The keris is a Malay or Indonesia dagger. In 2005, the then United Malays National Organization (UMNO) Youth Chief and Malaysia Education Minister, Hishammuddin Hussein, wielded the keris at the UMNO Youth general assembly, which he claimed to be a means to motivate the Malays. Following that, the UMNO Youth general assembly in 2006 and 2007 was noted for some racist statements made by several delegates in addition to the keris-wielding action repeated by Hishammuddin. The non-Malays perceived the action of wielding the keris as a gesture meant to defend ketuanan Melayu (Malay supremacy) and to threaten those who opposed Malay special rights. After the political tsunami in 2008, the Malaysian Chinese Association and Malaysian People’s Movement Party (Gerakan) leaders blamed UMNO for their electoral debacle. Hishammuddin also admitted that his raising of the keris was among the causes of the Barisan Nasional’s poor performance in the general election. He apologized to the non-Malays because of the fear to a symbol which was not his intention and to the Malays for not being able to uphold their symbol of heritage. This study aimed to compare the coverage of the keris polemics by mainstream Malay, English and Chinese as well as alternative newspapers. By using framing as the theoretical framework and content analysis as the research methods, it was found that the newspapers framed the issue differently, reflecting the political economic and ideological boundaries within which the journalists work.

News coverage of crises, conflicts, and wars is grounded in the notion of news value. Conflict reporting is often sensational and used as a device to boost circulation and ratings. Therefore, Norwegian Professor of Peace Studies Johan Galtung proposed peace journalism as a self-conscious working concept for journalists covering wars and conflicts. In recent years, tension has steadily increased over the South China Sea dispute. There are fears that the overlapping claims in the South China Sea will turn the region into an area of conflict, with potentially serious global consequences. This study aimed to examine the reporting of the South China Sea dispute by The Star, the English daily newspaper with the largest circulation in Malaysia. War/peace journalism and framing were employed as the theoretical framework, while content analysis was used as the research method to analyze the news coverage of the South China Sea dispute by The Star from 2014-2016. The findings showed that coverage in The Star was dominated by the war journalism frame but carried a neutral valence towards China. Implications of the findings to the understanding of war/peace journalism, conflict reporting, and news value studies were discussed.

No abstract

Rising incidents of suicide capture the attention of healthcare providers, government agencies, non-governmental organizations and media. Furthermore, public conversations about social problems are largely mediated by the media. It is noteworthy that media have the power to shape the way the public thinks about an issue by suggesting what the issue is about, what the cause is, and what should be done as a solution. The current study aims to examine suicide coverage in Malaysia, particularly the problem characterization and solution advocacy by The Star in reporting suicide from 2014 to 2018. The Star is the English-language daily newspaper with the largest circulation in Malaysia. Through content analysis, the study found that there was a statistically significant difference between the number of articles reporting suicide and the different years. Most of the coverage was published in the form of straight news with a negative depiction of suicide. There was reporting on both local and international suicide news. In addition, suicide was linked to various issues (e.g. mental health, relationship or marriage problems, financial problems, workplace stress, etc.) in the coverage. The study also found a significant difference between issue narrative styles and suicide solutions. The practical implications of the findings are discussed with regard to the role of media in raising awareness of suicide, promoting prevention and intervention efforts at the institutional level, as well as undertaking a more robust interpretive approach in addressing the issue.

The South China Sea disputes involve both island and maritime claims among several sovereign states within the region, namely China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam and Taiwan. Framing an analysis of international news and diplomatic relations allows researchers to examine how news organisations provide their audiences with context regarding news stories through content promotion and exclusion. This study examined how the Malaysian and Chinese newspapers reported about the South China Sea disputes and Malaysia–China bilateral relations. The findings indicated that the newspapers reported the topics with different intensity and prominence, while different news sources were employed. It was also found that conflict was a salient frame used by the various newspapers. In addition, this study found that the Malaysian and Chinese newspapers exhibited different valence in reporting the South China Sea disputes. Among the Malaysian newspapers under examination in this study, Sin Chew Daily (a Chinese-language daily) employed the most similar frame to that of the Chinese newspapers, where the coverage was pervasive with supportive valence towards China.