Cover not available
Article published In:
Pragmatics and Society
Vol. 14:5 (2023) ► pp.667–694

From evaluative authorities to involved narrators

Variation and change in first-person singulars used in the culture sections of six European newspapers from 1960 to 2010

ORCID logo | University of Helsinki
 | Tampere University
Is the use of the first-person singular becoming more prevalent in journalistic writing, like often claimed, and what is it used for? In order to tackle these questions, we analysed 11,775 articles published between 1960 and 2010 in the cultural sections of ABC and El País (Spain), Dagens Nyheter (Sweden), Helsingin Sanomat (Finland), Le Monde (France), and The Guardian (UK). Our analysis focuses on the variation and change in the frequency and functions of first-person singular pronoun and verb forms over time and between different newspapers. We provide a logistic regression analysis of the whole dataset, as well as a qualitative analysis of the 1,077 articles containing at least one first-person singular. The analyses reveal a considerable amount of variation in first-person singular usage between each newspaper. The findings, however, converge to reveal that the frequency of first-persons singulars increases over time while its narrative uses become predominant at the expense of the evaluative and epistemic ones.
Keywords: first-person singular, journalism, objectivity, pronouns, subjectivity
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1Journalism and the ideal of objectivity
    • 2.2First person singular, subjectivity and objectivity
  • 3.Research questions
  • 4.Data and methods
  • 5.Analysis
    • 5.1Quantitative analysis of the frequency of 1SG in the big dataset (N = 11,775)
    • 5.2Qualitative analysis of the functions of 1SG in the small dataset (N = 1,077)
      • 5.2.1Frequency of 1SG
      • 5.2.2Textual functions of 1SG subjects
  • 6.Discussion and concluding remarks
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
Published online: 3 April 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ps.20062.pos
References (40)
References
Argamon, Shlomo, Moshe Koppel, Jonathan Fine, and Anat Rachel Shimoni. 2003. “Gender, Genre, and Writing Style in Formal Written Texts”. Text 23(3): 321–346.Google Scholar
van Bogaert, Julie. 2011. “ I think and Other Complement-taking Mental Predicates: A Case of and for Constructional Grammaticalization”. Linguistics 49(2): 295–332. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1993. The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. London: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Cambridge Dictionary of English, [URL]. Accessed on April 8th, 2020.
Carroll, Noël. 2009. On Criticism. New York, N.Y.: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chang, Yu-Ying and John Swales. 1999. “Informal Elements in English Academic Writing”. In Chris Candlin and Ken Hyland (eds.), Texts, Processes and Practices, 145–167. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Chong, Phillipa. 2019. “Valuing Subjectivity in Journalism: Bias, Emotions, and Self-interest as Tools in Arts Reporting.” Journalism 20(3): 427–443. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Coward, Rosalind. 2013. Speaking Personally. The Rise of Subjective and Confessional Journalism. London: Palgrave. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fernández Rodríguez, Carlos J., Riie Heikkilä and Semi Purhonen. 2018. “¿Hacia una mayor apertura cultural? Un análisis de la cobertura de artículos sobre música en la prensa de referencia de cinco países europeos (1960–2010)”. Revista Internacional de Sociología 76 (2): e092.Google Scholar
Giddens, Anthony. 1991. Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Grijelmo, Alex. 1997. El estilo del periodista. Madrid: Taurus.Google Scholar
Hallin, Daniel C. and Paolo Mancini. 2004. Comparing media systems: Three models of media and politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heikkilä, Riie and Jukka Gronow. 2017. “Stability and change in the style and standards of European newspapers’ arts reviews, 1960–2010”. Journalism Practice 12(5): 624–639. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heikkilä, Riie, Tina Lauronen, and Semi Purhonen. 2017. “The Crisis of Cultural Journalism Revisited: The Space and Place of Culture in Quality European Newspapers from 1960 to 2010”. European Journal of Cultural Studies 21(6): 669–686. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heikkilä, Riie, Hazir Irmak Karademir and Semi Purhonen. 2020. “Live or recorded? Reassessing the ‘decline of the highbrow arts’ debate using European newspaper data, 1960– 2010”. Cultural Trends 9(3): 199–212. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hellman, Heikki, Leif Ove Larsen, Kristina Riegert, Andreas Widholm, and Silje Nygaard. 2017. “What is Cultural News Good For?” In Nete Nørgaard Kristensen and Kristina Riegert (eds.), Cultural Journalism in the Nordic Countries, 111–133. Gothenburg: Nordicom.Google Scholar
Huhtisaari, Pia. 2010. Gender and Culture in Newspaper Column Writing. A Quantitative Study of Male/Female and UK/US Differences in Pronoun Use. BA Thesis, Stockholm University.
Hyland, Ken. 2002. “Authority and Invisibility: Authorial Identity in Academic Writing”. Journal of Pragmatics 341: 1091–1112. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Jaakkola, Maarit, Heikki Hellman, Kari Koljonen and Jari Väliverronen. 2015. Liquid Modern Journalism with a Difference. Journalism Practice 9(6): 811–828. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Janssen, Susanne, Marc Verboord and Giselinde Kuipers. 2011. “Comparing Cultural Classification: High and Popular Arts in European and U. S. Elite Newspapers”. Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie 631: 139–168.Google Scholar
Kristensen, Nete Nørgaard. 2010. “Cultural Journalism in the Danish Printed Press: A History of Decline or Increasing Media Institutional Profiling?” Northern Lights 8(1): 69–92. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kristensen, Nete Nørgaard and Unni From. 2012. “Lifestyle Journalism: Blurring Boundaries.” Journalism Practice 6(1): 26–41. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Langacker, Ronald W. 2002. “Deixis and Subjectivity.” In Frank Brisard (ed.), Grounding: The Epistemic Footing of Deixis and Reference. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Matud, María Pilar, Carmen Rodríguez, and Inmaculada Espinosa. 2011. “Gender in Spanish Daily Newspapers.” Sex Roles 641: 253–264. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Muhlmann, Géraldine. 2008. A Political History of Journalism. London: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Mulcahy, Kevin V. 2003. “Comparing Cultural Patronage: Traditions and Trends.” In Valerie B. Morris and David B. Pankratz (eds). The Arts in a New Millennium: Research and the Arts Sector, 95–108. Westport, Conn.: Praeger.Google Scholar
Mullan, Kerry and Susanna Karlsson. 2012. “Subjectivity in Contrast: A Cross-Linguistic Comparison of ‘I think’ in Australian English, French and Swedish.” In Nicole Baumgarten, Inke Du Bois, and Juliane House (eds.), Subjectivity in Language and Discourse, 269–294. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Posio, Pekka. 2014. Subject expression in grammaticalizing constructions: The case of creo and acho ‘I think’ in Spanish and Portuguese. Journal of Pragmatics 631. 5–18. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Purhonen, Semi, Riie Heikkilä, Irmak Karademir Hazir, Tina Lauronen, Carlos Jesús Fernández Rodríguez, and Jukka Gronow, Jukka. 2019. “Enter Culture, Exit Arts? The Transformation of Cultural Hierarchies in European Newspaper Culture Sections, 1960–2010.” London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Purhonen, Semi, Riie Heikkilä and Irmak Karademir Hazir. 2017. “The grand opening? The transformation of the content of culture sections in European newspapers, 1960–2010”. Poetics: Journal of Empirical Research on Culture, the Media and the Arts 621: 29–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Riffe, Daniel, Charles F. Aust, and Stephen R. Lacy. 1993. “The Effectiveness of Random, Consecutive Day and Constructed Week Samples in Newspaper Content Analysis.” Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly 70(1): 133–139.Google Scholar
Ruotsalainen, Juho, Jaana Hujanen, and Mikko Villi. 2019. “A Future of Journalism Beyond the Objectivity–Dialogue divide? Hybridity in the News of Entrepreneurial Journalists.” Journalism 22(9): 2240–2258, DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schudson, Michael. 2001. “The Objectivity Norm in American Journalism.” Journalism 2(2): 149–170. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Säily, Tanja and Mark J. Hill. 2019. “Comparing Intellectual Poses: Public Authority, Actual and Represented”. Paper presented at Portraits and Poses: Representations of Female Intellectual Authority, Agency and Authorship in Early Modern and Enlightenment Europe . Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, 21–23 March 2019.
Starfield, Sue. 2015. “First Person Singular: Negotiating Identity in Academic Writing in English.” In Dwi Noverini Djenar, Ahmar Mahboob, and Ken Cruickshank (eds.), Language and Identity Across Modes of Communication, 138–143. New York: De Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Taylor, Helen and John Goodall. 2019. “A Preliminary Investigation into the Rhetorical Function of ‘I’ in Different Genres of Successful Business Student Academic Writing.” Journal of English for Academic Purposes 381: 135–145. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Thompson, Sandra and Anthony Mulac. 1991. “A Quantitative Perspective on the Grammaticalization of Epistemic Parentheticals in English.” In Elizabeth Closs Traugott, and Bernd Heine (eds.), Approaches to Grammaticalization, 313–339. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wahl-Jorgensen, Karin. 2013. “Subjectivity and Story-telling in Journalism.” Journalism Studies 14(3): 305–320. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Weibull, Lennar and Åsa Nilsson. 2010. “Four Decades of European Newspapers: Structure and Content.” In Jostein Gripsrud and Lennart Weibull (eds), Media, Markets & Public Spheres, 39–70. Bristol: Intellect.Google Scholar
Verboord, Marc. 2014. “The Impact of Peer-produced Criticism on Cultural Evaluation: A Multilevel Analysis of Discourse Employment in Online and Offline Film Reviews.” New Media & Society 16(6): 921–940. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (2)

Cited by two other publications

Larsen, Ingebjørg Sofie
2024. Getting emotional: Emotions and ‘journalistification’ in Norwegian music reviews, 1981–2022. Journalism DOI logo
Posio, Pekka, Sven Kachel & Gloria Uclés-Ramada
2024. Morphosyntactic stereotypes of speakers with different genders and sexual orientations: an experimental investigation. Linguistics DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 22 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.