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II.II Discursive practice: a shift?

II.II.II Afro-optimist discourse

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adds, it is the task of journalists to make foreign issues understandable to a non-specialist audience (Wrong, 2017: 32).

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Joye (2017) contributed to the conceptualisation of the Afro-optimist discourse with a contextualising identity frame. Western news media increasingly try to make events happening in Sub-Saharan Africa more comprehensible, relevant and appealing to their audience. To bring the unknown and alienated region and its inhabitants closer to the homes and cultural perception of Western audiences, the news media use domestication: “the framing of a foreign news event within the perceived national or local context of the audience,” (Joye, 2017: 52). In communicative events, this practice takes shape through the portrayal of Sub-Saharan Africa as a place that is similar to the West, with shopping malls, traffic jams, fashion designers and exchange markets (Joye, 2017: 52).

In short, Joye (2017), Bunce (2017) and Havnevik (2015) recognised reoccurring patterns in the Western media coverage of Sub-Saharan Africa, which they referred to as the practice of Afro-pessimism. This discourse constitutes a knowledge framework regulating Africa’s identity, societies, geography and history (Nothias, 2014: 75). To understand how such discursive practice influences the image-making of Sub-Saharan Africa, it is first and foremost important to understand how an Afro-optimist discourses takes shape in journalism.

II.II.II.I Afro-Optimist Framing Devices

To practice the Afro-optimist discourse, journalists have used different reasoning or framing devices, operating cooperatively and simultaneously. This paper has included certain features that have not been directly mentioned by other scholars, but instead constitute the antonyms of features of the Afro-optimist discourse.

To start, an optimistic perspective on the future of Sub-Saharan Africa is provided.

This optimistic prediction is driven by the hopeful outlook of the Africa is Rising narrative.

The news items embrace the three pillars of progress as identified by Havnevik (2015): (1) economic growth, (2) a substantial middle class, and (3) political stability and democratic progress (Havnevik, 2015: 6-15). In other words, a positive tone is used to frame the events happening in Sub-Saharan Africa. This is visualised in the journalistic work by means of references to “progress”, “encouraging” or “positive”.

This thesis embraces the use of a neutral writing style as another reasoning device of Afro-optimism. In practical terms, this primary journalistic frame gives preference to facts over opinions, while also excluding the usage of judgmental adverbs and adjectives , such as

‘chaotic’, ‘barbarous’, and ‘skulduggery’. A factual writing style can be recognised by

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references to the 5Ws [who, what, when, when] and 1H [how] that are part of the news writing formula. This news feature is established as an antonym of Ogunyemi’s (2018) Afro-pessimist feature; the use of a judgemental writing style (Ogunyemi, 2018: 426).

Another feature is an empowering ranking frame, which gives power to the Sub-Saharan Africans about whom the journalists write. They are presented as fellow human beings, who have equal standing with the Western audience. The idea is that the inhabitants of Sub-Saharan Africa are capable of following the Western road to development, which will eventually lead to success. Empowerment refers to the authority to perform certain acts.

Successful means to (be able to) achieve something desired or intended. This equalised ranking frame is characterised by references to success, experience and authority. As such, it stands in stark contrast to the Afro-pessimist ranking frame as identified by De B’béri and Louw's (2011).

A differentiating identity frame is also used as an Afro-optimist framing device. This frame recognises and emphasises the different countries and social groups to which African inhabitants belong (Nothias, 2014: 76). In this thesis, differentiation means the recognition of Sub-Saharan Africans as the subject of focus, instead of merely mentioning “an African country” or “Africa”. In other words, the separation of Sub-Saharan Africa from the rest of the African continent. On top of that, differentiation refers to the recognition of the social and national identities of the individuals mentioned in the articles instead of simply referring to them as “Africans”.

According to Joye (2014), Afro-pessimist news items contextualise events happening in Sub-Saharan Africa, to make them more comprehensible, relevant and appealing to media’s audience. To bring the unknown and alienated region and its inhabitants closer to the homes and cultural perception of Western audiences, journalists use domestication: “the framing of a foreign news event within the perceived national or local context of the audience,” (Joye, 2017: 52). In communicative events, this practice takes shape through the portrayal of Sub-Saharan Africa as a place that is similar to the West, with shopping malls, traffic jams, fashion designers and exchange markets (Joye, 2017: 52). As part of the Afro-optimist discourse, contextualisation thus does not take place through the provision of Sub-Saharan African historical drivers, economic or political circumstances and demographic structures (Ogunyemi, 2018: 426). Instead, news items are framed in such a way that they fit the context in which the audience lives.

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Journalists perform domestication through five different strategies. The most common strategy is to appeal to the emotions of the audience. Several discursive features can serve this purpose, such as the inclusion of moving images (e.g. children and elderly), the usage of expressive adjectives, the inclusion of eye-witness accounts and an emphasis on specific emotional details of their stories (Joye, 2017: 55). The second strategy is to focus on compatriots affected by the foreign event or issue. The eye-witness accounts mentioned before, often refer to statements made by people from the West who are residing in the place of happening or affected by it. Since the Western audience can relate more easily to these culturally close people, emotional proximity is reduced (Joye, 2017: 55). The third strategy is to elaborate on the domestic consequences of the foreign event or issue (Joye, 2017: 53). This brings the distant event directly on the doorstep of the audience, thereby creating a sense of urgency (Joye, 2017: 55). The fourth strategy is the usage of subtle stylistic, narrative and technical practices. Distant events and issues are made more familiar and understandable through the narration of foreign correspondents and the use of metaphors and illustrations (Joye, 2017: 56).

Nothias (2014) added three more framing devices that have been used to cover Sub-Saharan Africa. While he focussed on Afro-pessimism, the same features can be applied as antonyms to be able to practice Afro-optimism. Instead of undermining the Sub-Saharan African sources, quotation verbs are used that maintain or strengthen their trustworthiness and credibility. Assertive verbs, such as “explain” or “announce” position the source as a trustworthy and knowledgeable actor. Directive verbs, like “order” or “instruct” provide the source with authority and control. Neutral verbs, such as “say” or “tell” do not per se strengthen the credibility of a source, but they do not provide any judgmental or evaluative value and consequently, they do present the interviewees as actors that deserve a stage to express themselves (Nothias: 142-143). The second devices concerns the preference of local voices over external voices. This practice implies that Africans have the reliability and knowledge to tell their own story (Nothias, 2014: 137). As part of the Afro-optimist discourse, Sub-Saharan Africans are given the space to speak for themselves instead of being talked about. Lastly, Nothias (2014) recognized is the use of an ethnic frame that is non-racialised.

When writing about Africans, the journalists refer to the geographical inhabitants of the African continent instead of the black people living on the African continent (Nothias, 2014:

76). Each inhabitant of Sub-Saharan Africa is included, irrespective of race.

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In sum, a news item can be deemed Afro-optimist to the extent that it reproduces these features. In fact, these different features serve as the news frames that journalists use to (re)produce the Afro-optimist discourse. The presence of an Afro-optimist discourse in the journalistic work firstly shows that the journalist themselves have embraced an image of Sub-Saharan Africa as a place on equal standing with the Western audience. Secondly, it means that the audience is exposed to such a knowledge framework, which can influence its beliefs, attitudes and behaviour regarding Sub-Saharan Africa as region in the world (Baden, 2019:

230).

In the news framing process, the Afro-optimist discourse is reproduced through (1) the use of a neutral writing style, (2) the contextualisation of events happening in the region, (3) a preference of local African sources over Western sources, (4) the use of crediting quotation verbs, (5) optimism, (6) differentiating, and (7) non-racialisation of Sub-Saharan Africans.

These features are driven by the Africa is Rising narrative and the Afro-optimist ideology, which means that their use in communicative events contributes to the social hierarchy that places Sub-Saharan Africans in a similar power position as the Western people. It creates a ranking frame which equalises the former to the latter. In terms of the image making of Sub-Saharan Africa, this means that the power is divided between both the Western journal ists and Sub-Saharan Africans about whom they write.

II.II.II.II Opponents

While this narrative results in more positive coverage of Sub-Saharan Africa, Joye (2017) argues that “the so-called “other face of Africa'' is a very Western and neoliberal one” (Joye, 2017: 52). Africa’s progress is articulated in privatized, technocentric and mediacentric terms, that position Africa in the neoliberal world order created by the West (Wright, 2017: 152).

According to Khisa (2020), it can in fact be seen as a reflection of the development theory, allowing for one way of development according to the Western norm (Khisa, 2020: 304-305).

It is as if Africa is now rising to become what the West already is. The use of more positive representations of Africans appears to put Africa on equal standing with the West, but it “does not visibly disrupt the logic that contends Africa was lower to begin with,” (Flamenbaum, 2017: 122).

The success of Sub-Saharan Africa is not only measured against Western standards, but also presented as dependent upon the West (Joye, 2017: 58). Diawara (2000) expressed

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the double bind in which Africans are caught: “One also tends to feel that success in life depends on working with the same devil which thrives on racial superiority and which excludes the majority of one’s brothers and sisters from participating in history,” (Diawara, 2000: 55). This idea that African successes cannot be achieved without the assistance of the West makes the Africa is Rising Narrative more Afro-pessimist than Afro-optimist in that sense.

Joye (2017) adds the critique that Western sources continue to be overrepresented as central characters of the stories. Instead of citing local Africans, Western media have the tendency to rely on compatriots. This domestication practice does not only result in the absence of local voices, but also in the subordination of Africans vis-à-vis Westerners (Joye, 2017: 55). Domestication as the central practice of the Africa Rising Narrative can thus have similar implications as the Afro-pessimist discourse: the exclusion of local, African voices.

Another critique is offered by Wright (2017), who argues that the simplistic, positive narratives of Africa is Rising do not do justice to the complexities of African events and issues (Wright, 2017: 154-155). Bunce, Franks and Paterson (2017) also characterise the positive Afro-optimist news coverage as one-sided and as such, not doing justice to “an impoverished and often hungry majority [that] is left out of the story” (Bunce, Franks, Paterson, 2017: 4). In other words, they question whether the produced media image of Sub-Saharan Africa is a realistic picture of the region.