Media warfare content analysis of the conservative and alternative media during the Bukit Selambau Malaysian by-election

Mohamed Samsudeen Sajahan¹, Azlyn Ahmad Zawawi¹, Azni Syafena Andin Salamat¹, Nur Zafifa Kamarunzaman¹, Azrul Shahimy Mohd Yusof², Zaliha Hj. Hussin¹ and Kamaruzaman Jusoff³*

¹Faculty of Administrative Science and Policy Studies, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Malaysia.

²Department of Language, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Malaysia.

³TropAIR, Faculty of Forestry, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor. Malaysia.

Accepted 28 October, 2009

   Abstract

This paper discuss on the role of the media in the context of warfare that was brought by the conservative mass media as well as the alternatives during the N 25 DUN Bukit Selambau, Malaysia by-election timeframe. The main idea of this study is to analyze the role of conservative and alternative media during Malaysia’s 2009 by-election. It should be noted that the types of media that were selected in this paperwork were not biased upon any parties and this was determined on the rationale that these media were the main choice of the local population. Among the local media sources that were chosen for this analysis were Utusan Malaysia, Berita Harian, Nanban, Tamil Nesan, whereas malaysiakini.com and tvantara.com were for the alternatives,. The discussions in this paperwork were more focused on the issues that were discussed by the media in terms of their main topic, news focus, themes, role of pictures and videos and the delivery of news. In order to deliver a more effective writing piece, the researcher had used two main communicative theories which were the theory of agenda setting as well as the framing theory in analyzing the impacts of media in this by-election.

Keywords: Agenda setting, framing theory, media warfare, Bukit Selambau.