Research centre
Communication and Computing Research Centre

Date
2012 - current

Research Degree Project

My research project concerns political communication and will investigate the relationship between young people and political news on TV and print media online. This research investigates the political discourse across Kurdish media and how young people understand and respond to this discourse, in particular relating to corruption, reforms, government performance and the citizens’ trust.

My research investigates how Kurdish media address political issues in relation to corruption, reform, government performance, and citizens' trust. Alongside this, the research seeks to understand the differences and similarities between the ruling TV and the opposition TV and the print media of the ruling parties, opposition parties and the independent media in the coverage of the identified political issues. This research investigates how young people understand and respond to the political issues to explore the role of the media in shaping the political attitudes of young people towards the aforementioned political issues. In addition, this research will explore to what extent the demographic characteristics and political backgrounds of young people affect their understanding and their responses to political news in particular relating to the four identified political issues.

From the above objectives it can be understood how important the media is in shaping the political process and democratisation in Kurdistan, particularly among the opposition parties which have grown rapidly especially the Gorran Movement Party. It can be argued that Gorran relies on its media platforms to explain its aims of focusing on the fight against corruption and making reforms through changing the system, while the others parties depend to a greater extent on the partisan organisational offices. In other words, the media has become a main platform in political communication, due to the other parties being forced to use their media to send out their political discourse, both during the election campaigns as well as in the everyday context.

Young people comprise the majority who are influenced by Gorran, and at the same time young people make up the largest part of Kurdish society. Consequently, this research seeks not only to evaluate the role of the Kurdish media in shaping the political attitudes of young people, but also to evaluate the Kurdish media in terms of its coverage of the political issues and how young people see the role of media in the political process and democratisation.

Project Supervisors

• Rinella Cere (Director of Study)
• Ruth Deller  (Second Supervisor)

Researchers involved

Ahmed Omar Bali - Research Degree Student