Investigating status hierarchies with media analysis: Muslims, Jews, and Catholics in The New York Times and The Guardian headlines, 1985–2014

Abstract

Media analyses can help expand our understanding of how hierarchies are expressed and of how they evolve across time and place. In this article, we compare coverage of Muslims, Jews, and Catholics in The New York Times and The Guardian headlines over a 30-year time period. In aggregate, our data show that media portrayals of groups are relatively stable over the span of decades rather than highly sensitive to the impact of events at any given point in time. In keeping with the findings of surveys, Muslims are generally associated with more negativity than Catholics or Jews. At the same time, our data also reveal information that nuances what traditional surveys have shown. For example, Jews are portrayed consistently more positively than Catholics in our analysis; in addition, while headlines about Catholics are more positive than those about Muslims in The New York Times, the tone of headlines about the two groups is indistinguishable in The Guardian. The methods and the findings introduced here contribute to the research agenda of scholars concerned with identifying, tracking, and understanding status hierarchies.