From media to hypermedia: Journalistic representations of Rohingya refugees and humanitarian communication

Abstract

The paper is a comparative analysis of two media artifacts from Reuters engaging with the ongoing Rohingya refugee crisis. One artifact are the ‘traditional’ images that won the Pulitzer Prize in 2018; the second is a special report utilising several aspects of new media. Locating the artifacts within humanitarian journalism, the analysis seeks to understand whether emergent media has pronounced gains over traditional media. The study argues that moral connections through technology are not a given and that such relationships between the spectators and subjects of humanitarian communication artifacts must be continually worked on and improved upon through a vigilant media ethics. The paper hopes to contribute to knowledge about new media’s intersections with journalistic refugee representations and to the broad field imaginary of humanitarian communication.