An Analysis of the Power and Politics of Turkish Cypriots Representation in the British News

Following historical and political events, the Turkish Cypriot community living in North Cyprus are unrecognised by the world, with economic, political and at times socio-cultural embargoes placed on them since 1974. In a somewhat subordinate position, the Turkish Cypriot’s find themselves with almost no international voice of representation, with their contested representation scarcely studied by social and cultural studies scholars. This study aims to fill this gap by investigating how the Turkish Cypriots are represented in the British press. Due to Britain’s role of guarantor within the Cyprus issue, and thus, a stakeholder in the fate of the Turkish Cypriot’s plight, it’s important to measure the perception of the British journalists towards the Turkish Cypriot community. Primarily, relying on the theoretical work of Edward Said’s ‘Orientalism’ and Robert J.C. Young’s ‘White Mythology’, Qualitative Content Analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis was performed upon 45 news articles with the Turkish Cypriots and the Cyprus issue as core subject, published across five British broadsheet newspapers between the dates of April 1999 and April 2004; a period of increased political activity for all involved in the Cyprus issue. Inspired by the concepts of ‘self’ and ‘other’ in relation to the Turkish Cypriots, results from the Qualitative Content Analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis provide evidence for the representation of the Turkish Cypriot’s as ‘others’, with orientalist narratives used in relation to the Turkish Cypriot people and the North Cyprus territory, framing derogatory images of this nation of people. An additional finding is the presence of White Mythology, where lack of background historic iv information and the use and constant repetition of particular words, such as ‘invasion’, ‘breakaway’ and ‘occupied’, establishes different understandings of historical events in relation to the Cyprus issue. Keywords: Critical Discourse Analysis, Qualitative Content Analysis, Cyprus Issue, Orientalism, Representation, Turkish Cypriots, White Mythology