Representations of Social Work in the Australian News Media

ABSTRACT

How the news media constructs social work has been an area of great concern for the social work profession for several decades. It is a discussion within the professional literature that has been dominated by the assumption that the media has portrayed an unfairly critical representation of the profession. To address a significant dearth of knowledge surrounding this highly discussed but poorly researched topic, this article presents the findings from a study that analysed 12 months of social work coverage in Melbourne, Australia. The findings indicate that coverage was not necessarily unfairly critical, but rather relatively absent. Furthermore, the analysis found that existing reporting constructed the profession as being highly diverse in fields, practice methods, and worker demographics. The findings have significant implications for how the professional community understands the relationship, challenging dominant assumptions, but also informing future action and engagement with the news media.

新闻媒体如何塑造社会工作，是社工行业几十年来一直关心的问题。专业文献中的讨论有种假设，那就是媒体对该行业的描绘多为批评且有失公正。为弥补这个争议多、研究少的话题的知识不足，本文作者分析了澳大利亚墨尔本十二个月内涉及社会工作的媒体报道，发现媒体报道不是批评过多、公正不够，而是根本就没什么报道。作者还发现，即有的报道所呈现的社工行业是一个从领域到实践方法再到从业人员情况都很不一样的局面，这些发现有助于该行业人员理解他们与新闻媒体的关系，挑战了有关的成见、并且为将来如何行动、如何处理与新闻媒体的关系提供了意见。

KEYWORDS:

• Social Work
• News Media
• News Representation
• News Coverage

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.