Critical Discourse Analysis of Tabloid Headlines

Fogec, Tomislav. (2014). Critical Discourse Analysis of Tabloid Headlines. Diploma Thesis. Filozofski fakultet u Zagrebu, Department of English Language and Literature. [mentor Stanojević, Mateusz-Milan].

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Abstract

This paper analyses headlines appearing on tabloid front pages (the Croatian 24 sata and the British Daily Star) in order to determine how they capture the attention of their potential readers. A corpus of tabloid front pages was analysed using methods laid out by Critical Discourse Analysis and a focus group session was conducted in order to complement the results of the analysis. It was found out that tabloids offer to their readers a selective view of the world in which the presentation of certain events is overly exaggerated and the events are offered to the readers in a linguistically complex way worthy of further research. Specifically, this is achieved by making certain events sound shocking and unexpected, thus destabilizing the readers' view of the world and capturing their attention. On the other hand, celebrities are presented in an intimate and revealing way in order to bring them closer to the readers. Both of these strategies have been found in both Croatian and English tabloids. The focus group was mostly aware of them.

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