About framing

Introduction

‘Framing’ is an important theory in the study of communication. These years, there has been an increasing tendency that a lot of scholars become interested in the field of ‘framing’ and ‘framing analysis’. While, there is a lack of exact definition of ‘framing’. Thus, it is quite easy to use ‘framing’ inappropriately.

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The aim of this study is to better understand the concept of ‘framing’ and how does ‘framing’ work. Firstly, this paper reviews previous research and attempts to generalize how ‘framing’ works. Secondly, this paper employs ‘framing’ theory to analyze The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) News online coverage ofThailand Red Shirt protests from 2009 to 2010. Finally, this paper strives to critically evaluate the usefulness of ‘framing analysis’.

What is ‘framing’ and how does ‘framing’ work

It seems difficult to make the exact definition of the term ‘framing’. Entman (1993, p.51) describes it as ‘scattered conceptualization’, because ‘framing’ theory is related to several different fields, such as sociology, psychology, communication, and politics, and so on and so forth. The idea of ‘framing’ is originated from anthropologist Gregory Bateson (1972) and then primarily introduced by sociologist Eriving Goffman (Reese, 2001). As Goffman (1974) writes, frames are the ‘schemata of interpretation’, by which people can ‘locate, perceive, identify, and label a seemingly infinite number of concrete occurrences defined in its limits’ (p.21). Gitlin (1980) considers frames mainly contains ‘persistent patterns of cognition, interpretation, and presentation, of selection, emphasis, and exclusion…’ (p.7). Afterwards, many scholars continue to develop and amplify framing theory. Entman (1993) indicates ‘to frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text…’ (p.52). Reese (2001) points out ‘framing’ emphasizes ‘the way events and issues are organized and made sense of…’ (p.7) and describes frames as ‘active, information generating, as well as screening devices’ (p.11). Apart from that, scholars McCombs and Ghanem (2001) observe that framing is the ‘second level of agenda setting’ and it is ‘the transmission of attribute salience’ (p.69). As mentioned above, it is not difficult to find something in common. All of these scholars suggest some significant characteristics of the concept of ‘framing’, which are selecting and highlighting. Thus, Entman(1993) perfectly sums up ‘ framing essentially involves selection and salience’ (p.52) and also generalizes four functions of framing, which respectively are ‘problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation'(p.52) According to Entman(1993, p.52), a text firstly need to ‘define problems’, telling the readers what happens here; and then ‘diagnose cause’, indicating the cause or reason of the problem described; and next try to examine and assess the cause and impact of this event—‘make moral judgments’; Finally ‘suggest remedies’, recommending some solutions to deal with the problem. (see Entman, 1993).

What is more, Entman (1993) suggests that there are four critical factors when doing framing analysis, which are ‘the communicator, the text, the receiver and the culture’ (p.52) and these four factors provide the possibility to clearly study how ‘framing’ works. As Entman (1993) writes, ‘Frames highlight some bits of information about an item that is the subject of a communication, thereby evaluating them in salience’ (p.53). Nevertheless, frames can be influenced by both external factors and internal factors. According to Zhou and Moy(2007) external factors include ‘cultural resonances’, ‘sponsor activities’, ‘political culture’ and ‘social culture’ and so on (p.81). Shoemaker and Reese(1996) also list a series of internal factors, such as ‘background’, ‘characteristics’, ‘personal attitudes’, ‘values’, ‘beliefs’, ‘professional roles’ and ‘ethics'(p.66-95), which may consciously and unconsciously affect the frames of the communicators. Guided by frames, the communicators select what to say and how to say. Likewise, there are frames inside the text. Entman (1993) believes, in one text, ‘the presence and absence of certain keywords, stock phrases, stereotyped images, source of information… thematically reinforcing clusters of facts or judgments'(p.52) and text can stress certain part of the reality via ‘placement’ and ‘repetition’ (p.53). However, Graber (1988) claims that the frames of the text is not always having an effect on the thought and idea of people. Since receiver’s beliefs, attitudes, cultural value and their existing schemata will also exert effect on their perception and acceptance of the frames in the text. In particular, some scholars (Entman, 1993; Hertog, & McLeod. 2001) find out there is a tight connection between culture and framing. Entman (1993) designates ‘culture’ as a ‘common frames’ (p.53) and it plays a significant role within the framing process, affecting the interactions among the communicator, the text and the receiver. Additionally, Hertog and McLeod (2001) indicate culture is the source of power for frames, owing to its ‘symbolic power’, ‘excess meaning’ and ‘widespread recognition’ (p.141).

In short, framing is the process of selection and salience. Within the procedure of communication, frames have the power to decide what can be displayed and what should be screened: frames put emphasis on certain part of the reality, drawing people’s attention, guiding their interpretation and perception and influencing public evaluation and reaction. At the same time, frames downplay and even eliminate some aspects of the problem. (see Entman, 1993). This is the process of framing and clearly exhibit how framing constructs social reality and ‘structure our understanding of social phenomena’ (Hertog and McLeod, 2001, p.142).

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Case study—Thailand Red Shirt protests 2009-2010