Reporting on Racial Violence: A Content Analysis of Local & National Coverage of Jacksonville, Florida’s Dollar General Shooting

This study investigates how local and national news media outlets — particularly the Associated Press, CNN, the Florida Times-Union, and News4Jax — presented the “Dollar General Shooting” in Jacksonville, Florida on and after August 26, 2023. Far-reaching expectations for journalists call for “objective” observation and reporting, an ideal that is nearly impossible given that collective and individual experience inform perceptions and understandings. Nonetheless, the original definition of objectivity — as described by Kovach and Rosenstiel (2014, p. 10) — outlined a transparent approach to evidence, a process to remove personal bias from reporting, with the goal of a stronger journalistic product. This research analyzes how media bias shapes societal views on race. Focusing on two prominent national and two local outlets, this research provides a comprehensive understanding of how different news media, one embedded in the impacted community and one not, tackle a particular race-related event. This research makes a unique contribution to the field because it compares local and national coverage of race-related stories and suggests contextualization as an important part of ethical and ‘objective’ reporting. Additionally, it contributes to conversations about how news media reporting, specifically language surrounding race, has changed throughout time.