Abstract
In the last presidential election of the United States (2016), the interaction between t... more Abstract In the last presidential election of the United States (2016), the interaction between the Donald Trump and the American media was remarkable and unprecedented from both political and communication perspectives. The present paper is interested in observing the interactions between then the Republican Party candidate, Donald Trump, and the media of the United States. As there were major verbal confrontations between Trump, and some media, specifically CNN, this paper observes how Trump campaign reacted to CNN that turned out to be one of his biggest opponents. The relations and reactions are explained using “agenda setting” and “selective exposure” as theories and “thematic analysis” as the research methodology. The paper analyzes CNN videos from October 7 to October 31, and Trump’s tweets during the same period. The reason for conducting the research during October is that this month is regarded as one of the most critical periods in US presidential election, known as “October surprise”. Then a thematic analysis of the data is conducted to extract all accusations and allegations against Trump. Research results show that President Trump did not react to most of the accusations and attacks raised by CNN. Apparently Trump had decided that ignoring and not responding is a better strategy. There was an exception to this rule: Trump’s treatment toward women. He did address that issue frequently and tried to justify himself and apologize. Accordingly, Trump’s presidential campaign aim was to ignore accusations, keep attacking, and answering accusations only if they are already known to too many people. Keywords: Trump, Twitter, CNN, media messages, thematic analysis, agenda setting, selective exposure
The problem of runaway girls has been one of the most unsolvable social problems in Iran; it is a... more The problem of runaway girls has been one of the most unsolvable social problems in Iran; it is a problem by itself but it will not stop in itself and will entail several other problems. Because issues related to the subject of sex is still taboo in Iran, there has not been enough research on these issues and this is one of the reasons why this issue has not been dealt with properly. Reviewing what has been done so far on this subject, the present paper will proceed by presenting a report of a longitudinal study along with in-depth interviews with 56 runaway girls who lived now in a safe house by the government. We studied issues like drug and alcohol abuse, rape, sex, robbery, suicide or parasuicide, girl trafficking, and abortion; we found that family issues, broken families and strict parents and most importantly, having a boyfriend have been the most important factor for these girls on deciding to escape from home. We have provided recommendations to families, civil society organizations and the government based on our findings.
Cinema is a powerful media that can shape people's minds about different issues. Movies can focus... more Cinema is a powerful media that can shape people's minds about different issues. Movies can focus on very detailed or hidden matters in society, and critical issues that profoundly affect the lives of large populations are usually at the center of cinema's attention. Among these issues are wars that can affect tens of millions of people financially, mentally and of course physically. Films can question or justify wars. To answer if they questioned wars or justified them one should choose a specific war, a period and maybe a particular group of films and analyze their content and discourse. However, to do so, it would be helpful and maybe necessary to first better understand how films may question or justify wars. The present research is an effort to analyze a specific number of movies to see in what ways they may have justified the role of the United States in the Second World War. The results include eight issues that the movies raised regarding the legitimacy of the war and America's role in it.
The 9/11 attacks were a watershed in the history of the United States as it greatly influenced di... more The 9/11 attacks were a watershed in the history of the United States as it greatly influenced different aspects of the American society including its economy, politics, culture, and dominant ideology. It is no exaggeration to say that the 2001 terrorist attacks altered the American domestic and foreign policies. In this policy shift, the media played an important role since they were one of the main instruments which propagated and controlled the representation of different groups, especially Muslims, who came to be held accountable by the American mind for 9/11 attacks. The present thesis applies Saeid Reza Ameli's theory with regard to the representation of Muslims by westerners, classified into four major categories: Islamophilia, Islamoromia, Islamoverita, and Islamophobia. The present study aims to discuss the Islamophobic representational strategy as employed by the American weekly magazine of Newsweek two months before and two months after the 9/11 attacks. The research project uses Stuart Hall's representation theory to analyze Newsweek's articles about Islam before and after the 9/11 attacks. It also employs content analysis, and particularly SPSS, to come to a quantitative result about the dominant representational strategy of the magazine. After analyzing the findings, the researcher demonstrates the dominance of the Islamophobic representational strategy in the Newsweek magazine.
Academic research is heavily affected by priorities, which are also determined from outside acade... more Academic research is heavily affected by priorities, which are also determined from outside academia. In fact, in all branches of science, political as well as economic interests guide many academic activities. Studies of Iran–U.S. relations have been subject to this trend, and most of these studies consider the turbulent political relations between these two countries. Scholars in the field of intercultural communication, however, are careful to reveal the real attitudes of people towards themselves and others. It is very important, while acknowledging the omnipresent role of politics in intercultural communication and perceptions, to try to study things as they are. Therefore, this study is going to examine the cross- cultural schemata that two groups of Iranian women have of Americans without asking about their political attitudes.
Abstract
In the last presidential election of the United States (2016), the interaction between t... more Abstract In the last presidential election of the United States (2016), the interaction between the Donald Trump and the American media was remarkable and unprecedented from both political and communication perspectives. The present paper is interested in observing the interactions between then the Republican Party candidate, Donald Trump, and the media of the United States. As there were major verbal confrontations between Trump, and some media, specifically CNN, this paper observes how Trump campaign reacted to CNN that turned out to be one of his biggest opponents. The relations and reactions are explained using “agenda setting” and “selective exposure” as theories and “thematic analysis” as the research methodology. The paper analyzes CNN videos from October 7 to October 31, and Trump’s tweets during the same period. The reason for conducting the research during October is that this month is regarded as one of the most critical periods in US presidential election, known as “October surprise”. Then a thematic analysis of the data is conducted to extract all accusations and allegations against Trump. Research results show that President Trump did not react to most of the accusations and attacks raised by CNN. Apparently Trump had decided that ignoring and not responding is a better strategy. There was an exception to this rule: Trump’s treatment toward women. He did address that issue frequently and tried to justify himself and apologize. Accordingly, Trump’s presidential campaign aim was to ignore accusations, keep attacking, and answering accusations only if they are already known to too many people. Keywords: Trump, Twitter, CNN, media messages, thematic analysis, agenda setting, selective exposure
The problem of runaway girls has been one of the most unsolvable social problems in Iran; it is a... more The problem of runaway girls has been one of the most unsolvable social problems in Iran; it is a problem by itself but it will not stop in itself and will entail several other problems. Because issues related to the subject of sex is still taboo in Iran, there has not been enough research on these issues and this is one of the reasons why this issue has not been dealt with properly. Reviewing what has been done so far on this subject, the present paper will proceed by presenting a report of a longitudinal study along with in-depth interviews with 56 runaway girls who lived now in a safe house by the government. We studied issues like drug and alcohol abuse, rape, sex, robbery, suicide or parasuicide, girl trafficking, and abortion; we found that family issues, broken families and strict parents and most importantly, having a boyfriend have been the most important factor for these girls on deciding to escape from home. We have provided recommendations to families, civil society organizations and the government based on our findings.
Cinema is a powerful media that can shape people's minds about different issues. Movies can focus... more Cinema is a powerful media that can shape people's minds about different issues. Movies can focus on very detailed or hidden matters in society, and critical issues that profoundly affect the lives of large populations are usually at the center of cinema's attention. Among these issues are wars that can affect tens of millions of people financially, mentally and of course physically. Films can question or justify wars. To answer if they questioned wars or justified them one should choose a specific war, a period and maybe a particular group of films and analyze their content and discourse. However, to do so, it would be helpful and maybe necessary to first better understand how films may question or justify wars. The present research is an effort to analyze a specific number of movies to see in what ways they may have justified the role of the United States in the Second World War. The results include eight issues that the movies raised regarding the legitimacy of the war and America's role in it.
The 9/11 attacks were a watershed in the history of the United States as it greatly influenced di... more The 9/11 attacks were a watershed in the history of the United States as it greatly influenced different aspects of the American society including its economy, politics, culture, and dominant ideology. It is no exaggeration to say that the 2001 terrorist attacks altered the American domestic and foreign policies. In this policy shift, the media played an important role since they were one of the main instruments which propagated and controlled the representation of different groups, especially Muslims, who came to be held accountable by the American mind for 9/11 attacks. The present thesis applies Saeid Reza Ameli's theory with regard to the representation of Muslims by westerners, classified into four major categories: Islamophilia, Islamoromia, Islamoverita, and Islamophobia. The present study aims to discuss the Islamophobic representational strategy as employed by the American weekly magazine of Newsweek two months before and two months after the 9/11 attacks. The research project uses Stuart Hall's representation theory to analyze Newsweek's articles about Islam before and after the 9/11 attacks. It also employs content analysis, and particularly SPSS, to come to a quantitative result about the dominant representational strategy of the magazine. After analyzing the findings, the researcher demonstrates the dominance of the Islamophobic representational strategy in the Newsweek magazine.
Academic research is heavily affected by priorities, which are also determined from outside acade... more Academic research is heavily affected by priorities, which are also determined from outside academia. In fact, in all branches of science, political as well as economic interests guide many academic activities. Studies of Iran–U.S. relations have been subject to this trend, and most of these studies consider the turbulent political relations between these two countries. Scholars in the field of intercultural communication, however, are careful to reveal the real attitudes of people towards themselves and others. It is very important, while acknowledging the omnipresent role of politics in intercultural communication and perceptions, to try to study things as they are. Therefore, this study is going to examine the cross- cultural schemata that two groups of Iranian women have of Americans without asking about their political attitudes.
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Papers by Zahra Emamzadeh
In the last presidential election of the United States (2016), the interaction between the Donald Trump and the
American media was remarkable and unprecedented from both political and communication perspectives. The
present paper is interested in observing the interactions between then the Republican Party candidate, Donald
Trump, and the media of the United States. As there were major verbal confrontations between Trump, and some
media, specifically CNN, this paper observes how Trump campaign reacted to CNN that turned out to be one of
his biggest opponents. The relations and reactions are explained using “agenda setting” and “selective exposure”
as theories and “thematic analysis” as the research methodology. The paper analyzes CNN videos from October
7 to October 31, and Trump’s tweets during the same period. The reason for conducting the research during
October is that this month is regarded as one of the most critical periods in US presidential election, known as
“October surprise”. Then a thematic analysis of the data is conducted to extract all accusations and allegations
against Trump. Research results show that President Trump did not react to most of the accusations and attacks
raised by CNN. Apparently Trump had decided that ignoring and not responding is a better strategy. There was
an exception to this rule: Trump’s treatment toward women. He did address that issue frequently and tried to
justify himself and apologize. Accordingly, Trump’s presidential campaign aim was to ignore accusations, keep
attacking, and answering accusations only if they are already known to too many people.
Keywords: Trump, Twitter, CNN, media messages, thematic analysis, agenda setting, selective exposure
Books by Zahra Emamzadeh
In the last presidential election of the United States (2016), the interaction between the Donald Trump and the
American media was remarkable and unprecedented from both political and communication perspectives. The
present paper is interested in observing the interactions between then the Republican Party candidate, Donald
Trump, and the media of the United States. As there were major verbal confrontations between Trump, and some
media, specifically CNN, this paper observes how Trump campaign reacted to CNN that turned out to be one of
his biggest opponents. The relations and reactions are explained using “agenda setting” and “selective exposure”
as theories and “thematic analysis” as the research methodology. The paper analyzes CNN videos from October
7 to October 31, and Trump’s tweets during the same period. The reason for conducting the research during
October is that this month is regarded as one of the most critical periods in US presidential election, known as
“October surprise”. Then a thematic analysis of the data is conducted to extract all accusations and allegations
against Trump. Research results show that President Trump did not react to most of the accusations and attacks
raised by CNN. Apparently Trump had decided that ignoring and not responding is a better strategy. There was
an exception to this rule: Trump’s treatment toward women. He did address that issue frequently and tried to
justify himself and apologize. Accordingly, Trump’s presidential campaign aim was to ignore accusations, keep
attacking, and answering accusations only if they are already known to too many people.
Keywords: Trump, Twitter, CNN, media messages, thematic analysis, agenda setting, selective exposure