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Scientific article
French

Une re-définition de la frontière Humain-Animal à travers les images des médias d'information suisses

Contributors

Gorin, Valérie; Dubied, Annik; Burton-Jeangros, Claudine

Published in

Studies in communication sciences, vol. 9, no. 2, p. 191-220

Publication date

2009

Abstract

This article analyzes the social representations of animals in the Swiss media in two recent crises: the bird flu epidemic (2004-2007) and dog attacks (2005-2008). While animals have been a privileged subject in the media for a long time, they are increasingly characterized in Western societies by ambivalent representations: animals can be considered as threats to human beings, although at the same time we assist in a growing zoocentrism. Based on a corpus of images from Swiss television and news magazines, this article provides a better understanding of symbols and stereotypes depicted in the visual “language” and the way images depict animals as dangerous. While media coverage shifts from an intimate drama (during dog attacks) to a worldwide threat (through the bird flu), it is characterized by a sensationalist framing which reinforces human responsibility for the risk and its management, thereby signalling a permanent re-negotiation of the human-animal frontier.

Keywords

  • Representations
  • Media
  • Animals
  • Human
  • Images
  • Switzerland

Note

Publié à l'occasion d'une recherche subventionnée par l'Office vétérinaire fédéral

UNIGE affiliation entities

Citation (ISO format)

GORIN, Valérie, DUBIED, Annik, BURTON-JEANGROS, Claudine. Une re-définition de la frontière Humain-Animal à travers les images des médias d’information suisses. In: Studies in communication sciences, 2009, vol. 9, n° 2, p. 191–220.

Main files (1)

Article (Published version)

Identifiers

  • PID : unige:12484

Additional URL for this publication

http://www.scoms.ch/

Journal ISSN

1424-4896
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5downloads

Technical informations

Creation

12/11/2010 14:16:00

First validation

12/11/2010 14:16:00

Update

14/03/2023 16:08:55

Status update

14/03/2023 16:08:55

Last indexation

04/04/2025 12:54:02
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