NCRE Post-Graduate Seminars

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NCRE Post-Graduate Seminars

• Europe in the French Pacific Regions A
  Discourse Analysis of the Local Press'
  Construction of the European Union

Yoon Ah Choi (PhD Research Project)
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Map of the French OCTs
New Caledonia - Wallis/Futuna -
French Polynesia
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RESEARCH QUESTIONS
How is the EUs role in the Pacific represented
in the local newspapers of French Polynesia, New
Caledonia, Wallis and Futuna? Is France ready to
let go? Is there a visible construction of power
relations in the discourse? How does the EUs
initiatives and actions of the development plan
coincide with local objectives? What is the
local conception of the EU as a donor,
development, democracy, regionalism,
globalisation?
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Key Issues

• Development Programme (ACP aid- 9th EDF)
• Good governance (Cotonou Agreement)
• Political situation- Independence, regionalism
  and EU integration
• Economic stability and resources

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Theoretical Framework

• Post-Structuralism/Postmodernism

Meaning Reality Knowledge Identity Ideology Power
Foucault, Derrida Barthes, Bourdieu Habermas,
Adorno
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Methodological Framework

• Syntactic/semantic analysis
• Grammatical structure, transformations,
  functions, transitivity, agency
• Content Analysis
• Information structure
• Lexical Analysis
• Metaphors, Category labels

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Sources

• Corpus- Major local newspapers
• French Polynesia Tahitipresse,
• Les Nouvelles de Tahiti
• La Depeche de Tahiti
• New Caledonia Le Kanak
• Les Nouvelles Caledoniennes
• Libre Expression

Official documents Cotonou Agreement 9th EDF
Plan
Interviews Surveys
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Delimitations Variables

• Local press media
• Newspaper articles dating after the Cotonou
  Agreement
• 23rd June 2000
• Domestic focus

• Independent variable
• Development strategies, amount of aid
• Dependent variable
• Discursive structure of EU in the press
• Moderator variable
• Political situation
• Controlling variable
• Corpus of press articles
• Intervening variable
• Regional participation, Euro currency

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Novelty Importance
INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH
NON-EUROCENTRIC VIEW
GOOD TIMING
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Hypothesis/Assumptions
WILL UNCOVER

• Positive-negative evaluations
  of major issues
• Favourable position of the OCTs in regards to
  regionalism and EU integration
• Discursively constructed identities and
  relations, power hierarchy

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Merci beaucoup!

• Yoonah Choi
• email
• ych23_at_student.canterbury.ac.nz