Dehumanization of Palestinians in the press

Britain vs. Ireland

Most studies of dehumanising language focus on anecdotal examples of blatant dehumanisation. We develop a theoretically guided lexicon of dehumanising words that permits a more systematic analysis of subtler dehumanising rhetoric. We find more dehumanising language associated with Palestinians than is present in discussions of people in general as well as Israelis, confirming an anti-Palestinian bias. Contrary to expectations, British newspapers are not more likely to dehumanise Palestinians than are Irish newspapers. On the other hand, tabloids and regional newspapers use more dehumanising language than do national broadsheets

Die or be killed?

One key dimension of verbal dehumanization is denial of agency: language that suggests things just happen to an individual or group, commonly by using passive and intransitive verb phrases. While such phrases occur regularly in normal language, we show that they are systematically more prevalent in the U.S. media’s discussion of Palestinians than in its coverage of Israelis. Among others, Palestinians are described as simply “dying” (as opposed to “being killed”) with a measurably higher frequency than are Israelis.