Aljazeera TV’s role in shaping Arab political awareness (the Egyptian revolution 25 Jan – 11 Feb 2011)

This thesis investigates Aljazeera TV’s role in shaping Arab political awareness during the 18 days of the Egyptian Revolution, from 25 January to February 11, 2011. Situated within media impact studies based on news content analysis, the research is an ethnographic research on Aljazeera with thematic analysis of its news content during the Revolution. The study aims to understand the channel’s role between covering the events on the one hand, and participating in the event on the other hand. The study explores how the channel employed its staff and media discourse to play its role in the political change. The research focuses on the emotions in journalism, arguing that Aljazeera, by satisfying the audience’s cognitive and emotional needs, was able to gain their trust over a long period of time, which enabled it to influence the shaping of their political awareness.

Based on the aims of the study, I employ semi-structured interviews and archive analysis to produce an intimate narrative analytical account of the channel’s coverage of the Egyptian Revolution in a notable and important level of detail. The study primarily focuses on the themes and impact of Aljazeera’s main news bulletin, news reports and political commentary of the Arab thinker Azmi Bishara during the Revolution through an analysis of the archive. To understand how the channel produced its coverage of the Revolution, the study depends on semi-structured interviews with Aljazeera staff who produced the coverage.

The analysis shows how Aljazeera overcame the Egyptian authorities’ measures against it and broadcast all that the regime’s media ignored and denied during the Egyptian Revolution. Aljazeera employs the themes and visual elements of its news content in favour of the revolutionaries, which contradicted the objective journalism principles, and contributed to the benefit of the Revolution by encouraging, alerting and guiding the revolutionaries.

The results of this research illustrate that satisfying Arab audience's needs for knowledge and collective values enhances Arab television media’s ability to influence the audience's attitudes. Aljazeera, by employing its financial capabilities, network of correspondents and dealing with news in a different approach from what Arab media used to adopt, satisfies Arab viewers’ needs for knowledge and collective values. This role, regardless of hidden agendas, would increase in awareness that enables people to monitor regimes, challenge it, and eventually move to demand their rights through revolutions.