Document Type
Thesis
First Faculty Advisor
Jennifer Horan
Second Faculty Advisor
Martha Kuhlman
Keywords
media; young women; sentiment analysis; survey; lexicon
Publisher
Bryant University
Rights Management
CC-BY-NC
Abstract
Media has affected popular culture for hundreds of years in Western literature: from non-fiction stories to news coverage, to online publications. The tone, as well as source material chosen, not only indicates what society views as important, but also influences a culture’s shared beliefs. This paper explores the origins of women as objects in narrative structures, and then analyzes the more modern impacts of this trope. The purpose of this analysis is to determine the reasons behind why young women are disproportionately the victims in violent crimes in all forms of media coverage. The survey data collected will be used as a case study to see if the stereotypes of women hold true in a real-world setting. The survey will find out whether or not famous media cases of character, as well as real life deaths, are more memorable depending on the age and sex of the victim. Data will also be collected through sentiment analysis to see how news coverage reports on different kinds of victims. The three case studies will be on Gabby Petito, Jelani Day, and Maya Millete. A review of lexicon categories from the data will be used to categorize the feelings that the cases evoked. Finally, a Word Cloud will be used to create a visual representation of the most famous murder cases the survey respondents have heard of. The results support the idea that media unequally focuses on the deaths of young women. This unequal treatment has long lasting emotional effects on the audience. Media’s attention isn’t inherently unethical, but their practices now are. There needs to be equal coverage of all types of victims, and it shouldn’t be so focused on the nature of the crime but celebrate who the victim was instead.
Comments
This works takes a historical analysis on how media has viewed and capitalized on the death of young women. This historical lense is then used to show how we are still using these practices in current media, and the problematic nature behind this. This thesis uses sentiment analysis, lexicon categories, and word clouds as tools to highlight the findings from the survey conducted.