Framing a Movement: Media Portrayals of the George Floyd Protests on Twitter

Holly S. Cowart; Ginger E. Blackstone; Jeffrey K. Riley

doi:10.1177/10776990221109232

Framing a Movement: Media Portrayals of the George Floyd Protests on Twitter

Holly S. Cowart, Ginger E. Blackstone, Jeffrey K. Riley

Communication Arts

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

6 Scopus citations

Abstract

This study examines the way news media framed the protests following the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020. It utilizes 510 tweets from 13 different U.S. media outlets in a mixed-methods content analysis of images tweeted by those media outlets. It looks at how protestors and police are portrayed as well as the role of race in the news images. Civil liberties, as opposed to law and order, are found to be a dominant frame. These findings suggest a change from previous research. Images of protestors were likely to include signs that are readable. Implications are discussed.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	676-695
Number of pages	20
Journal	Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly
Volume	99
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1177/10776990221109232
State	Published - Sep 2022

Keywords

content analysis
framing
protests
race
social media
social movements

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10.1177/10776990221109232

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abstract = "This study examines the way news media framed the protests following the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020. It utilizes 510 tweets from 13 different U.S. media outlets in a mixed-methods content analysis of images tweeted by those media outlets. It looks at how protestors and police are portrayed as well as the role of race in the news images. Civil liberties, as opposed to law and order, are found to be a dominant frame. These findings suggest a change from previous research. Images of protestors were likely to include signs that are readable. Implications are discussed.",

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Framing a Movement: Media Portrayals of the George Floyd Protests on Twitter

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Keywords

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