Indigeneity matters: Portrayal of women offenders in New Zealand newspapers

Abstract

A growing body of research investigates women’s experiences within New Zealand’s criminal justice system, and several studies have addressed the misrepresentation of crime’s reality in news media. However, the discriminatory depiction of Indigenous women offenders in New Zealand’s press has yet to receive scholarly attention. Indigeneity and gender are both critical factors because Māori women constitute the fastest growing segment of New Zealand’s prison population, and media discourses help shape public consent to penal policies. To address this research gap, New Zealand newspaper articles featuring women offenders were collected over a 2-year period (2016–2018) and analysed for their use of neutralization and exacerbation techniques. The findings reveal that New Zealand newspapers distort our understanding of who is most affected by the criminal justice system and what crimes Pākehā1 and Māori women typically commit. Most importantly, stories about Pākehā women were more likely to use a favourable tone (56.5%), while stories about Māori women were more likely to take on an unfavourable tone (83.3%). Finally, motherhood, as an additional exacerbating factor, was mentioned nearly twice as often for Māori women. This article adds to the body of knowledge on the portrayal of Māori people in the media, linking it to public consent to governmental policies.

Adli Alanda Kadın Suçluluğunun Görünürlüğü Üzerine Eleştirel Bir Bakış

“…Kadın suçluluğu "Kocasını Öldüren Kadın" gibi ifadelere veya annelik üzerinden söylemlere yer verilerek aktarılmaya çalışılmaktadır. Suç işleyen kadınların anne olma özelliklerine yer verilmesi ile kadınların toplumsal cinsiyet rollerine uygun davranmadıkları vurgulanmaktadır (Deckert, 2019;Kural, 2019). Bu durumda Koçak 615 kadınların işledikleri suçtan dolayı ceza almadan önce de toplum tarafından farklı şekilde yargılandıkları söylenebilir.…”

Prison and Community Penalties

“…This stigma can be intensified by racism. Deckert's (2020) analysis of news media portrayals of criminalised women in New Zealand found negative portrayals of Maori women were compounded by more frequently mentioning they were mothers than in stories about Pakeha (white) women. 'Prisoner' is a master status so powerful it overrides other aspects of identity, including motherhood (Haney, 2013).…”

“…In New Zealand, Maori men form over half of the sentenced male prison population but only 15% of the general population (McIntosh & Workman, 2017). As a group, Maori women had the fastest growing incarceration rate in New Zealand in the 2010s (Deckert, 2020). Indigenous women constitute 34% of the Australian women's prison population but make up 2% of the general population (Baldry & Cunneen, 2014).…”

Police Ten 7 feeds racial stereotypes of Māori and Pacific peoples in Aotearoa New Zealand

“…In Aotearoa New Zealand, research has conclusively demonstrated that negative portrayals of Māori and Pacific are prominent in discourses on health (Hodgetts, Masters, & Robertson, 2004;H. Moewaka Barnes & McCreanor, 2019;Rankine & McCreanor, 2004), politics (Galy-Badenas, Gray, & Cassidy;McConville, Wetherell, McCreanor, & Barnes, 2014), and crime (Barnes, Taiapa, Borell, & McCreanor, 2013;Deckert, 2020;Maydell, 2018;McCreanor et al, 2014;Meek, 2013). However, to our knowledge, only one study has analysed the content of reality-crime shows (Podvoiskis, 2012).…”