B.2.3. Ethics
3. Methodology
Research Question
The theoretical basis for designing my research is informed by the conceptualization of Journalism as a discursive re-construction of reality (Carvalho, 2008) and the following three findings from the Theoretical Framework chapter:
1. True Crime is a dynamic genre which focuses on entertainment and differs from news coverage, yet pertains to authentic, real-life murder stories and, as far as interpretation and reproduction are concerned, depends on audience meaning-making,
2. Platform dependent entrepreneurs, such as YouTubers, respond to institutional pressures by developing income diversification strategies in order to maximize profits while co-creatively partaking in the culturally meaningful circulation of dominant discourses and semiotic representations,
3. Adhering to journalistic values concerning Objectivity, Public Service and Ethics has traditionally legitimized journalistic authority and news narratives, but the ongoing tendency to reject the polarity of the (“serious”) Information vs Entertainment construct, coupled with growing concerns over profitability, result in a re-negotiation of these values.
My intention is to comparatively analyze True Crime YouTube videos made by innovative,
“amateur” YouTubers, by contrasting them to a True Crime YouTube video from the BuzzFeed Unsolved Network -whose infotainment format will be considered a paradigm for the purposes of this analysis-, in order to answer the research question:
“How do innovative True Crime YouTubers navigate the video presentation of real-life murder while establishing their entrepreneurial brand, as far as adhering to journalistic values
pertaining to Objectivity, Public Service and Ethics is concerned?”.
The BuzzFeed video will serve as a paradigm of the infotainment format.
Sampling Criteria
The videos must meet the following criteria:
As far as YouTubers are concerned, As far as video content is concerned,
YouTubers must not have a background, whether academic or professional, in journalism (with the exception of the BuzzFeed Unsolved Network hosts).
YouTubers must be both the innovative content creators and hosts of their
Same case videos pertaining to a highly publicized murder case will be examined comparatively.
The murder case must involve a male
videos (with the exception of the BuzzFeed Unsolved Network hosts).
YouTubers must be U.S. citizens, currently residing in the U.S.A.22
perpetrator and a female victim23.
Videos must be approximately 25 minutes long.
The “amateur” content creators whose videos will be examined are Bailey Sarian and Antphrodite, and they will be introduced in more detail in chapter 4 - Video Analysis (see Table 9. Content Creators).
The True Crime case
Elizabeth Short (aged 22 at death) was a beautiful American woman whose gruesome L.A. murder in 1947 shocked post- WW2 America. The case became extremely sensationalized due to the details of the crime (Short’s body was found naked, bisected, and with a “Joker” smile carved on her face), leading to a media frenzy which produced wild speculations about the victim’s personal life, dubbing her the
22 See Self-Branding: The U.S.A. Case.
23 See The Butchery of Female Bodies.
Black Dahlia.
Research Design
I will perform a qualitative close reading by employing Anabela Carvalho’s (2008) textual analysis framework for researching media discourses, with a few adaptations in order to account for intertextual elements (e.g. links, imagery) and format differences; For example, Carvalho’s prompting to “pay close attention to headlines and the first one or two paragraphs”
of the analysis corpus articles (Carvalho, 2008, p.166), will be adjusted by examining the Video Titles and Video Descriptions, alongside the Video (overall recording), in terms of meaning-making.
Therefore, the dominant discourses and semiotic representations in the Video Titles, Video Descriptions and Videos by two “amateur” True Crime YouTubers and the BuzzFeed Unsolved Network, respectively, will be analyzed in accordance with four of Carvalho’s (2008) textual analysis dimensions, namely the categories i) Actors, ii) Language & Rhetoric, iii) Discursive Strategies, and iv) Ideological Positioning. Moreover, Videos will also be analyzed according to a fifth category pertaining to v) Visual Elements, and the Top 5 Comments for each video will be examined too, in order to identify how viewers24 respond to each YouTuber’s discursive choices.
Table 8. Categories.
Category Description Comments
Actors
Who is mentioned?
How are they represented?
Actors are selectively presented in the Video Analysis chapter. The remaining Actors are discussed in the Appendix.
24 See A Community of …Watchers?, Participatory Rhythms and So, What is the Message?.
Language &
Rhetoric
Language analysis pertains to identifying noteworthy sentence structure and grammatical/lexical elements.
Rhetoric pertains to
personalization (relatability) techniques,
exhibiting personal bias,
the reasoning behind stating one’s personal opinions (e.g. due to education-based expertise / work experience),
where applicable.
In the case of YouTuber Antphrodite, note that Antphrodite’s positioning as a psychic may still qualify him for falling under the Objectivity 2.0 category, as what matters is not the validity of his claims, but that he offers his personal opinion on the basis that he has a skill which
the viewers perceive as authoritative.
Discursive Strategies
How are
the primary victim,
the crime,
the primary suspect,
authority figures,
the media/the Press
presented, as far as sensationalism and negative criticism /
presuppositions are concerned?
Has fact-checking taken place?
Ideological Positioning
Why is the YouTuber informing the viewers?
What is expected from the viewers?
Visual Elements
The video’s Set, Imagery and Thumbnail are discussed:
Are graphic crime scene photographs being shown?
What stylistic elements stand out (e.g. polished editing, quick transitions, dramatic music, etc.)?
Visual elements include on-screen text.
Top 5 Comments
How do viewers respond to the YouTubers?
Do viewers adopt the YouTuber’s discursive treatment of key Actors?
Do viewers agree with the YouTuber’s self-representation?
The discourse analysis findings will then be assessed in order to establish whether innovative, “amateur” True Crime YouTubers adhere to journalistic values pertaining to Objectivity, Public Service, and Ethics.
For the purposes of this thesis, “Objectivity” shall refer to transparency in terms of sourcing, attention to fact-checking, lack of expressing personal bias and presuppositions, and interpretation on the basis of some sort of expertise (e.g. educational or work experience) that the viewers perceive as authoritative. Whether each video’s content falls under the Objectivity 1.025, Objectivity 2.026, or neither variation, will then be determined.
The “Public Service” value shall refer to the YouTuber’s self-conceptualization as someone whose duty is to inform the viewers so that the latter can put pressure on/assist the State’s
25 The YouTuber systematically credits their sources (meaning that both factual information and stylistic video components are being referenced), exhibits minimal personal bias, and does not offer his/her personal opinion.
26 The YouTuber systematically credits their sources, exhibits minimal personal bias, and offers his/her personal opinion on the basis of some sort of expertise that the viewers perceive to be authoritative.
response (e.g. in the case of sub-standard police work), as well as the YouTuber’s conceptualization of the viewer as someone willing to promote social cohesion by actively trying to solve cases27. The viewers’ responses to these conceptualizations will also be discussed, in view of the Top 5 Comments analysis.
Finally, the “Ethics” journalistic value shall refer to whether sensationalist (both verbal and non-verbal) framing, and self-branding that overpowers the narrative at the expense of providing key information, take place. Of particular interest will be whether the YouTuber’s entrepreneurial side is taking over the video presentation or not.
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