Media Hegemony: The Portrayal of Rohingya Refugees in the Canadian Print Media
Date
2024-06-28
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Abstract
The Rohingya, a predominantly Muslim ethnic group in Myanmar's Rakhine state, gained global attention in 2017 due to the Myanmar military's genocide. This study focuses on how the Canadian media portrays the Rohingya minority after their displacement from Myanmar and resettlement in Canada. The primary objective is to analyze how different news outlets depict the Rohingya community, with a secondary goal of contrasting media narratives with the actual experiences of Rohingya migrants in Canada. My research emphasizes prioritizing refugee perspectives both theoretically and methodologically, aiming to engage these voices in dialogue with prevalent stereotypes and misrepresentations. My goal is to understand how our perceptions of these migrants are produced and how they influence refugee settlement. Based on their age, gender, and family background, the fieldwork with the Rohingya people revealed differences of opinion amongst the community about their portrayal in the media. Further, the data shows how different the resettlement journey is for each of these people in a foreign land. The media analysis demonstrated that the Rohingya were often portrayed as helpless victims, rarely discussed Rohingya history, and prioritized refugee camp stories with a significant absence of the Rohingya women's voices in the news. Ultimately the study displays the implication and significance of bringing refugee narratives into the mainstream media as people still fail to understand the crisis on a deeper level.
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Media, Canada, Rohingya
Citation
Chowdhury, T. (2024). Media hegemony: the portrayal of Rohingya refugees in the Canadian print media (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca.