The Guardian vs The Daily Mail: Representations of stories about Boris Johnson

The Guardian and The Daily Mail are rival newspapers both with contrasting views on politics and society. The Guardian is a 'left wing' newspaper with its readership mainly being progressive people who want change. The Daily Mail is a 'right wing' newspaper with its readership mainly being middle class white men. This causes them to show stories in different ways.

In the Daily Mail, they portray Boris Johnson as a man who they believe in, describing him as having a 'Master plan' which suggests he is going to help the country greatly. The article features images of him looking authoritative which implies that the paper believes he has a right to be in control and is doing it well. The paper also suggests that Johnson is strongly supported with the suggestion he 'will receive a more positive response back home'. This shows the support the paper has for Johnson and the belief that many other people will support him too (which is commonly true for their conservative readership). The Daily Mail has made sure to include the opposing party, Labour, as they say ' a number of Labour MPs have signaled their backing for Johnson's new proposal'  this allows the paper to show the Conservative party as being superior to Labour as even some of its rivals have agreed to them. The readership will be happy with this as they will like to feel greater than people in which they have contrasting views to. This creates a build vs them ideology which is thought of by Stuart Hall. The paper uses its language to try and show the conservative party in a positive way which associates with the theory by Bandura that media controls the way we think and act and we don't have a choice on what we view and take in. 

The Guardian portray Boris Johnson in a very different way as they describe him as 'a Jeremy Kyle villain' which gives him negative connotations created by the paper. Contrasting to The Daily Mail, the article features images of Boris Johnson that are unflattering and make him look as if he is lacking control (which is how the Labour party feel). The paper emphasises the questioning of how Corbyn is not in power yet Johnson is, as it features the text 'yet he is still 42 points above Jeremy Corbyn'. This again shows the left-wing view of the paper which are contrasting to the Daily Mail. The Guardian uses language which creates a mockery tone surrounding Johnson which shows how the labour party don't believe they are lower than conservatives, which the readership will be happy with as they will like to feel equal.  The paper includes symoblic codes which cause the reader create their own connotations from what the paper has said which links to the theory of Semiology by Roland Barthes. The paper will hope the reader has got the preferred reading of the message which has been encoded through the symoblic code suggested by theorist Stuart Hall. 

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