The project is divided in 3 workpackages:
1) Mainstream news reporting (responsible researcher: Niko Pyrhönen)
This corpus consists of two data sets. The first set focuses on the two nationally delimited spheres of nationwide mainstream media, operationalized as news articles published by Helsingin Sanomat (HS) and Hufvudstadsbladet (HBL); and Dagens Nyheter (DN) and Svenska Dagbladet (SvD). The second data set complements the corpus by taking in the televised output of the National Broadcasting Company, with data collected YLE broadcasting.
2) Solidarity activism in media (responsible researcher: Minna Seikkula)
We then make use of the data collected and analyzed in the mainstream media corpus as we compare the media narratives to the ones recognized and produced by solidarity activists.
Activist understandings of crisis/crises are studied along the route of people arriving through Sweden to Finland. Interview data on activist narratives and ethnography in activist spaces is collected in Helsinki, which was the destination to majority of the arrived persons. In addition, media texts produced by activists (demonstration invitations; op-eds; blog texts etc.) will be collected from the research participants.
3) Anti-immigration mobilization in social media and countermedia (responsible researcher: Gwenaëlle Bauvois)
The third corpus consists of data collected in the Facebook groups of two Finnish anti-immigration groups founded in late 2015, Suomi Ensin and Rajat kiinni!, and from Finland’s largest countermedia outlet MV-lehti.
Collecting data on narratives that perform “the crisis” allows tracing back the extent to which strictly anti-immigration crisis frames are channeled into different mainstream outlets.