Cancer patient narratives in the Finnish media
Karvinen, Susanna (2018)
Haaga-Helia ammattikorkeakoulu
2018
All rights reserved
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2018113019319
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2018113019319
Tiivistelmä
Every third Finn will develop cancer during their lifetime. Cancer therefore affects a great amount of people in Finland. Cancer topics are widely covered in the Finnish media and cancer patient narratives offer surfaces for patients and other people to reflect on their emotions and experiences about sickness.
The purpose of this study is to find out what kind of cancer patient narratives are constructed in Finnish mainstream media.
The study has two research questions. First, it aims to find out what are the dominant themes through which cancer patients are represented in the patient narratives of the chosen articles. Secondly, it looks at how the patients are represented in these narratives and how the patients themselves define their role and their relationship to their disease.
Theoretical framework of the study lies in health journalism and sociology of health. Health as well as narratives about cancer are seen as social constructions that vary from time and place. The focus of the study is in language which is not seen as just a tool to describe the reality we live in but rather as something that is producing it.
The research method is discourse analysis. The analysis was conducted for five articles in the Finnish mainstream media, including both newspapers and periodical magazines.
The results show that the cancer patients in the chosen articles were represented through multiple themes and discourses. They also defined their roles and relationship to their disease in multiple ways. The patients were mostly represented as active and capable individuals. They either had accepted the fact that they have to live with their disease or had hope that life will return to normal or even better than it was prior cancer.
Discourses found in the articles were the discourses of biomedical approach, acceptance, hope, fight, consoler, the need to hide the disease, downplaying of the disease, separating the disease from “normal” life and gratefulness.
The purpose of this study is to find out what kind of cancer patient narratives are constructed in Finnish mainstream media.
The study has two research questions. First, it aims to find out what are the dominant themes through which cancer patients are represented in the patient narratives of the chosen articles. Secondly, it looks at how the patients are represented in these narratives and how the patients themselves define their role and their relationship to their disease.
Theoretical framework of the study lies in health journalism and sociology of health. Health as well as narratives about cancer are seen as social constructions that vary from time and place. The focus of the study is in language which is not seen as just a tool to describe the reality we live in but rather as something that is producing it.
The research method is discourse analysis. The analysis was conducted for five articles in the Finnish mainstream media, including both newspapers and periodical magazines.
The results show that the cancer patients in the chosen articles were represented through multiple themes and discourses. They also defined their roles and relationship to their disease in multiple ways. The patients were mostly represented as active and capable individuals. They either had accepted the fact that they have to live with their disease or had hope that life will return to normal or even better than it was prior cancer.
Discourses found in the articles were the discourses of biomedical approach, acceptance, hope, fight, consoler, the need to hide the disease, downplaying of the disease, separating the disease from “normal” life and gratefulness.