I am not your metaphor: frames and counter-frames in the representation of disability

Abstract

When it comes to disability, powerful ideas are articulated in and circulated through the media. Through framing analysis, this study examines how the media portray disability and people with disabilities in a sample of Flemish print news and entertainment magazines. The study aims to understand the dominant and alternative frames related to disability by scrutinising which aspects of reality are selected, rejected, emphasised or modified in the production of a media text. Participatory analysis of articles from 16 Belgian magazines over one year (n = 184) reveals a number of frames and counter-frames. Results indicate that the media tend to perpetuate and reinforce the stigma of those categorised as disabled as ‘Other’ and disability as one of the most frightful obstructions in one’s life, while counter-frames underlining the notion of persons with disabilities being different but not ‘abnormal’ are relatively absent.

Points of interest

• This study offers insights into dominant and alternative frames related to disability in the Flemish print media. Frames can be described as the angles or perspectives from which a media story is told.

• Media texts from different media magazines were analysed by means of a framing analysis.

• The research reported here was ‘inclusive’ research, thereby combining and equally valuing experiential knowledge as well as academic knowledge from different contexts and disciplines.

• In this article, an inventory of dominant frames was developed, together with alternative counter-frames that may offer ‘new’ perspectives regarding disability.

• This type of research covers academic research in the intersecting fields of Media Studies and Disability Studies, and makes a contribution on both an empirical and a methodological level.

Keywords:

• Disability representation
• framing analysis
• media coverage
• inclusive research

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Funding

The work reported in this article was funded by the Department of Equal Opportunities of the Flemish Government.