media’s critical role in presenting events and people as ‘threats to societal values and interests . . . in a stylised and stereotypical fashion’

media content often exaggerated events through a process of stigmatising (Ben-Yehuda, 1990: 103), invoking fear as a reasonable response to perceived threats posed by ‘folk devils’. Cohen’s model recognises mass media’s salient role in the early stages of social reaction to perceived threats, during which images of deviance are produced (Critcher, 2008). In Cohen’s (1973) view, this involves three processes: symbolisation, where, in the case of asylum seekers, the term ‘asylum seeker’ is positioned to signify threat; exaggeration and distortion of the perceived threat; and prediction of the consequences should society fail to act.

people construct what Kang (2005) calls ‘racial meanings’ either through direct contact with minorities or through ‘vicarious experiences’ which are stories about ‘the other’ told by the media or one’s own social network (p. 53).

because ‘vicarious experiences’ occur much more frequently, especially in the form of media consumption, these ‘vicarious experiences’ are much more influential in attitude-building (Kang, 2005: 53).

‘Framing’ can be defined as ‘the process of culling a few elements of perceived reality and assembling a narrative that highlights connections among them to promote a particular interpretation

wo newspapers to represent the homeless camp as impacting negatively on the image of Melbourne and homeless people as anti-social and even criminal.

location within an existing health clinic in the low-income African American neighborhood of Englewood