Two realities of one revolution: coverage of mass protests of 2011 in state-run and independent Belarusian media

This study examines the way the Revolution through Social Networks (the series of mass protests organized with the help of social media in Belarus in 2011) was covered in Belarusian press. After the overview of the news representation and ideology concepts, it looks at the difference in the nature of discourse on the Revolution through Social Networks in major Belarusian state-run and independent newspapers. Then it addresses the question of the diversity of voices presented in the articles. A total of 72 news stories from four Belarusian newspapers were examined with the help of discourse analysis methods. The study revealed that state-run and independent Belarusian media constructed two distinct realities of the event and their representations were often in contradiction with each other. The state-run newspapers covered the event occasionally and explicitly favoured pro-government perspective. They never allowed the participants of the rally to speak on their pages and represented them as a detached and dangerous group of people. In their articles, anti-oppositional and anti-revolutionary ideological standpoints were disseminated and the image of stability in the country was supported. Independent media covered the event more systematically, presented diverse voices, and discussed different aspects of the mass protests. They made attempts to evaluate the phenomenon, and attached to it a significant importance. At the same time, the use of the frames of the authoritarian regime, idealized representation of protesters as well as appealing to emotions could have influenced the reporting in the independent media