A content analysis of coverage of a Korean public health crisis from September 1999 to December 2000 explored four hypotheses regarding how major social actors were depicted within two national newspapers,Chosun Ilbo, a conservative daily, andHankyoreh, a more liberal, youthoriented daily. The findings failed to support any of the four hypotheses. The coverage of major actors tended to range from unfavorable inHankyoreh to equivocal inChosun Ilbo. The study suggests that (1) the depiction of social actors was different between leading Korean news organizations and (2) a one-dimensional, broad characterization of the Korean news media’s alleged biases over time was difficult to validate. The study also implies that a tendency to uniformly characterize the depiction of social actors by all national news organizations is difficult inKorea and, perhaps, in similar cultural contexts.
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