Sinikka Aapola-Kari, Docent, University Lecturer, Dept. of Sociology, University of Helsinki

Cute, celebrated, comical? - Representations of Children and Young People in Media Portraits

In this paper, I shall be looking at representations of children and young people in the Finnish media. The data consists of 150 articles drawn from Finnish newspapers between 2003-05. It is mainly portrayals of children and youth (ages 7-24) who have been successful in the field of sports, the arts or education. The portraits are analyzed as a particular media genre, from a critical discourse analytical perspective. The focus is on cultural constructions of age, childhood, youth and gender.

While on surface the media portraits seem to celebrate the young interviewees, their age seems to invite a particular framing for the interview, with a humoristic tone-set as well as certain kinds of questions posed for them. All these together contribute in reproducing childhood and youth as ‘Others’ in relation to adulthood.