A SOCIAL ACTION ANALYSIS OF NEWS ON 2011 WAR IN LIBYA: REPRESENTATION OF THE US ALLIANCES ON ONLINE USA TODAY AND THE TRIPOLI POST.

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Arini Rusyda, 2014

A SOCIAL ACTION ANALYSIS OF NEWS ON 2011 WAR IN LIBYA: REPRESENTATION OF THE US ALLIANCES ON ONLINE USA TODAY AND THE TRIPOLI POST

Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia | repository.upi.edu | perpustakaan.upi.edu

A SOCIAL ACTION ANALYSIS OF NEWS ON 2011 WAR IN LIBYA: REPRESENTATION OF THE US ALLIANCES ON ONLINE USA TODAY

AND THE TRIPOLI POST

Submitted in partial fulfillment of a Sarjana Sastra degree

Arini Rusyda 0700351

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND ART EDUCATION INDONESIA UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION

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A Social Action Analysis of News on 2011 War in Libya:

Representation of the US Alliances on Online USA Today and The

Tripoli Post

Oleh

Arini Rusyda

Sebuah skripsi yang diajukan untuk memenuhi salah satu syarat memperoleh gelar

Sarjana pada Fakultas Pendidikan Bahasa dan Seni

Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia

Agustus 2014

Hak Cipta dilindungi undang-undang.

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dengan dicetak ulang, difoto kopi, atau cara lainnya tanpa ijin dari penulis.

A SOCIAL ACTION ANALYSIS OF NEWS ON 2011 WAR IN LIBYA: REPRESENTATION OF THE US ALLIANCES ON ONLINE USA TODAY

AND THE TRIPOLI POST

A Research Paper

Written by: Arini Rusyda

0700351

Approved by:

Main Supervisor Co-Supervisor

Dr. Odo Fadloeli, M.A. Susi Septaviana R., M.Pd. NIP. 195408041977021001 NIP. 197609042009122002

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Prof. Dr. H. Didi Suherdi, M.Ed. NIP. 196211011987121001

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ABSTRACT

This paper reveals the representation of social actions of news discourse regarding 2011 War in Libya on online USA Today and The Tripoli Post. Social actions refer to a set of actions and reactions of nine main social actors involved in the war news reports, especially the US Alliances (President Obama, NATO, US Administration (White House), US Military (Department of Defense)). The research employs van Leeuwen’s (2008) framework on Representing Social Actions to analyse those social actions through two stages, by classifying the categories and discovering the distribution of the transformations.

The results indicate that USA Today presents 288 actions, 39 reactions and 187 transformations, while, Tripoli Post attributes 262 actions, 18 reactions and 112 transformations. US Alliances, on both media, are assumed to build legalization on war issue by being represented in positive quality transformation through objectivated and deagentialized social actions, which allow their social actions to be subtilized. In addition, quotations and renditions belong to them are dominantly mentioned, suggesting their power of dominance within the texts. This dominance is supported by their representation as the one that coping with the war in cognitive and perceptive reactions, illustrating them as rational, thinkers in contrast to civilians and rebels who are represented in more emotive reactions (affective). It indicates that both media tend to be biased in representing social actors involved by means of their attributed social actions.

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ABSTRAK

Makalah ini membahas tentang representasi aksi sosial dalam wacana berita mengenai 2011 Perang di Libya pada portal berita online USA Today dan The Tripoli Post. Aksi sosial tersebut mengacu pada serangkaian aksi dan reaksi dari sembilan aktor sosial utama yang terlibar dalam wacana berita terpilih, terutama Aliansi AS (Presiden Obama, NATO, Pemerintahan AS (Gedung Putih), Militer AS (Departemen Pertahanan)). Penelitian ini menggunakan kerangka pemikiran van Leeuwen (2008) tentang Representing Social Actions untuk menganalisis aksi-aksi sosial melalui dua tahapan, dengan mengelompokkan kategori aksi dan menganalisa distribusi transformasi aksi-aksi tersebut.

Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa USA Today menyajikan 288 aksi, 39 reaksi dan 187 transformasi, sementara, Tripoli Post mengatribusikan 262 aksi, 18 reaksi dan 112 transformasi. Aliansi AS, pada kedua media, diasumsikan tengah membangun legalisasi isu perang dengan adanya transformasi positif pada aksi sosial melalu objektivasi dan deagentialisasi, yang kemudian memungkinkan aksi sosial mereka diperhalus secara literal. Selain itu, kutipan yang diutarakan AS dominan disebutkan, menunjukkan penguatan posisi mereka dalam teks. Dominasi ini didukung dengan adanya representasi mereka sebagai salah satu pihak yang menghadapi perang dalam reaksi kognitif dan perseptif, menggambarkan Aliansi tersebut sebagai pihak yang rasional, pemikir, berbeda dengan warga sipil dan pemberontak yang direpresentasikan dengan reaksi yang lebih emotif (afektif). Hal ini menunjukkan bahwa kedua media cenderung bias dalam merepresentasikan aktor sosial yang terlibat melalui aksi sosial mereka.

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LIST OF TABLES

1. Table 2.1 Elements of Social Practices 19

2. Table 3.3 The Initial Analysis 36

3. Table 4.1 Source articles taken from online USA Today 38

4. Table 4.2 Source articles taken from online Tripoli Post 38

5. Table 4.3 Actions and reactions on USA Today’s articles 39 6. Table 4.4 Actions and reactions on Tripoli Post’s articles 39 7. Table 4.5 Materializations and Semioticizations

on USA Today’s articles 41

8. Table 4.6 Materializations and Semioticizations

on Tripoli Post’s articles 41

9. Table 4.7 Transactive and Nontransactive Actions

10.Table 4.8 Transactive and Nontransactive Actions

on Tripoli Post’s articles 43

11.Table 4.9 Transactive Instrumental and Interactive Actions

12.Table 4.10 Transactive Instrumental and Interactive Actions

13.Table 4.11 Affective Reactions on USA Today

and Tripoli Post’s articles 48

14.Table 4.12 Perceptive Reactions on USA Today

15.Table 4.13 Cognitive Reactions on USA Today

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on USA Today and Tripoli Post’s articles 51 17.Table 4.15 Deagentializations on USA Today and Tripoli Post 55

18.Table 4.16 Generalizations and Distillations

on USA Today and Tripoli Post 56

19.Table 4.17 Symbolizations and Inversions

on USA Today and Tripoli Post 58

20.Table 4.18 Reactions Embedded to the US Alliances

on USA Today 61

21.Table 4.19 Materializations and Semioticizations

Embedded to the US Alliances on USA Today 61

Embedded to the US Alliances on USA Today 62

23.Table 4.21 Transactive Actions Represented to the

US Alliances’ Social Actions on USA Today 62

24.Table 4.22 Reactions Embedded to the US Alliances

on Tripoli Post 64

25.Table 4.23 Actions Embedded to the US Alliances

on Tripoli Post 64

Embedded to the US Alliances on Tripoli Post 65

27.Table 4.25 Transactive Actions Embedded to the

US Alliances on Tripoli Post 65

28.Table 4.26 Deactivation Represented to the US Alliances’

Social Actions 66

29.Table 4.27 Deagentialization Represented to the US Alliances’

Social Actions 68

30.Table 4.28 Abstraction Represented to the US Alliances’

Social Actions 68

31.Table 4.29 Overdetermination Represented to the US Alliances’

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LIST OF FIGURES

1. Figure 2.1 Influence of discourse on practice 17

2. Figure 2.2 Social Actions Network 21

3. Figure 3.1 Selected research corpus 32

4. Figure 3.2 Detailed scheme on data analysis 34

5. Figure 4.1 Objectivation and its forms 51

6. Figure 4.2 Constitutions of an action that can be

abstracted through generalization 55

7. Figure 4.3 Types of Social Action and Their

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

This chapter encompasses the background of the research, the significance

of research, research questions, aims of the research, research methodology,

clarification of key terms and the organization of paper.

1.1. Background

In society, mass media play a crucial role in both capturing and shaping

realities among them. It does not only encompass all forms of information

that are transferred to a large group of people but also create news based on

the decision of what and which news to be reported. As asserted by Chomsky

(2002, p.27), there are different necessities carried by the media. It shows that

the media are not neutral and objective, supported by the different facts of

their background and circulation. In addition, Gitlin (1980, p.15) in “The

Whole World Is Watching”, writes that “the media created and amplified

impressions of how the world work, that images and narratives were

manufactured for consequential reason and purposes of their own.” Regarding

to the value of subjectivity owned by each media the research makes effort to

dismantle the representation of Middle East War‟s reporting news in different

media, precisely, newspapers.

Newspaper itself is a product of a text or discourse which represents the

prevailing knowledge at a certain place and time (Foucault, 1996). Discourse,

as argued by van Dijk (1998), is a medium which functions as a powerful tool

of communication through particular social and political beliefs and practices,

ideologies, subject positions, and norms. It includes ways of using, thinking

of language and acting over language. Therefore, discourse provides

connection between social notions of value and practice either as inputs or

outputs (Carling, 2009). In this way, discourse is counted as a social

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A discourse exists in line with/or opposition to other discourses because

each brings its own particular set of ideology. Here, van Leeuwen (2008)

reflects the view by proposing concept of re-contextualization in social

practices. He believes that elements of social practices can be traced in texts

through the process of reconstructing followed by transforming or

re-contextualizing.

Discourse as social practices can be re-contextualized through the

substitution, deletion, rearrangement and/or addition of the social practice

elements which construct the text in embody of specific context. The essence

of those elements is the social action networks that can or cannot cause

transformations (van Leeuwen, 2009, as cited in Wodak & Meyer, 2009). The

categories of actions and the actor, whom they are attributed to, mostly

trigger the recontextualization process to allow readers to go beyond the

surface structures of text. In addition, van Leeuwen (1993, p.12) argues that

“the field structure of a text or set of texts is a recontextualization of the structure of social practice, or set of interrelated social practices”.

From March to May 2011, the conflicts of long-lasting dictatorial

leadership in some Middle-Eastern countries became a global political

discourse which has attracted Western countries‟ attention. One of the

conflicting countries is Libya, of which the people fought against their leader,

Moammar Khaddafi.

The Libyan civil war, also referred to the Libyan revolution (PBS

Newshour, 2011), was preceded by protests in Benghazi beginning on

Tuesday, 15 February 2011, which had escalated into a rebellion that spread

across the country. The involved protesters were some of the citizens who

sued for democracy against his tyranny within more than 30 years. According

to Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, however, the reason for the de-militarization was a

reaction to the Iraqi War, so that Libya would not be accused of possessing

Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) and assumed to face the same fate

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Regarding the harsh political and military condition thereby, the

involvement of other powerful countries were inevitable. The war has invited

the United States to lead another invasion, involve its coalition armies and

NATO to attack Gadaffi‟sresidence for the sake of „saving‟ civilians in Libya

(Obama, 2011, as cited in USA Today). All Western countries cut off

diplomatic relations with Gaddafi's governance in February and March,

followed by applying regulation of Libyan no-fly zone on 17 March (UN

Security Council, 2011, as cited in BBC News).

It was getting severe as other Western countries (US, Britain, France and

Italy) were encouraged to be involved in the war. Each party (the pros and

contras) generated more deaths and insecurity for the people, which was thus,

leading to the decease of the Libyan leader himself by the allegedly NTC

(National Transitional Council in Libya).

The Libyan war news in 2011 is thus a good issue to be investigated with

Critical Discourse Analysis. The analysis may contribute to social change as

it provides media representation on news contents both at a national or global

level. In relation to the contents, news may create a debatable or pro-contra

assumption to the readers in terms of a particular issue.

As suggested, CDA questions the usage of language and the context of its

use and what subtext it produces to the text (Fairclough, 1995, as cited in

Paltridge, 2000). It offers the opportunity to adopt a social perspective in the

cross-cultural research of the media texts and “overtly political agenda”

(Kress, 1976), which presents a critical, theoretical and descriptive accounts

of texts. Therefore, van Leeuwen (2008) builds a conceptual discourse

framework as the re-contextualization of social practice. It refers to a process

of transformation of social practices, i.e. actions, performance modes, actors,

presentation styles, times, spaces, resources, and eligibility. Consequently,

recontextualization can be a powerful tool in transforming particular social or

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Newspaper articles used are online USA Today and Tripoli Post. The

former newspaper is the United States of America‟s most frequently read

newspaper with total circulation of approximately 2,528,437 visitors (as cited

in Infoplease). Though Qaddafi (1977) argued that “The press is a means of

expression for society; it is not a means of expression for private individuals

or corporate bodies”, the war has led the media to have more discretion in

either reporting news or providing opinions of the people. As a matter of

fact, the latter is included as one of the top rated private media in Libya that

represents the conditions in Libya, according to newswealth.com.

Those texts on online version of USA Today and The Tripoli Post, from

March to May 2011, encompass several social action networks and practices,

which allow the analysis on particular hidden meanings represented

linguistically. The differed representation will bring contrasted tendencies

between USA Today and The Tripoli Post.

Also, through the presentation on their social actors, it is thus possible to

reveal their each tendency on representing the US Alliances, in relation to the

issue of 2011 war in Libya.

1.2. Research Questions

The research problems are formulated in the following questions:

1. How are social actors represented through social actions on online USA

Today and Tripoli Post?

2. What are social actions attributed to US Alliances on online USA Today

and Tripoli Post?

1.3. Aims of Research

Fundamentally, the research was conducted to uncover the hidden

intentions beyond chosen texts as framed in the research problem. Therefore,

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relation to its approaches and strategies, the research aimed to do the

following steps:

1. Conduct critical discourse analysis on texts by representing the social

actions attributed to US Alliances

2. Unpack the contrasts of social actions (actions and reactions) on online

USA Today and The Tripoli Post referring to 2011 War in Libya

3. Reveal the tendencies of USA Today and The Tripoli Post in

representing US Alliances in their news reports on 2011 War in Libya

1.4. Significance of Research

The research concerns investigation on the distinctive representation of

2011 War in Libya in the media discourse. The used discourses are articles in

USA Today and The Tripoli Post from March to May 2011. Those articles

generally delineate the involving actions of America and other Western

countries in the Libyan war.

Van Leeuwen‟s (2008) framework of discourse by representing social

actions was applied in the research. The critical discourse analysis is preceded

by identifying the categorizations of social actions within texts, as the textual

evidence of distinctive social constructions, embedded with dismantling the

transformations of each social action. In final sequence, it analyzes the

contrasts of USA Today and The Tripoli Post through their social actors in

representing 2011 war in Libya, as well as how the tendencies of both media

in representing the US Alliances on the issue can be specified.

1.5. Research Methodology

The method employed in the research is descriptive qualitative. It is

coherent with the aims of the research due to its functions in analyzing

written materials or documentary analysis. Furthermore, it reveals the

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empirical data, and consequently there is 'closeness of fit' between theory and

data (Woods, 2006).

The research investigates the representations of War in Libya, conveyed

by USA Today and The Tripoli Post, using the framework of Critical

Discourse Analysis (CDA). According to Halliday (1994), there is an

interconnection between word classes and their representations by engaging

discourse with the social contexts. The interconnection has led van Leeuwen

to conceptualize CDA based on discourse as the recontextualization of social

practice. The core of social practice is a set of actions (Wodak, 2009, p.148),

thus, the elements of social actions and their transformations are embedded in

the research. Social actions are analyzed to investigate the relation between

actual texts, discursive practices and social contexts that influence.

The further delineations of data collection and analysis are presented

below.

1.5.1. Data Collections

The news reports of war in Libya from USA Today and The Tripoli Post,

from March to May 2011, were used as the primary sources. Three articles of

each were analyzed and sorted to uncover the tendencies beyond the news

representations entitled:

 President Obama tells Libya’s Gaddafi to step down (USA Today)

 NATO hits Libyan ships to protect rebel-held port (USA Today)

 Obama cites 'responsibility' of U.S. in Libya intervention (USA Today)  NATO: 'No Apologies' For 'Friendly Fire' that Killed Rebels (The Tripoli

Post)

 US Military Denies Shooting on Civilians (The Tripoli Post)

 Barack Obama: 'Al Qathafi Must Step Down; Leave Libya to the Libyan

People' (The Tripoli Post)

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In analyzing the content of the data, the research applied the analytical

framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) through representing social

actions offered by van Leeuwen (2008, p.68) in his Discourse and Practice.

His framework has been backgrounded by the preceding transitivity analysis

in Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG), proposed by Halliday (1994). It

focuses on observing language through representation of social actions used

in a discourse. The use of social actions itself is inevitably influenced by the

social and cultural contexts attributed to the actions.

Analysis on the core of social practices, namely actions, according to

Wodak (2009, p.148) provides a more thorough representation of meaning.

Three series of step are at least engaged in analyzing the social actions in the

discourse. The first step deals with the categorizations of social actions. The

main categories include actions and reactions, classified as material, semiotic,

behavioural, non behavioural, cognitive and so forth. It is further followed by

dealing with the transformations of those social actions, activated and

deactivated, agentialized and de-agentialized, concretized and abstracted, as

well as single and overdeterminated. Eventually, the relation between actual

texts, discursive practices and social contexts is investigated. Those series

lead to the different interpretation among texts.

1.6. Clarification of Key Terms

Several particular related terms are required to be presented in obvious

clarification. Hence, it will lead to in-depth comprehension on the raised

problematic issues. Below are some clarified terms in brief statements:

1. Representation is the production of the meaning of concepts in human‟s

mind through language. Hence, it constructs the meaning beyond speech,

writing or images as an aspect of „reality‟ such as people, places, objects,

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2. Discourse encompasses ways of using language, of thinking and of acting

in order to identify a socially meaningful identity (a social network). It

functions as a powerful tool to analyze social and political beliefs and

practices, ideologies, subject positions, and norms (Carling, 2009).

3. Social Action is a set of actions, which can be represented through various

linguistic codes. It can be conducted through different attitudes to the

represented social actions (Mazid, 2001).

4. The United States has formal diplomatic relations with most nations. In

this paper, the US has several common goals and interests with NATO.

Therefore, the social actions referring to President Obama, the US Defense

and State Department, Nato and the US Spokesmen constitute the term 'US

Alliances'.

5. Tendencies include a representation of a social construct or phenomenon

which contributes to assign an identity and the establishment of

knowledge. (Fairclough, 2003).

1.7. Organization of Paper

Five chapters are included within the research paper. Each chapter covers

several subtopics which favours and completes the major discussions.

The first chapter is Introduction. It delineates the background of the research, overview of literature, research questions, limitation of research,

aims of research, methodology in conducting the research, clarification of key

terms, and organization of the paper.

The second chapter encompasses Theoretical Framework. It provides the theories and conceptual frameworks that are applied to support the

accomplishment of research problems.

The third chapter presents Research Methodology. This chapter discusses the series of procedural step taken in conducting the research. It also

presents the supporting tools of analysis completed with the reasons of

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The fourth chapter depicts the major discussions if the research. It is

namely, Finding and Discussion of the research. The result of the research and solve of research problems are put forward in the fourth chapter.

Furthermore, the discussion and interpretation of the data findings are

elucidated within.

Eventually, the last chapter presents the result and conclusion of the

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CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter elaborates methodology applied in the research on Critical

Discourse Analysis (CDA). A number of supporting aspects are described

thoroughly concerning the research processes. They cover formulation of

problems, research design and analytical framework. Furthermore, adopting the

framework of „Representing Social Actions‟ by van Leeuwen (2008), it includes

the data collections and sample analysis regarding to representation of social

actions, the core of social practices. Thus, either aims or objects of the research

are eventually provided.

3.1. Formulation of Problems

The research problems are formulated in the following questions:

1. How are social actors represented through social actions on online USA

Today and Tripoli Post?

2. What are social actions attributed to US Alliances on online USA Today

and Tripoli Post?

3.2. Research Design

The method used in this research is descriptive qualitative, intended at

describing the use of discourse to represent certain tendencies on certain events in

two different newspapers. The focus of the method lies on the „philosophy, concepts, data gathering procedures and statistical methods‟(Given, 2008, p.699) so that it is employed due to its appropriateness and support on the critical

discourse analysis as the framework of the analysis. It is coherent with the aim of

the research, which is analyzing written materials or documentary analysis. Also,

it reveals the subtlety and complexity of cases or issues since theory is generated

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and data (Woods, 2006). It is supported by Yin (1994), who argued that it is

applied to dismantle the „how‟ and „why‟.

To complete the employment of the method, descriptive method is applied

due to its nature of gathering information about the occuring phenomenon in

testing hyphotheses and answering the related questions (Creswell, 1994). Thus, it

is capable of describing the 2011 War in Libya as the recent existing phenomenon

to investigate.

The above methods facilitate the research to concern on the framework of

representing social actions as one of analytical tools in CDA in order to discover

the representations of 2011 War in Libya, the tendencies conveyed by USA Today

and The Tripoli Post both in presenting the war and the position of US Alliances.

According to van Leeuwen (2008), CDA can be conceptualized through

representing the core element of social practices, a set of actions (Wodak, 2009,

p.148). Thus, the elements of social actions are investigated to find the relation

between actual texts, discursive practices and social contexts that influence.

The further delineations of data collection and analysis are presented below.

3.3. Data Collection

The data were collected from USA Today and The Tripoli Post published

from March to May 2011. Selected articles were on the hypotheses that they have

different points of view concerning 2011 war in Libya. In addition, several related

specific tendentious information were provided at each. Three articles of each

were selected as the materials to analyze. Both papers are retrieved from

http://www.usatoday.com and http://www.tripolipost.com. _{The selected articles}

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Figure 3.1. Selected research corpus

3.4. Data Analysis

In analyzing the content of the data, the research applies the analytical

framework of representing social actions as an analytical tool of Critical

Discourse Analysis (CDA), offered by van Leeuwen (2008) on his Discourse and

Practice. Building on what Halliday (1956) proposes—transitivity (Systemic

Functional Grammar), he develops a categorization of elements of social practices

(action, participant, presentation styles, time, location, resources of tool and

material and eligibility condition). Out of those elements, social actions are the

core (Wodak, 2009, p.148) to be represented in a text on the newspapers as the

research sources.

Sequentially, there are three series of steps in analyzing the representation of

social actions in the online newspaper discourse. The first step concerns close

Barack Obama: 'Al Qathafi Must Step Down; Leave Libya to the Libyan People'

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reading of the selected texts—online USA Today and The Tripoli Post) to identify

the social actions through the frame of social action network (See in Chapter 2:

Figure 2.2. Social Actions Network).

Total number and type of social actions that were discovered include

reactions and actions, in which the former consists of three types; affective,

perceptive and cognitive. The latter are constituted by material and semiotic

actions that can be transactive or nontransactive among the social actors.

It is followed by the next step, dealing with the transformations of the above

social actions. They can be identified based on their four main form (See Chapter

2: Figure 2.2. Social Actions Network) covering deactivation (objectivation and

descriptivization), deagentialization (eventuation, existentialization and

naturalization), abstraction (generalization and distillation) and overdetermination

(symbolization and inversion). Those series lead to the different interpretation

between each text, so that the relation between actual texts, discursive practices

and social contexts is investigated.

Essentially, in this research, preferred forms of social action performed by US

Alliances regarding the 2011 War in Libya can be discovered.

The following scheme illuminates details of data sets drawn from a sample

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Figure 3.2. Detailed Scheme on Data Analysis

Table 3.1. below presents the initial analysis of social actions on each article of

both newspapers based on van Leeuwen‟s categories on social action network. It

consists of four main columns. The first column presents clause complexes of Data Analysis Close-Reading

Identification of social Actors and Actions

Specification of Social Actions’

s’

Transformation TEXTS

Analysis of transformation on social

actions (the sub -classification)

Contrasting two online newspapers as

the primary text sources

Dismantling the tendencies of each newspaper through Actions embedded to the US

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each article under discussions (See Appendices) based on the sequence of

sentences. The second and third column covers the realization of actions (material

or semiotic; transactive or nontransactive) and reactions (specified;

affective-perceptive-cognitive or unspecified) embedded. The last column illuminates the

transformation occur on those social actions. Some abbreviations are used to

shorten the terms of each type of transformation:

DeAct. Deactivation

O Objectivation

Desc. Descriptivization

DeAgt. Deagentialization

Ev. Eventuation

N Naturalization

Ex. Existentialization

Abs. Abstraction

G Generalization

Dist. Distillation

OverDet. Overdetermination

S Symbolization

I Inversion

Further depictions on findings and discussions of the research are provided in the

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36 Table 3.1. The Initial Analysis

No Sentences

Actions Reactions Transformations

Material Semiotic Unspecified Specified

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CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS

5.1. Conclusions

The study is conducted to observe the representation of social actors that are

embedded in news discourse regarding 2011 War in Libya on online USA Today

and The Tripoli Post, based on the classification of van Leeuwen’s (2008, p.73)

Social Action Network. The study finds that there are nine actors involved on six

articles used from both media, including President Obama, NATO, US

Administration (White House), US Military (Department of Defense), Civilians,

Rebels, Pro-government Libyans, Gaddafi, Other Allies, Nations, Coalitions and

Journalists. Based on that recognition, the last four main actors including

President Obama, NATO, US Administration (White House), US Military

(Department of Defense), are referred to ‘US Alliances’. Social actions are

defined as a set of actions and reactions attributed to those social actors involved

in the war news reports, which can be further transformed into activated,

de-agentialized, over-determinated forms for re-contextualizing the discourse.

USA Today presents total of 288 actions, 39 reactions and 187

transformations, while, Tripoli Post attributes 262 actions, 18 reactions and 112

transformations. Approximately 60% of those social actions are assigned to US

Alliances and highly distributed in the form of material and semiotic actions. The

dominating instrumentalized material actions lead them interchange the other

actors as the object or goal affected by their material purpose, such as ‘strike’,

‘attack’ and ‘hit’. The instrumentalization also projects humanized actions as

objects that are passive in responses. Their interactive actions are also

objectivized in positive qualities, such as ‘responsibility to protect’ and ‘address

to the nation’. In addition, they are stated to make ‘lifesaving effort’ to maintain

their positive quality action and affirmed with the assumed urgency to ‘help’

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‘democratic aspirations spreading across Middle East’ and ‘Hits Libyan Ships to

Protect the Rebel Held Port’. The statements thus legalize them to freely ‘bomb’

and wage war in Libya.

By means of semioticization, the mostly heard voices are theirs. It is a result

of high number of occurrence of nontransactive quotations and renditions relying

to their arguments through influence, comments, instructed, said, push back

against, told, urged, and saying. USA Today presents more nontransactive

semiotic actions, whereas Tripoli Post shows a balanced proportion between

transactive and nontransactive actions.

Regarding the reactions, both USA Today and Tripoli Post mostly attribute

them with cognitive reactions, including ‘decisive’, ‘make sure’ and ‘predicted’,

leading them to be assumed as rational, react in a logical and reasonable way.

Supporting to that, the study reveals that deactivation and de-agentialization

are the most frequent transformations applied to subtilize their discourse over the

war. USA Today and Tripoli Post attempt to objectivize ‘hit’ and ‘attack’ into

‘friendly-fire’ and let it be attributed to a thing; ‘NATO’s warplanes’, ‘British

Jet’. Thus, objectivation may also trigger a deagentialization. When their actions

are deagentialized, responsibility of the agent is disguised as in ‘the attacks

struck’. In addition, when the reactions are objectivated, they distance the

emotions, not represented as activated feelings and directly representing how the

US Alliance feels such as the affective reaction of the US Alliance, as in

‘interests’. Interestingly, ‘interests’ is combined with the material ‘serves’,

illustrating their dominance and control over the event and the other social actors.

It, thus, sharpens the biased portrayal of both media, not only by the

imbalance amount of actions and reactions but also by the attempts of

transformation made by the media to represent US Alliances in a particular way.

Tripoli Post, however, presents a more balanced proportion in presenting actions

and reactions of the US Alliances compared to the other social actors’ actions and

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5.2. Suggestions

Assigning a critical discourse analysis based on van Leeuwen’s (2008)

framework on recontextualization of social practice is not limited to social action

analysis, as a set of time, location, presentation style of an actor, tool and material

resources to perform a practice may also invite an in-depth investigation. Those

wide ranges of analysis may contribute to break down discourses, so that the

process of perceiving something through discourses will be more impartial,

avoiding bias, judgment or justification. In addition, selected discourses may vary

from discourses of economic, sociocultural conditions to educational discourses,

such as rules at school, source books used at school, and so forth. Those further

analyses may support to a critical consideration of a system in our country based

on the massive use of a particular discourse.

Van Leeuwen’s framework on recontextualization of social practice can also

be combined with his Visual Grammar Analysis, as recently mass media

discourses often completes their illustration on a particular topic with images. A

CDA, through the combination of recontextualization and visual grammar, will

dismantle discourse with visual communication in a more adequate understanding

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