MCC at NYU London, and the Global News Media

I still cannot believe that it has been over halfway through my semester at NYU London. For those who are interested in or planning to study away in the future, I’d like to share what the MCC course in London is like, and some reflections on the global news industry as well.

There is only one MCC course offered at NYU London— Global Media Seminar: Britain and Europe. This class meets weekly; it includes a lecture by the professor and a group presentation, which often lasts for about one hour as presenters will pose questions to encourage class-wide discussions. Then we will use the rest of the class time (2 hours and 45 minutes) to discuss our weekly blogs or any related topics. Throughout, we are mainly focusing on the news/journalism side of media and exploring how they relate to topics such as the public sphere, politics of representation, globalization, and so on. We have looked at several examples of news produced by British outlets and had interesting conversations about them. We post blogs based on different seminar topics each week on a WordPress site. Since we all come from or are based in different areas of the world, the news pieces we are exposed to can be diverse. Therefore, it is interesting to read what my classmates have discovered, from which I can develop a more comprehensive understanding of the global news media environment. We would even scroll through TikTok during class to see what posts we can find from media, particularly news, organizations.

Among our seminar discussions, we’ve paid much attention to the idea of framing theory and the representation of race in news. "To frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation for the item described." (Entman 1993: 52) Media framing can simply be described as the angle or perspective from which a news story is told. While the news is often thought to be objective, this is rarely if ever the case. News is not an exact representation of reality but rather a reconstruction from various angles of a small section of reality. 

One example I’ve found is the different framing of the Russia-Ukraine War between the New York Times and BBC News. As I read through the two pieces of news, I found that the one by the New York Times is more focused on details of the war, while the one by BBC news provides a relatively refined version with emphasis on weapons. The New York Times spends much length informing the audience about the state of the war and what actions both sides have taken. The passage starts with a tragic scene in Ukraine: “KYIV, Ukraine — Torture chambers in the basements of police precincts and school buildings. Witness testimony of abuse, humiliation, and murder.” The suffering of Ukrainians is made more salient in this news. On the other hand, the article from BBC News has more descriptions of Putin’s actions on nuclear forces and Russia’s nuclear weapons.

When describing President Biden’s interview with the CBS News program “60 Minutes,” the two articles’ wordings are also different. The New York Times glides over Biden’s words, while BBC news includes several direct quotes from the interview. For example, when Biden was asked what he would say to President Putin if he was considering using weapons of mass destruction in Ukraine: “Don’t, don’t, don’t,” was President Biden’s response. Biden was then asked what the consequences would be for Putin if such a line was crossed. “You think I would tell you if I knew exactly what it would be? Of course, I’m not gonna tell you. It’ll be consequential,” he responded. With the inclusion of direct quotes, the portrayal of Biden on BBC News is more aggressive. On the contrary, along with images in the article, the New York Times shifts focus onto Russia as the one to blame for their consideration of using unconventional powers, and for the damage they have already done to Ukraine. Additionally, President Biden’s warning in turn is depicted as right and reasonable. This, as a result, demonstrates the projection of a diverse image of the Russian-Ukraine War to audiences by different news outlets.

The representation of race in news is another interesting thing to note. Society tends to treat whiteness as the default regarding representation in media, whether in books, tv, movies, or even video games. When you take a look at the western news feed that you usually receive information from, it is not hard to find an example. As pointed out by Richard Dyer in “The Matter of Whiteness,” the invisibility of whiteness as a racial position is prevalent in popular discourse; white people are considered as just “people” while others are “raced”. His argument reminds me of a fact that I did not pay enough attention to before: in western representations, we often see a racial prefix added when describing people of color, but we do not often hear terms such as “a white girl,” etc. 

In a recent news report by The Guardian, the headline reads: “Mississippi police shoot Black teenager in the head outside the store.” The title of it sets the tone by calling Jaheim McMillan a “Black teenager,” leading the reader to have an expectation or assumption about the event; we anticipate that his blackness caused this harsh interaction with the police. In this case, the teenager is “raced” while the racial imagery of the police (who is white as seen from the video) is neglected because the teenager is black. The very first sentence of the report’s body paragraphs points out the blackness of the teenager: “A Black teenager in Mississippi was taken off life support days after Gulfport police shot him in the head outside a discount store, and his relatives are questioning officers’ actions.” Even though this incident has nothing to do with race, readers inevitably connect the brutal treatment of the police officer to McMillan’s race and how black people are often represented in the media. This is an example that demonstrates the absence of reference to whiteness in Western media, as argued by Dyer in his book. White people are seen as just “human.” 

To sum up, the study away experience at NYU London has exposed me to more diverse cultures and encouraged me to learn about the world through different lenses. Since NYU London is a much smaller community compared to the New York campus, I feel more connected with the students here and love the overall vibe. We also have a series of “Cultural Programming” events led by the school that enable us to explore the musical, historical, art, and food cultures here. If you're thinking of studying away in London, the experience is well worth a try!