Reference no: EM132389387 , Length: word count:1000

Media Analysis Assignment -

Select a particular theme (e.g. coverage of extreme events; adaptation funding; climate change and food security; climate change and migration...) and review media coverage a time period that makes sense for this theme. Once you have read widely, refine your media analysis to a question, and then critically review how the media frames answers to this question.

For example, you may be interested in water supply in California, or drought in developed nations. After tracking media, you notice a change in how California's drought was portrayed during the very high snow winters of 2016-2017 and 2018-2019 versus the dry year of 2017-2018. You might now come up with the question:

"Is California's drought over during a wet winter?"

In your media analysis, you would review how portrayal of the issue changed as a result of the wet winters, and cite evidence that in popular press, there were two types of messages - one that proclaims the drought to be over because of the high snowpack in the Sierra Nevada mountains and the fact that all the reservoirs were full, but another message which pointed considered groundwater supply and cautioned that recovery in groundwater is modest at best. You might summarize what types of data the articles cite as evidence (precipitation data vs long term well data), or if they attribute causes of drought merely to precipitation or link it to withdrawals from agriculture (i.e. what do they consider drought is).

Another avenue you could take, on the same topic, is the implications of wet and dry years in California. Perhaps you've noticed that there are two dominant climate change-related themes: groundwater shortage and wildfires. You could contrast the balance of framing of these two issues (as management vs. climate change issues) over a period of time.

Your theme must fit under the broad umbrella of "adaptation and vulnerability" (i.e. you cannot write about emissions trading or GHG reductions). Write a 1200 word (maximum, excluding references) paper which critically summarizes media treatment of your theme over a selected time period. You are encouraged to incorporate peer-reviewed and other sources of information as appropriate (in the example above, you might introduce some well data from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and a 2017 peer reviewed book chapter which summarizes the California drought), but the focus of this paper is to synthesize the messages the media is sending on what defines a drought/how the issue is framed, and when it is over.

Instructions: Selection of the theme - "Climate change and food security in India". The question is yet to be derived further.

Note that there have to be 50 references that are news articles. Just to make it clear again they are 50 "news articles" over a period of time. If you read the assignment closely it has proper instructions.

Just to double-check again it's a media analysis and not a research paper.

Word count - 1000 words.