Presented at the 2014 AEJMC Conference

3. Background
 Protest paradigm: structural biases that produce a pattern of
coverage of SMO actions
 Entman & Rojecki (1992): the news grants legitimacy to
participation by movements with little institutionalized power in
politics but only so long as they steer clear of effective political
action.
 Historical overview of protest coverage in Brazil: media “flip-
flop,” legitimizing protests when they become more powerful.

4. Research questions and hypotheses
How did Brazilian media outlets cover the 2013 protests online?
 RQ1: What frames were employed by main media outlets when
covering the 2013 Brazilian protests online?
 RQ2: What frames were employed by bloggers when referring to the
2013 Brazilian protests?
 RQ3: What frames were employed by Twitter users when referring
to the 2013 Brazilian protests?
 H1: The more people participate in protests, the more the media use
“legitimizing” frames when covering them.
 H2: The broader and more resonant the collective action frames, the
more the media use “legitimizing” frames to cover the protests.

5. Method
 Computerized content analysis using the software Crimson-
Hexagon
 Sub-data sets: a) news websites; b) blogs and forums; c) Twitter
news outlets; d) Twitter general
 Machine learning: a sample was used to train the program on the
various frames proposed by Hertog and McLeod (2001):
confrontation, riot and debate
 Algorithm applied the lessons to the large data sets based on the
identification of central concepts (Hertog & McLeod, 2001; Miller &
Riechert, 2001)
 Results were compared with a timeline of the events (H1)
 Hashtags were used as a proxy for the movement’s demands (H2)

6. News websites

7. Blogs

8. Twitter: news and general

9. Results

10. So what?
 Brazilian media followed the “protest paradigm” more closely at
the beginning of events, but migrated to legitimizing frames as
public support increased (H1 supported).
 This is consistent with the literature on media coverage of
previous protests in the country, but in contrast to US theory.
 News stories follow public support in the streets. Twitter news
accounts follow public support on the Twittersphere.
 The rise of the resonant “rights frame” was closely followed by
legitimizing media coverage (H2 supported).

11. What’s next?
 Software training limited: could not identify the circus frame.
 Future studies on frame sponsorship are needed to understand
Brazilian media’s “flip-flop” behavior.
 Next step: compare the results of media frames analysis to the
collective action frames promoted by SMOs and political elites on
blogs and Twitter.

12. Thank you!
rachelmourao@gmail.com
@rachelmourao
rachelmourao.wordpress.com