Towards a typology of mediated anger: Routine coverage of protest and political emotion

This paper establishes the importance of studying mediated anger. It first develops a typology of mediated anger, suggesting it is performative, discursively constructed, collective and political. It applies this typology to routine coverage of anger in UK protest coverage during a two-month time period in 2015. The analysis demonstrates that anger serves as a cause of engagement and a barometer of public feeling. It sets out a spectrum of discursive constructions of mediated anger. At one end sits rational and legitimate anger, which forms the basis for social change. Along the spectrum sits aggressive and/or disruptive anger motivated by rational and legitimate concerns. At the other end of the spectrum lies illegitimate and irrational anger.