Standpunten en kanttekeningen

Een Arabisch beeld van de Golfcrisis 1990: inhoudsanalyse van editorialen van een Jordaanse krant

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Abstract

An Arab view of the second Gulf crisis. Content analysis of editorials in a Jordanian newspaper - This article is an analysis of 44 editorials published from August 2 until December 31 1990 in the Jordanian daily paper Ar-Ra’y (’Point of View’) during the second Gulf crisis. The content analysis is preceded by a survey of the historical context : the economic and political problems in Jordan at the time, Ar-Ra’y and the political power in Jordan, and the relationship between the Hashemite monarchy and Iraq. The content analysis is an interpretative evaluation of the rhetorical and linguistic strategies applied in the Jordanian editorials. The latter are compared to characteristics and guidelines concerning editorial writing as they are found in Western literature. Judging Arab texts to Western norms is a deliberate choice, by which we avoid interpreting characteristics such as vagueness, ambiguity and emotionality as being typical of the Arab culture. All too often they have been opposed to our supposedly Western rationality and objectivity. Complementary to the content analysis, we give an interpretative evaluation of terminology, which is recurrent in the editorials. The results of this reveal the values and images the newspaper wants to build up or which exist among the reading public.

How to Cite:

Goethals, M., (1995) “Een Arabisch beeld van de Golfcrisis 1990: inhoudsanalyse van editorialen van een Jordaanse krant”, Tijdschrift voor Sociale Wetenschappen 40(4), 424–435. doi: https://doi.org/10.21825/tvsw.95217