Analysing News and Treatment values in news stories- The Guardian

Example one- The Guardian

This is an example of hard news, its shows the harsh reality of the story and does not have a soft aproach. It gives details of a brutal attack and murder of a military soilder.
The story has immedicay as it has been published today within the hour showing that it has happened in very recently and it breaking news. The news story is easily understandable by the audience as the audience understands that terrorism and murder is, sadly, part of the culture in England and something that happens regularly. As well as this

News and Treatment values

News and treatment values are important concepts when thinking about what to include in the news. Every news story is effected by both news and treatmeant values. These concepts are important in the news and shape the stories that are broadcasted.  News values, identified by Galtung and Ruge-include:

• Immediacy- The story is judged by when the event happened (Has it happened recently if not the same day?) and if it is breaking news.
• Familiarity- A story that will be immediately understood by the home nations audience- reflecting its culture, calender, customs and habits.
• Amplitude- How 'big' the story is. The story involves and effects a large number of people to warrant its inclusion in the news.
• Frequency- The even is a regular happening- an event that crops up almost every year.
• Predictable- Stories that are far from being new. Some news is easy to predict for example: things that happen every year (Calender events e.g remembrance day) occasions when important speeches are made. Another aspect of the predictability of the news is the fact that many stories and events are floated long in advance to those in the news so that they can 'get it in the diary'. Public relations are behind a lot of news stories and clearly the timing of these stories is carefully scheduled in advanced.
• Surprise- Stories that are unexpected and unpredicted, contain scandal or sudden hardship to community.
• Continuity- If the story links to a theme that has already been defined as news featuring in newspapers and TV bulletins- then it may well make the news itself.
• Elite nations and elite people- Stories about famous, rich, powerful people and countries often dominate the news schedules.
• Personalisation- A key way of making stoires about big topics seem more understandable or relevent  is to feature a single person or a few people affexted by the event. This gives the story a human face and creates what's known as 'human interest'.
• Conflict- Drama, Without people, communities or even countries at loggerheads, newspapers and news bulletins would have very little to cover. politics is all about managing scarce resorces, deciding how to share them out, so this element is key part of all storiesabout government policies.
• Negativity- Bad news.
• Balance- According to broadcasting standards, there is an obligation on TV news programmes to be as fair as possible, offering bith sides in a conflict a voice. At the same time, this quality may be supplied by varying the contnts of the programme overall so that difficult stories are offset by lighter ones

Treatment values refared to what is valued about the 'treatment' of the message in the story and how stories are handled. Some treatments are prefared over others. Paticular storied that lend themselves to particular types of treatment are valued over others. These treatmeant values, identified by Burton, include:

• Visuals- Stories that offer interesting images (stories with images)
• Drama- Stories that lend themselves to dramatisation (Where recognisable sterotypes/ binary oppositions are involved)
• Saga- On going stories that unfolds into sagas
• Conflict- Conflict is valued
• Human interest- Stories with a human interest angle.
• Actuality- Actuality is valued, actually being there on the spot- even if nothing is happening.