Galtung and Ruge

Frequency – The time – span of an event and the extent to which it fits the frequency of the newspaper’s or news broadsheet’s schedule.

Big Brother issue with Shilpa Shetty and Jade Goody. This turned into a world wide issue as it was plastered all over the news and broadsheet AND tabloid news papers about the factor concerning “racism”.

Thereshold – How big is an event? Is it big enough to make it into the news?

The event was discussed at every time of the day, showing that it was important and a crucial issue that had to be raised. The fact that it was published nationally suggests that the event was huge, and therefore also states that a lot of people were affected by it.

Unambiguity – How clear is the meaning of the message?

With the “racism” event, the message being conveyed that racism is against the law and also the fact that they were all celebrity’s before entering the Big Brother house and the house just brought out their real side and what kinds of people they really were.

Meaningfulness – How meaningful will the event appear to the receivers of the news? Hartley stresses in this context what he refers to as “cultural proximity”. Events happening in cultures very different from ours will not be seen as being inherently meaningful to audiences here.

The event was definitely important and did have a massive impact on those in others parts of the world. The fact that such a controversial issue was raised, had the entire world interested in the news event. Also because the main victim was being bullied AND racially attacked, was not from the UK, and was from India instead drew a vast majority from the Indian culture. Also we know that they were particularly interested in the subject regardless of what race or religion they are, as it included other news information too. Like the fact that Carphone Warehouse discontinued their sponsorship with Big Brother.

Consonance – Does this event match the audience’s expectations? Journalists have a pretty good idea of the angle from which they want to report an event, even before they get there.

This racism issue was perceived by the nation to make Jade Goody look like the bad bully. Throughout the two last weeks Jade was in the Big Brother house everyone paid close attention towards Jades actions and words. The audience were forced by the news that Jade, Jo, and Danielle were the three beasts and Shilpa was a huge beauty. The audience were geared against Jade’s point of view and towards Shilpa as she was a favourite of the press.

Unexpectedness – ‘Man Bites Dog’ is news. If an event is highly unpredictable, then it is likely to make it into the news.

The news about Shilpa saying that she despised Jade was not news. We were more likely to have hoped that this is true, however, we know that Shilpa was too much of a nice person to say anything of that sort. The press deceive us as an audience and trick us into believing things on a front page of usually a tabloid newspaper which tend to display false and gossip information. By doing this the audience are interested and therefore tempted to buy the magazine or newspaper.

Continuity – Once an event has been covered, it is convenient to continue to cover it – the running story.


Composition – This is a matter of the balance of the news. It is a master of the editors’ judgement, more than anything else. A different news broadcast will have a different agenda in terms of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ news, for example, usually dependant on the perceived target audience.

Clearly, with they racism issue, not one article I or anyone I am aware of has read an interview or a comment suggesting that they agree with Jades actions or that they do not think Jade was in the wrong. One news article on Sky news I had read, the news reporter may I re-call ‘beauty and the three beast’ situation an excuse for ‘being uneducated and of low society class … people who did not know how to conduct themselves’. This to us is hard hitting news as the reporter has harshly named and shamed these bullies.

Reference to elite nations – This again relates to ‘cultural proximity’. Those nations which are culturally closest to our own will receive most of the courage.

In this case, this is a false assumption as India and the UK are the main two nations which received the maximum coverage. This is because everyone whom was involved was from either the UK or India. Therefore it would have interested them more than other countries. But however, that doesn’t go to say that other countries were not interested, because the issue was nation wide and therefore held interests of each and every individual including myself.

Reference to elite person – The media pay attention to important people. Anyone the media pay attention to must be important (cult of the celebrity).

This is important to remember as in this situation Shilpa Shetty herself was idolised all around the world, primarily by Asians, but also other nationalities too. This followed a cult of celebrity, not only in her own country, nor only in the UK, where the event was taken place, but in America, Tom Cruise has suggested that he would like to be in a movie with Shilpa Shetty as a main actress in there.

Personalisation – Events being seen as actions of individuals.

This was displayed all over the news, when Jade, Jo and Danielle were exploited by the press and the media and the audiences of the show and therefore proven to be bullies. The press adapted what they thought the personalities of the individuals were, rather than actually getting to know their back ground.

Negativity – Bad news is good news in terms of what is reported.

The more worse news gets, the better it is for those writing the stories. Audience buy stories with juicy gossip and hatred. Therefore, magazines intend on attracting certain types of audiences and appealing to different people. The racism story was total bad news and this meant good news to the press. Therefore however many news papers were published was determined by the amount of people who agree with what is being advertised on the front covers of news papers and magazines.