Migrants in Russian News Media: Analysis of Construction of Visual Images

Many studies claim that Russian media continue to spread xenophobic, anti-migrant, and even racist statements, not only through textual information but also through visual images. At the moment, there are few studies devoted exclusively to the visual images of migrants: usually studies focus on textual information, perceiving photos as just an addition to articles. However, photographs and visual images can be independent units of analysis. Visual information in the media plays an important role. Photos are usually the first to attract the attention of readers, while the text is perceived already under the influence of the image seen. Three mainframes of portraying migrants: as a threat, burden, or as a victim, while the hosts are shown as defenders. Migrants presented as “others” by means of special photojournalistic techniques. This study is done within the theoretical framework of the political-economic approach in the study of media. This study examines the images of migrants in Russian newspapers that vary in the ownership of the publishing house, the area of distribution and political orientation, to find out whether the methods of visual representation differ, which newspapers use more "othering" photojournalist techniques in the image. The study also tested whether the image of migrants in newspapers changes depending on time period: photos published in 2019 and 2020 were studied. Quantitative content analysis was conducted, where the unit of analysis was photos published in 2019 and 2020 from Russian newspapers. The photos were encoded according to a codebook that was made based on previous studies (all the codes were collected and compiled into one study). New variables were also created. Association tests were conducted to test the hypotheses: Chi-Square and Kruskal-Wallis tests. Research has shown that state-owned newspapers tend to show migrants less using techniques of otherness. National newspapers also used fewer techniques for constructing otherness in the visual representation of migrants, as opposed to regional ones. In the Siberian region, in contrast to the Central and Northwestern regions, migrants were more often shown as "others". The analysis also showed that in 2019, more practices of otherness were used in visual representation.