Contention between framing by media and framing through media

Abstract

Framing study is getting more popular among the communication scholars. researches have been conducted in examining the news framing from the outlook of framing by media rather than framing through media. The role of news sources as the external factor in frame-building process has thus far very much been neglected for its capacity of communication within communication. The scrutiny of sources - government, ruling political parties, education movement and interest groups, opposing political parties, general public, and editorial - for their predominant generic frames, is believed to have made significant contribution to the knowledge of framing study. An empirical examination on 2,374 units of analysis that drawn from five Malaysian Chinese dailies for the news coverage on the contemporary educational issue of teaching and learning of mathematics and science subjects in English in two different periods has proven the establishment of source's frames. For reason of their different positions in the issue, it has been ascertained that source's frames emerged by means of the favourable frame that prominently portrayed by various news sources, who act as the frame sponsors in building news stories.