(De)constructing peace
A multi-methods project on peace discourses on the Russo-Ukrainian war
Contact: David Ongenaert, Postdoctoral Researcher, david.ongenaert@fsv.cuni.cz
Dr. David Ongenaert obtained a JUNIOR Fund Postdoc Grant in 2024 for his research project “(De)constructing peace. A multi-methods and multi-stakeholder project on mediated peace discourses on the Russian-Ukrainian war”. The ongoing Russian-Ukrainian war has ignited intense discursive struggles across different media platforms. However, mediated peace discourses and particularly the involved production processes and audience receptions have barely been researched, even though they can substantially shape media, public, political and corporate agendas, interests and support.
Structural research into mediated peace discourses is necessary and arguably particularly relevant for the Russian-Ukrainian war. Under supervision of Prof. dr. Nico Carpentier, David therefore examines how various key stakeholders (i.e., news agencies, journalists, citizens and refugees) (de)construct and (re-)imagine mediated peace discourses on the Russian-Ukrainian war. The project adopts a start-to-end (i.e., production, text and reception) and comparative multi-method perspective.
Czech Republic
Ongoing Project
Mediated peace discourses, political communication, news production, media witnessing, forcibly displaced people, participatory methods
Objectives
01
First, drawing on and contributing to Carpentier and KejanlıoÄŸlu’s (2020) model of war and peace discourses, I will examine which peace discourses key Russian and Ukrainian news agencies construct in their news releases. These form important news sources on the Russian-Ukrainian war and can thus influence mediated peace discourses. I will apply a discourse-theoretical analysis (Carpentier, 2010, 2017) on their English news releases during diverse so-called ‘critical discourse moments’.
02
Second, through expert interviews, I will reconstruct how Czech journalists construct peace discourses in their news production processes on the Russian-Ukrainian war, as news coverage constitutes the main information source on ‘distant suffering’. Relying on and contributing to Shoemaker and Reese’s (2014) Hierarchy of Influences model, I will investigate the underlying reasons, including the role of news releases.
03
Finally, I will examine through 16 focus groups involving active co-creation and visual ethnography (Pink 2014) how Czech citizens and Czech Republic-based Ukrainian refugees interpret, give meaning to and (re-)imagine mediated peace discourses on the Russian-Ukrainian war. Adopting a non-media-centric approach and building on ‘media witnessing’ (Kyriakidou, 2015), I will investigate if and how they connect this to broader societal issues.
RESEARCH PROJECT BY:
David Ongenaert (Postdoctoral researcher, Culture and Communication Research Centre [CULCORC], Charles University)
Nico Carpentier (Supervisor, Culture and Communication Research Centre [CULCORC], Charles University)