CHANGE OF REPORTING THE RAILWAY ACCIDENTS OVER THE TIME

The linguistic and design differences on railway accident news in The Times throughout the time
SUBJECT METHODOLOGY THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This poster basically aims to pursue the For this comparison it was chosen two As reporting has changed historically and become more and more
change of reporting news over the time. different railway accident news from The realistic in order to keep up with the times, journalists’ duties also
When one would look at the history of Times newspaper. One of them is from has changed and these affect each other when the point is come
reporting it is clear that insight of breaking 1877 and the other is from 1983. Those to alteration of news. For example, in his book Schudson
the news have changed, especially for some articles are retrieved from online website explains that in the past a reporter was also a printer, an editor, an
specific events. In order to penetrate this The Times Archive. There are some advertising agent. (Schudson, 1978) Breaking the news have an
change it was questioned that how categories that is created for comparison: effect on how reporter write or lay out because at that time
journalistic and editorial elements have been informal or formal language, headlines reporter had to do all the work himself. However this changed
transformed in a newspaper historically. In and text font, text length, pictures, layout when distribution and professionalism began as we see in this
this poster, those elements are looked into on of the page. According to those poster’s newspaper examples. Other thing that affect design and
railway accident news from two different categories these two news are analyzed. language directly or indirectly is techonology and technological
time in The Times newspaper. developments such as telegraph, satellite, advanced printing or
radio. These are also effective for journalistic practises. (Birkner,
Koenen and Schwarzenegger, 2018)
Two different news from two different times are distinguished as
short text and long text because sometimes even length of news
changes the elements in the news. For instance, Høyer and
Pöttker explained in their work in 2005 that in short texts most
important thing is at the begining but as the text is short the
ending shall be even important too but this is also is about
inverted pyramid which one of the newspaper here is also
structured from that type. (Høyer and Pöttker, 2005).

1877 1983
Not Fully Semi-Informative
Informative & Intense
Headline Headline
1877 Railway Accident 1983 Railway Accident
Grid Column Visual Effects
RESULTS
Structure
The news from 1877 has a very simple and direct headline: Railway Accident. There is no Semi-Formal Formal
picture for it. Only a bigger headline and the text which is in the bottom of the column among
other railway news. In the text it was mentioned who owned railway companies, how it Story-Like Inverted Pyramid
happened and about the times which trains should normally be. The text has many adjectives but
it looks formal. Main notable point is that reporter do not give any detail about people if they are Narrative & Objective
died or injured but shortly mentioned it. The Times in 19th century is more like a notice board
with columns and without any pictures. However column grid have a purpose to make it
readable. Otherwise if the text were written straightly it would occupy bigger place.
The news from 1983 has a conspicuous headline: Irish train disaster on fail-safe system. It has Technique Daily Language
subtitle. Headline has much more bigger fonts and bolder than the text but again this headline
also do not give whole event is not fully informative but it is more dramatic and intriguing that
Jargon
the first example. For this kind tragic events headlines normally presented informatively and not Name of the Name of the
try to catch the feelings. (Busa, 2013) This headline has function of attracting the reader
(Bednarek & Caple, 2012). There is a picture, a visual element, which is bigger that the text Reporter Reporter
and therefore attracts the reader. In the text it was mentioned objectively about the event, people
who injured or dead, how it happened. However this news main point is that an investigation REFERENCES
began which inquiries how and why this accident happened. Linguistic features are quite formal
and understandable but it can be said that the language is less conventional if you look at 1877’s Bednarek, M., & Caple, H. (2012). News discourse (Vol. 46). A&C Black.
Busa, M.G. (2013). Introducing the Language of the News: A Student's Guide (1st ed.). Routledge.
news because of the words. Each reporter were interested in different points. One of them is
Høyer, S., & Pöttker, H. (2005). Diffusion of the news paradigm 1850-2000. Göteborg: Nordicom.
interested in technical side and ownership and the other is interested in investigation the event Schudson, M. (1978). Discovering the news: A social history of American newspapers. New York:
and why that particular system had failed people. Finally, even if they are the same newspaper, Basic Books.
Thomas Birkner, Erik Koenen & Christian Schwarzenegger (2018) A Century of Journalism
there is a big difference of how reporters break the news linguistically. Not only their style but History as Challenge, Digital Journalism, 6:9, 1121-1135, DOI: 10.1080/21670811.2018.1514271
also the newspaper’s design have transformed. The Times (1877, February,28) Railway Accident https://www.thetimes.co.uk/archive/article/1877-
02-28/10/8.html?region=global#start%3D1785-01-01%26end%3D1985-01-
01%26terms%3DAccident%26back%3D/tto/archive/find/Accident/w:1785-01-01%7E1985-01-
01/1%26prev%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/Accident/w:1785-01-01%7E1985-01-
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Onur Yilmaz
The Times (1983, August 23) Irish train disaster on fail-safe system
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/archive/article/1983-08-23/1/3.html?region=global#start%3D1983-01-
Erasmust Student in
01%26end%3D1983-11-
Communication Sciences of
01%26terms%3Drailway%20accident%26back%3D/tto/archive/find/railway+accident/w:1983-01-
Bamberg University
01%7E1983-11-01/1%26prev%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/railway+accident/w:1983-01-
01%7E1983-11-01/2%26next%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/railway+accident/w:1983-01-
onur.yilmaz@stud.uni-
RESEARCH POSTER PRESENTATION DESIGN © 2019
01%7E1983-11-01/4
bamberg.de
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