The media has played a centripetal role in shaping public opinion and setting domestic and foreign affairs agendas. The Republic of Turkey is a ubiquitous factor in Greek historiography, nation...Show moreThe media has played a centripetal role in shaping public opinion and setting domestic and foreign affairs agendas. The Republic of Turkey is a ubiquitous factor in Greek historiography, nation-building processes, and foreign security policy. Throughout their unstable and fluctuating relations, the Greco – Turkish dyad has received copious media attention. In 2019 Turkey and Libya signed a maritime exclusive economic zone (EEZ) Memorandum of Understanding. Such a settlement allegedly balked the EU's planned project to enhance the EastMed pipeline and violated Greece's EEZ, consequently causing an intense media reaction throughout Greece. This thesis applies Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to the publications of Kathimerini and Ta Nea, Greece's most widely read daily newspapers. The analysis brings insight into the media's sociopolitical role, its position regarding the citizenry and the state, and Turkey's importance as an external agent that reinforces the Greeks' in-group cohesion. Considering Aristotelian topoi to approach CDA, the analysis indicates that the Greek media's narrative on the Turkey-Libya settlement frames (i) Turkey as a threatening 'other,' (ii) portrays Greece as the referent object, and (iii) rejects the validity of such a settlement under international law, reinforcing the previous two points.Show less
