Gender and Racial Stereotyping in Rape Coverage

Abstract

This article uses critical discourse analysis to discuss and analyse articles about rape that appeared in a South African newspaper, Grocott's Mail, between 14 October, 2008 and 29 October, 2009. Drawing on existing literature on “rape myths” in media coverage of rape, this article argues that Grocott's Mail perpetuates racial and gender stereotypes through the way in which it reports on rape. While not all of the articles included in the analysis use rape myths, most use one or more when discussing rape incidents. Specifically, Grocott's Mail tends to use rape myths that blame the victim for the rape and de-emphasise the role of the perpetrator in the rape.

Keywords:

• rape myths
• media coverage of rape
• rape in South Africa
• sexual violence

Acknowledgement

This manuscript was developed from a master's thesis written under the supervision of Dr Sally Matthews (Political and International Studies Department, Rhodes University, South Africa).

Notes

1. In two of the sixteen rape incident articles it is clear that that there was more than one rapist but the number of rapists is not given, meaning that there are at least twenty-eight rapists in the sample.

2. While no author is listed for these articles, typically one journalist writes all of the “News in Brief” articles per edition.

3. “O-Week” refers to “Orientation Week” at Rhodes University. “O-Week” takes place before classes start and has become known as a social week in which students drink and party.

4. In South Africa, “township” refers to a relatively underdeveloped area that is located on the periphery of most towns and cities. During apartheid, black urban dwellers were forced to live in these townships, and today, township residents are still almost exclusively black.

5. One article covered the alleged rape incident and the other article covered the legal proceedings of the incident. This section will discuss the rape incident article, which was 537 words long, covered two pages and began on the front page of Grocott's Mail.