Cannizzaro, S and Gholami, R (2016) The Devil is not in the Detail: Representational absence and Stereotyping in the Trojan Horse News Story. Race, Ethnicity and Education, 21 (1). pp. 15-29. ISSN 1470-109X

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Abstract

Using Content Analysis, this study investigated the coverage of the Trojan Horse news story aiming to ascertain whether its representation by the British press emphasised ‘Islamist extremism’ over ‘poor school governance’. The sample coverage was extracted from five national newspapers and ranged from 9 June (the date of release of the Ofsted Advice Note) to 26 June 2014. Our analysis shows that the coverage reported evidence of Islamist ideology much more frequently (61.5%) than evidence of poor governance (38.5%). This suggests that the Trojan Horse news story was predominantly represented as a case of Islamist extremism and therefore covered in an unbalanced manner. Such a partial coverage relied on ideological dualisms and negative stereotypes to represent Islam and Muslims, and on the textual strategy of selecting some features (extremism) whilst omitting others (governors’ professional misconduct). This bias has arguably diverted attention away from systemic problems within the national school system whilst reinforcing Islamophobic discourses.

Item Type: Article
Additional Information: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis Group in Race, Ethnicity and Education on 19 July 2016, available online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2016.1195350
Uncontrolled Keywords: Trojan Horse, news, content analysis, representation, governance, Islamophobia,
Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BL Religion
B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BP Islam. Bahaism. Theosophy, etc
L Education > LB Theory and practice of education
Divisions: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > School of Social Science and Public Policy
Depositing User: Symplectic
Date Deposited: 13 Sep 2016 13:24
Last Modified: 26 Feb 2021 14:49
URI: https://eprints.keele.ac.uk/id/eprint/2184

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