Media Event, Racial Ramblings, or Both? An Analysis of Media Coverage of the Tamworth Council Sudanese Refugees Resettlement Case (2006)

This article presents our analysis of Australian media reporting ofthe 2006 Tamworth City Council’s decision to refuse the resettlement of five Sudanesefamilies in Tamworth (NSW) and subsequent reversal, supposedly due to the pressurebrought to bear on the council as a result of the media “hype.” The question at the coreof our analyses is as follows: Did the media play a role in the over-(re)presentation ofthis case as racist or was it just a case of the media reporting racism? Informed bymedia framing theory, we examine print media reports for patterns of presentation aswell as representations of both the council and the refugees who were the focus of thereporting. We conclude that while the media played a significant role in making visiblea case built on racial stereotypes, their reporting also contained racializing andpaternalistic stereotyping that contribute to the reproduction of both everyday andsystemic racism