trust us now that you know how we do it?” The aim is to make the public understand the message behind the message, not only in news but also in entertainment--to help people understand what a story is really telling them. “This is part of what we see as our social responsibility,” said Marsh. “I think that a lot of the broadcasters do not get this. They think that social responsibility is doing things that are for the social good, in a kind of general, philanthropic sense. They overlook things they could do which are incorporated in their business.”
Marsh foresees that the Safeguarding Trust project will change the way people think about and view journalism. “I think that once we have the website up and running, journalism schools will use us as a resource. I guess that will influence the language in which journalism is taught outside the BBC. It feels to me as if it will become the industry standard, which I think will be good,” he said.
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=84328
“It was just striking how the same words kept coming up again and again: Islam, headscarf, generals, generals, Islam, headscarf, secular, European Union (EU), EU, EU. If a story did not have one of those elements or, more importantly, if you could not put one of those elements in it, it was almost as if it just did not get in the paper,” he said
The same over here...