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Assessment 3 research essay. 31.10.2014

The stateless Rohingya

By Philippa Martens

Research question

How do the Myanmar government and the state-owned media,

Myanmar independent media, the Western world media and

humanitarian organisations frame the religion, ethnicity and right to

citizenship of the Rohingya?

Introduction

Since 2012, The Rohingya, an ethnic and religious minority group of

approximately 800,000 in Myanmar, have been in the global spotlight.

They are Muslim, whilst the majority of Burmese are Buddhist and

herein lies the first frame. They live mainly in Rakhine state, in

Western Myanmar. Fierce fighting broke out between the Muslim

Rohingya and Buddhist Burmese in Rakhine state in June 2012 with

200 Rohingya killed after a Burmese girl was raped and killed,

allegedly by a Rohingya man (BBC, ‘Why is there communal violence

in Myanmar?’ 3.7.14). Since then, two years of ethnic violence has

occurred across Myanmar, with 40 people killed in Meiktila in Central

Myanmar in March 2013 and most recently five people killed in

Philippa Martens/Student ID #12063374 1


Mandalay, Myanmar’s second largest city, in June 2014. Most of this

violence can be attributed to Buddhists accusing Muslims of some

wrongdoing (BBC, ‘Why is there communal violence in Myanmar?’

3.7.14).

The Rohingya are also a unique minority group in Myanmar, as they

are not classified as Burmese citizens, like other ethnic minorities are,

due to controversy surrounding their ethnicity. Many historians

believe they settled in Myanmar in the 1400s, migrating from Bengal

(now Bangladesh). Conversely, the Burmese government asserts that

they are migrants from Bangladesh after World War II in the 1950s

whilst Myanmar (then Burma) was under British rule.

In this research essay, I will be using framing analysis to examine

three opposing frames of the Rohingya. The first frame is the Muslim

frame, the second frame is the ethnic minority of Myanmar or Bengali

immigrant frame, and the third frame is the right to Burmese

citizenship or limited citizenship rights if willing to register as Bengali.



Framing analysis as basis for a theoretical study of reporting on

Rohingya

The theoretical framework employed for this research essay is a

content analysis based on framing theory using both discourse

analysis (qualitative) and quantitative content analysis techniques.

Framing is defined by Kitzinger (2007) in Framing and frame analysis.

Media Studies: Key Issues and Debates as “the process whereby we

organize reality – categorising events in particular ways, paying

attention to some aspects rather than others, deciding what an

experience or event means or how it came about”. In relation to

journalism, “Journalists frame a story by selecting the ‘relevant’ facts

and placing an event in what they consider to be the appropriate

context…which highlight particular ideas about the nature of the

event”(Kitzinger, 2007).

The history of framing analysis dates back to Goffman (1974), whose

concept of ‘frame’ “refers to systems of classification that allow us to

‘locate, perceive, identify and label’ the diverse phenomena we

encounter through the course of our lives”(Goffman, 1974:21).



I am using the framing analysis theory for my research of the

Rohingya, as I believe that the media discourse surrounding Rohingya

is predominantly reported by opposing views or ‘frames’. The first

being the religious frame classifying them as Muslim, therefore

different to the majority of Burmese population that is Buddhist, the

second frame portrayed by the Government and state-owned media

that they are recent immigrants to Myanmar from Bangladesh and

should call themselves Bengali versus the Western media and

humanitarian frame that they should be recognised by the Burmese

government as another ethnic group in Myanmar. The final frame

surround their right to citizenship, with the Government and state-

owned media advising that they identify as Bengali to obtain limited

Citizenship rights, whereas the Western media and humanitarian

organisations condemn this, stating they should be known as

Rohingya and given full citizenship rights.

Framing analysis will be conducted by doing a content analysis of a set

of media products. Content analysis is a “research technique for

making replicable and valid inferences from texts (or other

meaningful matter) to the contexts of their use”(Krippendorff, 1982).



I am employing it for my research essay for its proven efficacy in

determining frames. “As a research technique, content analysis

provides new insights, increases a researcher's understanding of

particular phenomena, or informs practical actions. Content analysis

is a scientific tool” (Krippendorff, 1982). I will employ content

analysis to explain the quantitative data found in my research.

Discourse analysis as a technique of qualitative framing analysis will

be employed in this research essay as well. Discourse is defined as “a

system of communicative practices that are integrally related to wider

social and cultural practices, and that help to construct specific

frameworks of thinking” (Macdonald, 2003).

I conducted a framing analysis on 13 media products by first breaking

down the articles into three groups. The first group of articles that

relate to issue of Rohingya as Muslims in a predominantly Buddhist

country, the second group of articles that respond to the issue of their

ethnicity as either Rohingya or Bengali and finally the issue of

whether or not they should be granted full citizenship rights.

Empirical research



I am examining a total of 13 media products including one Myanmar

state-owned newspaper, The Myanmar Times, three Independent

Myanmar newspapers including The Irrawaddy, Democratic Voice of

Burma and Mizzima News and five International media companies

including the BBC, Reuters, The New York Times, Deutsche Welle and

Agence France Presse, and three humanitarian organisations

including Human Rights Watch, United Nations High Commissioner

for Refugees (UNHCR) and U.S. Campaign for Burma.

I am predominantly examining news articles written in September

and October 2014, as these are most relevant to the citizenship debate

surrounding Rohingya. The Burmese government released its new

citizenship policy for Rohingya in late September 2014. I will look

further back in time for literature on the 2012 violence and history of

the Rohingya people to contextualised the ethnicity debate.

I have set the limit to thirteen media products, as the Rohingya are not

a group reported on widely in the mass media in the West.

Furthermore, it was difficult to find more than one Burmese media

products with an English language version, easily accessible online.



Specifically, I have chosen Reuters and Agence France Presse as they

both have offices in Myanmar. I have chosen the BBC as it’s the United

Kingdom’s public broadcaster and they appear to report on the

Rohingya more often than other UK media. I haven chosen The New

York Times for an American perspective and Deutsche Welle for a

mainland European perspective (German).

Regarding the Myanmar independent press, I chose the Irrawaddy as

it is a well respected and world renowned (having won international

journalism awards) independent media product founded by a

Burmese journalist in exile in Thailand.

For the Burmese State owned media, I chose The Myanmar Times as it

one of the first daily newspapers created in Myanmar and has a wide

circulation across Myanmar. Unfortunately, it was difficult to find

more than one state-owned media product that had an English

version of its newspaper, therefore my frame from the state-owned

perspective is smaller and I have relied on re-quotes from the

Western media products of the Governments statements.



Upon investigation, research essays on the Rohingya have been

published by numerous academic journals including: The Asian

Resource Foundation, Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies,

Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs and the Forced Migration Review.

Methodology

I am concerned with four key questions as outlined in Devereux

(2007) Media studies: key issues and debates to assist my frame

analysis.

How is the matter of the Rohingya’s religion, ethnicity and right to full

citizenship, being Muslim in a predominantly Buddhist country,

framed in the state-owned Burmese media, the independent Burmese

media, the international media and from the humanitarian

organisations’ perspective?

How are the key players (Rohingya, Ethnic Burmese, Burmese

Government) portrayed?

Who is presented as responsible for Rohingya situation?

What solutions are proposed?

For a quantitative content analysis of the frames, I have analysed and

counted the occurrence key terms that reflect the differing cultural



opinions of Rohingya are used in the groupings of articles by media

product. Key terms include the occurrence of the term ‘Muslim’, the

reference to ‘Rohingya’ or ‘Bengali’ and the occurrence of the term

‘Refugee’. This technique is effective in determining the frames as

frames have “condensing symbols…making it possible to display the

package as a whole with a deft metaphor, catchphrase or other

symbolic device” (Gamson and Modigliani, 1989:3). By using a certain

catchphrase or word, the audience is potentially able to automatically

recognise the issue within the frame, without it being spelt out in

great detail. The results are found in Table 1 on page 20.

From a qualitative perspective, I have identified the key discursive

cues through discourse analysis of the media products such as

definition of group, language used, problem definition, responsibility

and solutions proposed. The results are found in Table 2 on page 21 -

24.



The Frames

Frame one: Muslim frame.

This frame examines the importance or unimportance placed on the

religion of the Rohingya. I have found that the Burmese state-owned

media places more emphasis on their religion than the Western

countries’ media where there is religious freedom. In Western secular

countries such as Australia, minority groups are not always referred

to in conjunction with their religion. For example, when the Australian

media reports on the Italian community, no reference is regularly

made to their religious affiliation (i.e. the Catholic Italian community).

However in a predominantly Buddhist society such as Myanmar,

where 89% of the population is Buddhist (CIA World Factbook, 2014),

there is an emphasis placed on any ethnic group that is no Buddhist.

Interestingly, there is an equal number of Muslims (4%) as Christians

(4%) (CIA World Factbook, 2014) in Myanmar, but no reported cases

of violence against Christians in recent history.

However, almost all articles I analysed refer to the “Rohingya Muslims

or Muslim Rohingya” when describing the group. This includes

reports from the BBC article ‘Why is there communal violence in

Myanmar?’ The Myanmar Times article ‘Rohingya face regional



discrimination’, The Democratic Voice of Burma article ‘Terror threat

low, but president warns Burmese to remain vigilant’ and articles by

Deutsche Welle, Agence France Presse, The Irrawaddy, Reuters and

Human Rights Watch.

The underlying theoretical basis that best explains this frame is that of

hegemony, as described in The Neglect of Power In Recent Framing

Research (Carragee & Roefs, 2004). “Hegemony, a concept derived

from Gramsci (1971), refers to the process by which ruling elites

secure consent to the established political order through the

production and diffusion of meanings and values. According to

Gramsci, dominant groups and classes struggle to maintain their

ideological hegemony, resistance occurs, and hegemonic ideology

evolves over time as elites seek to diffuse and incorporate political

challenges” (Carragee & Roefs, 2004). This is most certainly the case

in Myanmar, which was ruled by the Military elite (Buddhist) from

1948, when it gained independence from Britain to 2011, when it

swore in its first parliamentary government. Since more freedom has

come to the country, ethnic and religious tension has re-intensified

across the country. The BBC reported four major riots against

Muslims from 2012 – 2014, which left more than 280 Muslims dead



(BBC, ‘Why is there communal violence in Myanmar?’, 3.7.2014). It

reported “In April 2013, Human Rights Watch said that although state

forces did intervene to protect fleeing Muslims, more often they

fuelled unrest either by standing by or taking part in violence” (BBC,

‘Why is there communal violence in Myanmar?’ 3.7.2014). It further

examines the religious angle to the violence, reporting “Overseas-

based Rohingya rights groups have said that Rohingyas bore the brunt

of the violence. Rakhine Buddhists said Rohingyas were mainly to

blame” (BBC, ‘Why is there communal violence in Myanmar?’

3.7.2014). This frames the issue as sympathetic to the violence against

the Muslim minority. In contrast to this, The Myanmar Times articles

frame the majority of their articles with an ‘anti-Muslim’

undercurrent. Such as in an article that states, “UN agencies, along

with international NGOs, have been dogged by accusations that their

work in the state has favoured its Muslim community” (McLaughlin,

The Myanmar Times, 15.9.2014). The Burmese government, as

reported on in its state-owned media, The Myanmar Times, also

frames itself as ‘anti-Muslim’ in its rhetoric about how to solve the

Rohingya crisis. A Myanmar Times article wrote that “Following

deadly clashes in the state in June and October 2012, President U

Thein Sein called for the UNHCR to take responsibility for the group in



Rakhine State or resettle them in another country” (McLaughlin, The

Myanmar Times, 6.10.14).

The independent Burmese media provides a cautiously sympathetic

yet still wary frame of the Muslim issue of Rohingya, perhaps as a

direct result of Government anti-media freedom laws in the country,

with the Irrawaddy running a feature article titled ‘The Muslims of

Myanmar’ (Linter, The Irrawaddy, 13.10.2014) which highlights

potential Rohingya links to terrorism, following a statement by Al

Qaeda leader Ayman Al Zawahiri broadcasted on 3 September which

called on Al Qaeda to expand its jihad to India, Bangladesh and Burma

(Nai, Democratic Voice of Burma, 1.10.2014). In the Irrawaddy article,

it states “the only proven link between Al-Qaeda and Muslims in

Myanmar goes back to the early 1990s, when the Rohingya Solidarity

Organisation (RSO) had a camp…in south-eastern Bangladesh…Afghan

militants visited the camp and RSO did arrange for some Muslim

refugees to be sent to Afghanistan to fight for the Taliban” (Linter, The

Irrawaddy, 13.10.2014). It goes on the offer a more sympathetic frame

by stating “Apart from such anomalies, Myanmar Muslims have never

been of the rebellious kind in a religious sense” (Linter, The

Irrawaddy, 13.10.2014). Similarly, the Democratic Voice of Burma

frames the Muslim aspect of Rohingya in a more objective light.



“Burma’s mostly Buddhist security forces have been accused of doing

little to quell the violence, and in some cases have allegedly

participated in attacks against Muslims” (Nai, Democratic Voice of

Burma, 1.10.2014).

A final frame comes from the humanitarian and NGO perspective,

namely Human Rights Watch (HRW), which uses the term ‘Anti-

Muslim’ the most frequently out of all the articles analysed in the 13

media products and acknowledges that extremist monks are often to

blame for anti-Muslim sentiment in Myanmar. It reported on a topic

that was not found elsewhere, that of a Myanmar government policy

blocking inter-faith marriage. “The boycott of Qatar-based

telecommunication company Ooredoo (a Muslim country) is the latest

development in the expanding anti-Muslim political activism of

Myanmar’s revered Sangha (Buddhist priesthood), led by prominent

monks such as U Wirath and the xenophobic 969 movement”

(Mathieson, Human Rights Watch, 3.7.2014). “Research by Human

Rights Watch concluded that 2012 attacks on Rohingya amounted to

crimes against humanity in a campaign of “ethnic

cleansing”…”Prominent monks…acts as lighting rods for deeply rooted

racism that ricochets through Myanmar’s uneven reform process”



(Mathieson, Human Rights Watch, 3.7.2014). Human Rights Watch

uses emotive language to portray the human side to the Rohingya

debate that highlights their persecution in Myanmar and placed

emphasis on the extremist Buddhist element to the violence.

Frame two: Ethnic Rohingya or Bengali refugee.

This frame will examine the two opposing views on the ethnicity of

the Rohingya. The ‘Rohingya’ frame accepts they have lived in

Myanmar since the 1400s and have a right to be in Myanmar.

Whereas, the ‘Bengali’ frame explains that they only migrated to

Myanmar after World War II and are recent immigrants from

Bangladesh, therefore they are refugees.

The Myanmar Times, owned by the Government, frames this issue in a

very matter-of-fact way. The Burmese government does not recognise

the term “Rohingya”, therefore always refers to them as “Bengali”.

“The Rohingya are not recognised as an ethnic group in Myanmar…

with the government arguing it is a fictitious ethnicity created shortly

after World War II. It instead refers to them as Bengalis and most are

unable to access citizenship or associated rights”(O’Toole, Myanmar

Times, 17.10.14).



The Government itself frames the issue of their ethnicity as ‘Bengali’,

almost every time they are quoted in any article I researched.

“Myanmar’s Information Minister Ye Htut has said that the name

(Rohingya) had never been accepted by Myanmar citizens…Htut told

the AP news agency that it was created by a separatist movement in

the 1950s and then used by exile activists to pressure Myanmar’s

former military government at the United Nations in the 1990s” (Al

Jazeera, 20.08.2014).

The frame of ‘Bengali’ when reported by the Western or Independent

media normally associates the term ‘Ethnic cleansing’ to denote the

Governments wrongdoing in persecuting the minority group. “…As

part of a campaign of ethnic cleansing led by the ethnic Rakhine

community in which state agencies were heavily implicated” (Stoakes,

The Diplomat, 14.10.2014).

The opposing frame that they are ethnically Rohingya, having lived in

Myanmar for centuries is reported by the Western media and

humanitarian organisations in similar, emotive terms, using words

like “ethnic cleansing”, “discriminatory”, “persecution” and “crimes

against humanity”. “Labeling the Rohingya “Bengali” is a

discriminatory, xenophobic way of erroneously implying that



Rohingya are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh” (U.S. Campaign for

Burma, October 2014). Human Rights Watch reports that the term

“Bengali” is an inaccurate and derogatory term commonly used by

Burmese officials and nationalist Buddhists (Human Rights Watch,

3.10.2014). According to the UNHCR, the Rohingya are the most

persecuted minority in the world, with 1.09 million people without

citizenship (UNHCR Myanmar factsheet, September 2014). The

Myanmar government and European countries are at loggerheads on

the terminology too, with the Independent Burmese media Mizzima

News writing that “Some European countries have challenged the

Myanmar authorities to prove the claim that Rohingya do not exist in

Myanmar by providing strong evidence, according to Rakhine State

Chief Minister U Maung Maung Ohn” (Zuu, Mizzima News,

23.10.2014). The frame that a lot of the Western media including BBC,

Deutsche Welle and The New York Times reports on is the

discriminatory policies and the effects they have on the livelihoods of

the Rohingya. “…Government policies impose extensive restrictions

on the basic freedoms of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar’s Rakhine

state…restricting movement, marriage, childbirth, home repairs and

construction of houses of worship” (BBC, 25.02.2014).



Frame three: the citizenship debate.

The final frame ties in with the ethnicity debate as the most recent

development in the plight of the Rohingya, two distinct frames

emerged from my empirical review: for and against the new limited

citizenship policy. The Myanmar government released its ‘Rakhine

State Action Plan’ in late September 2014. It states that “A plan that

will give around a million members of the persecuted Rohingya

Muslim ethnic minority a bleak choice: accept ethnic reclassification

and the prospect of citizenship, or be detained” (Ferrie & Thin, The

Irrawaddy, 27.09.2014).

The citizenship issue first took shape in 1978, when 300,000

Rohingyas were driven into Bangladesh, the Myanmar military junta

enacted the Burma Citizenship Law, making the Rohingya stateless,

“resident foreigners”, to be repatriated worldwide (The New Nation,

5.10.2014).

The frame that condemns the Government’s citizenship plan is widely

held in the Western media, humanitarian organisations and more

subtly by the Independent Burmese media.

The state-owned media, The Myanmar Times, promotes the plan in its

media coverage. Headlines in the Myanmar Times like “UN backs

verification as ‘step in the right direction” (McLaughlin, Myanmar



Times, 15.05.2014) aim to promote the plan in a positive light. The

government media aims to portray the issue being ‘verification’ rather

than ‘ethnicity’ to determining their limited citizenship rights. “It’s a

very emotional issue. We do not fully understand the emotions on

both sides. Let’s see what practical steps we can take to address the

real issue, which is citizenship” Mr Xu, UN assistant secretary-general

told The Myanmar Times (McLaughlin, Myanmar Times, 15.09.2014).

The state-owned media does acknowledge that the plan has been

controversial and condemned by the West and humanitarian

organisations worldwide. “The action plan has drawn sharp criticism

from members of the human rights community, with Human Rights

Watch on October 3, calling it a “blueprint for segregation”

“(McLaughlin, Myanmar Times, 6.10.2014).

The Western media frames the citizenship reporting by strongly

condemning the plan, often citing Human Rights Watch. Deutsche

Welle’s reporting uses language such as “discriminatory” and “abusive

government policies”. Reuters’ reporting uses similar language such

as “marginalising and dehumanising”. Agence France Presse concurs

with language such as “miserable” and “conflict-torn”.



Table 1 Key word occurrence by media product Frame employed Media

product and affiliation

Number of articles

Key word: Muslim

Key word: Rohingya

Key word: “Rohingya” in quotations to denote its illegitimacy

Key word: “Bengali” in quotations to denote its illegitimacy

Key word: Bengali

Key word: Refugee

Muslim/Bengali/Limited citizenship frame

The Myanmar Times. Myanmar state-owned.

7 18 24 9 0 20 6

Muslim/Rohingya/Full citizenship frame

The Irrawaddy. Independent.

3 25 27 0 2 13 1


Democratic Voice of Burma. Independent.

5 5 33 0 0 0 19


Mizzima News. Independent.

2 4 22 0 4 1 0

Religious freedom/Rohingya/Full citizenship

BBC – British state-owned.

4 23 46 0 0 1 0


Agence France Press. Independent.

2 3 8 0 0 3 0

Religious The New York 2 30 4 0 0 0 0



freedom/Rohingya/Full citizenship

Times. Independent.


Deutsche Welle. Independent.

2 8 40 0 6 1 0


Reuters. Independent.

2 2 13 0 0 2 0


Human Rights Watch. NGO.

3 17 31 0 3 2 0

Table 2 Frame matrix for Rohingya issue highlighting key discursive cues and framing devices employed by various media Frame employed Media product

and affiliation.Definition of group

Problem definition

Responsibility Proposed solutions

Policy solution

Muslim/Bengali/Limited citizenship frame

The Myanmar Times. Myanmar state-owned.

Bengali. Immigrants from Bangladesh after 1950s. Refugees. Muslims.

World War II conflict caused Bangladeshis to flee into Myanmar. Muslim.

Bangladesh, UNHCR. Bengalis brought it on themselves.

UNHCR camps outside Myanmar or limited Citizenship rights as Bengali.

“Rakhine State Action Plan” with changed ethnicity. UNHCR to resettle non-citizens from 2015.


The Irrawaddy. Independent.

Rohingya. Lived in Myanmar for centuries. Little reference to

Historical violence against religious minority.

Military, extremist Buddhists, religious tension, violence.

UNHCR to intervene. Continued/more NGO support.

Cautious condemnation of government policy.



‘refugees’. Muslim.


Democratic Voice of Burma. Independent.

Rohingya. Lived in Myanmar for centuries. Refugees.

Historical violence against religious minority.

Military, extremist Buddhists, religious tension, violence.

UNHCR to intervene. Continued/more NGO support.

Cautious condemnation of government policy.


BBC. British state-owned.

Rohingya. Lived in Myanmar for centuries, therefore not refugees.

Ethnic cleansing by Government and violence extremist Buddhist nationals.

Myanmar Government, military, extremist Buddhists.

UNHCR to reject government plan to resettle ‘non-citizen Rohingya’.

Amendments needed to Government plan. Full citizenship rights granted.


Agence France Press. Independent.

Rohingya. Lived in Myanmar for centuries, therefore not refugees

Ethnic cleansing by Government and violence by extremist Buddhist nationals.





The New York Times. Independent.

Rohingya. Lived in Myanmar for centuries, therefore not refugees





Religious Deutsche Welle. Rohingya. Ethnic Myanmar UNHCR to reject Amendments



freedom/Rohingya/Full citizenship

Independent. Lived in Myanmar for centuries, therefore not refugees.

cleansing by Government and violence by extremist Buddhist nationals.

Government, military, extremist Buddhists.

government plan to resettle ‘non-citizen Rohingya’.

needed to Government plan. Full citizenship rights granted.


Reuters. Independent.







Human Rights Watch. NGO


Government lack of action. Ethnic cleansing by Government and violence by extremist Buddhist nationals.

Myanmar government, military, extremist Buddhists.

Continue economic sanctions. Reinstate economic sanctions.

UNHCR should reject citizenship plan. Or make amendments. Not allow resettlement outside Myanmar


UNHCR. United Nations agency.


Government lack of action. Ethnic cleansing by Government and violence by extremist

Myanmar government, military, extremist Buddhists.


Likely to reject Government citizenship plan and plan to resettle Robina outside Myanmar.



Buddhist nationals.


U.S. Campaign for Burma. NGO


Government (Myanmar and International) lack of action. Ethnic cleansing by Government and violence by extremist Buddhist nationals.

International governments. Myanmar government, extremist Buddhists.


Should reject government citizenship plan.



Results

My key quantitative findings suggest that articles that use the term

‘Muslim’ frequently are implying their religion is relevant to their

ethnicity or plight. Articles that often use the word ‘Refugee’ frame the

group as such most especially in the Myanmar state and independent

media, whereas almost all Western media and humanitarian

organisations never used the term ‘refugee’ as they refute this claim,

stating that they can’t be refugees because they were born in

Myanmar. Democratic Voice of Burma used ‘refugee’ most frequently.

Another key finding was the use of double quotation marks to discuss

“Rohingya” and “Bengali”. The state-owned Myanmar Times used this

as a tool to inform the readers “Rohingya” is not legitimate

terminology. Whereas Western media used “Bengali” in the same, yet

opposing function. As to be expected, the term ‘Bengali’ was most

used in The Myanmar Times, owned by the Burmese Government.

My key qualitative findings are based around the use of emotive

language to engage the reader. Human Rights Watch and U.S.

Campaign for Burma as well as the BBC used the most emotive

language to describe the plight of the Rohingya. The British and

American community have numerous non-government organisations



set up to monitor Myanmar’s human rights abuses so it begs that their

media would be most likely to use such language to appeal to their

audience. The independent Myanmar media treaded very carefully in

their use of emotive language as there is still limited press freedom in

Myanmar and journalists have been killed in recent ethnic violence.

My research has concluded that the Burmese state owned media, by

oftentimes regurgitating what the Burmese government policy

dictates is the Rohingya’s ethnicity and citizenship status, diminishes

the human rights of this ethnic minority.

Conclusion

Framing was defined for the purpose of this research essay as “the

process whereby we organize reality – categorising events in

particular ways, paying attention to some aspects rather than others,

deciding what an experience or event means or how it came about”

(Kitzinger, 2007).

The imperative question from any framing analysis is how do frames

affect the audience perception of a problem or issue? “Frames call

attention to some aspects of reality while obscuring other elements,

which might lead audiences to have different reactions” (Entman,

1993). If you read only The Myanmar Times account, you would



predominantly hear the Governments perspective. Conversely, if you

only read the humanitarian organisations reports, you may not

understand the Governments point of view objectively.

The most dominant frame found was that of the Rohingya as victims, a

persecuted group who need humanitarian assistance and a sounder

path to citizenship than what the Government is currently proposing.

The Western media, humanitarian organisations and to a lesser extent

independent Burmese media agreed on these assertions.



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