Manipulative prototypes in leading online english newspapers in the Philippines: A critical discourse analysis

• Main Author: Flores, Eden Regala
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2009
• Subjects: English newspapers > Philippines; Electronic newspapers > Philippines; Discourse and Text Linguistics
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_doctoral/259; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/context/etd_doctoral/article/1258/viewcontent/CDTG004607_P.pdf
• Institution: De La Salle University

This study examines the linguistic and discoursal realization of manipulative prototypes in news reports in three leading online English newspapers in the Philippines at the microstructure level. It likewise describes how the macrostructure or the schematic structure of news reports via conceptual categories can contribute to the attainment of manipulation in the news discourse. The data of the study consists of 75 news reports on the alleged cheating during the 2004 presidential elections involving the President and an unidentified Commission on Elections officer, which first surfaced on June 6 and reported until June 20, 2005. These news reports are retrieved from the archives of the leading online Philippine English broadsheets, namely, Philippine Daily Inquirer (Inq.net), Philippine Star (philstar.com), and Manila Bulletin Online (MBO). The study shows that there are structural, linguistic, and discourse features that define the manipulative prototypes reflected in the three leading online English news reports in the Philippines. Among these is the presence of a general schematic structure where conceptual categories such as, Headline, Lead, Main Event, Verbal Reaction, Previous Event, Evaluation, and Consequence that both the journalists and readers implicitly use in the production, and understanding of news. It is hypothesized that the sequencing of these categories helps promote or perpetuate a particular value, belief, or ideology. With regard to the linguistic features of the news reports, nominalization, passivization, and rhetorical figures as manipulative prototypes are noted to be utilized by the news reporters. At the discourse level, three manipulative prototypes stand out as widely used: (1) appeal to relevant ideologies, attitudes, and emotions of the recipients, (2) focus on (new) beliefs CDA: Manipulative Prototypes v that the manipulator wants the recipients to accept as knowledge, and (3) de-emphasis on the position, power, authority, or moral superiority of the speaker/writer or their source. Finally, it is observed that these manipulative prototypes are predominantly positioned in the Verbal Reaction, Previous Event, and Evaluation categories of the news reports. In the light of the above findings, there is a need to look at how lessons on reading newspapers are taught in the classrooms. It may also be helpful to impress upon the learners that news reports, like any accounts of any events, are the reporters interpretations or versions of the events and situations that would require close and critical reading.