Victims and perpetrators of feminicide in the language of the Mexican written press

Abstract

This study investigates the language used by national newspapers in Mexico: “El Universal”, “La Jornada”, “Milenio”, and “Reforma”, when addressing the issue of feminicide regarding victims and perpetrators, as well as their relationship with the gender of the reporter and with each newspaper. The research is based on the analysis of qualitative content and the theoretical framework of framing. Categories were built on the type of language in cases of feminicide of 360 journalistic texts published during 2017: 1) Narrative of feminicide; 2) Justification of the perpetrator or alleged perpetrator; 3) Social issues; 4) Blaming the victim. The analysis yielded cases of victim blaming to a lesser extent than those of the perpetrator's justification. Aspects of the narration of feminicide stood out both by the gender of the reporter and by the media in the four newspapers, from two perspectives: 1) The fact, the follow-up, or the context; 2) The fact, legal aspects, and statistics. Reporters, men and women, tend to justify the perpetrator; male reporters blame the victim more than female reporters; and female reporters contextualize feminicide through social issues: social violence, impunity, and failures in legal processes. “La Jornada” is inclined towards social issues, while “El Universal” tends to justify the perpetrator..