The language of suffering.
What is it about?
This study adopts a multidisciplinary approach to investigate public discourses on the MH17 tragedy in Malaysia and the UK. First, corpus-based discourse analysis was employed to explore the construction of the Malaysia Airlines tragedy MH17 in four selected Malaysian and British newspapers. In addition, an attitudinal study examining 50 Malaysian and 50 UK nationals’ perceptions of the tragedy was conducted.
Why is it important?
Air transport is one of the world’s most important industries and offers important social benefits by providing the only transportation means in remote areas. In 2017, commercial airlines carried nearly four billion passengers, equivalent to half the world’s population (Statista, 2018). Thus, the investigation of aircraft accidents is important since it helps to understand human suffering in relation to the world’s most important transportation.