"Heja Sverige! Heia Norge!" : En kritisk diskursanalys av nationalism inom svensk och norsk sportjournalistik med fokus på bevakningen av Skid-VM i Falun 2015

The purpose of this essay, entitled ”Heja Sverige! Heia Norge”, was to study the difference in nationalistic tendencies between Swedish and Norwegian news coverage of the 2015 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships in Falun, Sweden, which took place between 18 February and 1 March 2015. It was the fourth time the event took place in Falun, previous games having been held in 1954, 1974 and 1993. I performed a critical discourse analysis of a total of twelve articles split over two race days – one where Swedish athletes outperformed Norwegian athletes and vice versa. I did this order to study if the news coverage in each of the two countries’ most promininent sports papers; Sportbladet in Sweden and VG Sport in Norway, was charaterized by a nationalistic discourse, as well as comparing the two to find similarities and differences between them. Having based my analysis on theories and previous research regarding media events, nationalism, national identities, ”us and them”, imagined communities et cetera, I came to the conclusion that a nationalistic discourse is, without a doubt, present in the news coverage – something very unique for sports journalism as a genre. The athletes are often referred to as ”Sweden” or ”Norway” instead of their names; national identities are hugely influential in almost every article; theories of nations and imagined communties are confirmed and present within the texts and the theories regarding ”us and them” – the metaforical warfare between the two main antagonists Sweden and Norway – are obvious in almost every single article. The difference between the countries’ respective coverage is subtle but noticable: every article in VG Sport is longer than Sportbladets’ version, and the Norwegian newspaper seem less keen on referring to the Swedish athletes as a force to be reckoned with, albeit with a feit exceptions. However, both newspapers are definitely characterized by a nationalistic discourse which fit well into my theoretical framwork as well as previous research within the field.