Media Representation of Indonesia in the Sydney Morning Herald From 2004 to 2009

Abstract

This research analyzes how one Australian newspaper reported Indonesia in 2004-2009. The purpose is to observe how one country?s media represents another country. The news production and comprehension processes are seen from the social, cognitive and cultural perspectives. The frameworks of analysis developed in this study ? the news actor, the news actions, and the author evaluation frameworks ? follow the social actor and social action frameworks (van Leeuwen, 2008) and the appraisal system (Martin & White, 2005). The results show how the president is mostly represented as friendly and positive towards Australia, but weak in terms of making decisions towards corruption cases. The government officials from all three powers ? legislative, executive and judicative ? are represented as corrupt. The people are recognized as a huge Moslem population and the majority live in abject poverty. This study learns that foreign media representations can be used as feedback, although representations are commonly partial.