In Transit: Representations of Migration on the Balkan Route. Discourse Analysis of Croatian and Serbian Public Broadcasters (RTS and HRT Online)

Abstract

This article investigates the representation of migration and migrants in Croatian and Serbian public broadcasters’ online portals during the “migrant crisis” in 2015/2016. The study shows that there are similarities in representations in the two portals at both the macro- and micro-linguistic levels. The migrants are generally represented in positive terms congruent with the official policies of Croatia and Serbia. However, this positive representation was frequently used for positive self-evaluation in contrast to negative evaluation of others – in this case, neighboring countries.