Media Course work: The Times and The Daily Star’s Coverage of the Ian Huntley Conviction

For my Media coursework I have chosen to study and comp be The generation and The chance(a) steer. I purchased these covers on Thursday December 18th 2003. The baloney is covered on both front paginates and thus continues into the inside. It is or so Ian Huntley world found guilty of murdering Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells. Both newspapers have articles on how the parents felt, what happened in the trial and how the people of Soham feel.The multiplication is a broadsheet newspaper and is aimed at social groups A, B and C1. These social groups include Lawyers, doctors, accountants, teachers, nurses, police officers, clerical workers and people in other skilled jobs. The multiplication has a more extensive coverage and longer articles than the insouciant Star. The perfunctory Star aims at social groups C2, D and E. these are plumbers, mechanics, lorry drivers, postal workers, the unemployed and casual workers. It has a bolder layout and the articles are shorter than the Times.In the everyday Star it calls Ian Huntley Evil child sex fiend, sex beast and killer is caged at last. This shows open disgust most Ian Huntley and they are comparing his actions to that of a monster. The Daily Star storys on gossip, sex and what the celebrities are up to. The paper does not have a fixed political view and this comes across in the paper. The Times on the other hand is centrist and tries to be neutral and does not have a political side. It calls Ian Huntley Huntley instead of victimization vocabulary such(prenominal) as monster.On the front cover of the Daily Star it has a photograph of Maxine Carr kissing a seventeen-year-old boy the same night the girls were murdered. This is a human-interest tommyrot and is vaguely linked to the trial that found Ian Huntley guilty. The picture takes up nearly the whole of the first page and aims at grabbing the readers attention, as it is shocking to cheat on your partner in public. The idea behind this it that 100% of readers read the headline and see the photograph so if the paper can hold the readers attention then the paper might be purchased. In contrast The Times although it has a large colour photograph on the front there is still rather a bit of text surrounding it. The photograph is a picture of Ian Huntley that has been enlarged greatly to allow you to look into his eyes. The Times aims to make the front page instantly recognizable as that particular newspaper.The Times headline No Mercy, No Regret is taken from a speech made by the judge to tell the trial. It is a restrained headline and is more serious than the Daily Stars that is Kiss Of Death. The editor uses the headline Kiss of death as it is far more dramatic and has a more down market approach to the main story that happened that day. Kiss of Death is more dramatic and provokes shock and disgust among the readership. The Times headline is using someone elses opinion on Ian Huntley and is not as emotive as the Daily Stars headl ine.The Times uses only four photographs on the story where as the Daily Star uses nineteen photographs. This is because broadsheet newspapers like The Times are more serious, plainer and have a more restrained layout than tabloid newspapers like the Daily Star, which extend to have a bolder layout. By having more photographs the Daily Star can capture the readers attention and make it visually exciting. The Times has additional coverage of the story so photographs are not so vital as it is all explained in the text. The Daily Star has pictures of the tell and of Huntleys bedroom. This shows the reader how Ian Huntley tried to hide the evidence and what he was doing in police custody. The Times has pictures of floral tributes and just a few of Ian Huntley, Maxine Carr and the family.The Times has a menu on the first page this is called a puff or blurb. It advertises the content in the paper that might interest the reader. The Daily Star has a small puff but contradictory the Time s it does not summarise the content of the articles. The Daily Star uses quotations, for font Jesss Dad I want Huntley in coffin. This is dramatic and would appeal to the readers of the Daily Star who are after human feeling and not the facts of the trial. The Times has article involving New money-laundering regulations and More awards for The Times. So the articles inside are about political and financial matters.The Daily Star uses a fair amount of bold type for example on page cardinal under the drumhead of Huntley killed girls in frustrated frenzy that whole article is in bold type. In the article it uses language that will turn the reader into hating Ian Huntley. Here are some examples of this in the same article, they rejected his twisted advances and Ian Huntley murdered Holly and Jessica out of sexual frustration. The Times describes Ian Huntley as a violent sexual marauder. The Times only uses bold type on headlines, sub-heads and for the journalists names.Both papers use Journalese register. In The Times it uses words like blunders and booming voice of legal expert. The Daily Star use it more frequently like fiend cops and frenzy The Daily Star uses blunders just like The Times. These examples help the audience to rede the article more easily, because it is familiar language. The Times uses Journalese register that has a stronger degree of formality but it still uses words like blunder to exaggerate the story.The Daily Star uses repetition and alliteration quite often. For example FrustratedFrenzy and it has a rectangle with justice written in it along with a photograph of the two girls the day they went missing. The Times uses only a bit of repetition and that is in the main headline No Mercy, No Regret. This is probably because the editor of The Times does not feel that the readership of its paper needs to be told something twice as they have had a better education than the readers of The Daily Star. The Times demands a version age six yea rs older than the Daily Star.The Times uses a more sophisticated range of vocabulary for example persistent cruelty, open loathing, demonstrate some slither of humanity and allegations. This offers more description to the reader and makes the article more intriguing. The Daily Star uses vocabulary like groped, govern out and Monsters Lair this makes a powerful impression on the reader and facts are often exaggerated from the truth to sell papers.The Daily Star uses often more quotations that involve peoples opinions for example Our girls were in the wrong place at the wrong time. I dont think there is anymore to be said about him this is an extract from what the parents of the girls said to the press. The Times uses Experts views on the trial and that is mainly the judge. For example it was not just for those two families you have sought to destroy, your crimes are those for which the community fulfill.The Times gives an unbiased view but cleverly uses quotations that show what the paper thinks on the matter it is addressing. The Daily Star has a split devoted to what the paper itself thinks on the verdict. The Times ends the article about the parents of the murdered school girls, Holly and Jessica, by using a final quotation, Mr. Wells said that his family would now be outlet on holiday. We are going to take a short holiday break and gather our thoughts and focus on our son. Using this quotation here concludes the report by looking to the future and helps link the reader more closely to the story.The Daily Star uses single-sentenced paragraphs, which are highly characteristic for tabloid papers, simplify the logical argument and allow the reader to follow it with ease. For example He used to live with a girl of 15- and fathered her child. The Times on the other hand uses convoluted sentences in comparison. For example, But in searching the Police National Computer, Cambridgeshire police looked only for information about an Ian Nixon. Cambridgeshire also made inquiries with their counterparts in Humberside, but keep that they probably asked only two names. The Times puts probably in inverted commas to show that this is somebody elses term, and the journalist does not necessarily approve.Both newspapers convey as much information as they possibly can in the first paragraph. This is because it is estimated that around 70% of readers may read until the end of the first paragraph. Here is an example from the front page of The Times, Ian Huntley is today revealed as a violent sexual predator who should never have been given the job that brought him into contact with Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells. This first paragraph tells the reader who is involved and what happened. In the Daily Star And is a sentence conjunction and it is frequently used as paragraph connectives. Here is an example, And as he was led t o the cells the full horror of his perverted life was revealed for the first time.I conclude that although there are many dif ferences between The Times and The daily Star, The Times are moving towards including some of the tabloid papers features as it has more human-interest stories in it than ever before. The Times still has a plainer and more restrained layout than the Daily Star that uses colour and photographs to make it visually exciting and hold the readers attention. The editors of both papers try to cram as much information into the first paragraph and headline and few readers carry on reading until the end of the article. The Daily Star uses shorter paragraphs and lengths of articles to hold onto the readers attention and to make it simple large for the reader to understand. The Times gives a neutral approach to what is an emotive story that most people have very strong feeling about.