Visual Representations of Refugees in German Media 2010 - 2020

The research project “Visual Representations of Refugees in German Media 2010-2020” examines photographs of refugees shared by three major German newspapers and magazines (Der Spiegel, Frankfurter-Allgemeine Zeitung, and taz.de) over the past decade presented in the form of a bilingual multimedia website. In the research project 21 photographs, both the positive and negative visual representations of refugees, across major German news organizations with varying political biases, are analyzed to demonstrate the need for a standard of practice with regards to content creation and photograph selection. Additionally, the project aims to encourage journalists and editors to use of first-person content and storytelling in stories and visuals published in the media, as is made possible by the increased availability of mobile phones or disposable cameras, as well as commissioned and targeted photo assignments completed by ethical photojournalists, in place of photographs supplied by news agencies such as the Deutsche Presse Agentur (dpa) (German Press Agency) or the Associated Press (AP).

The question of migration and the integration of immigrants into German culture is of particular interest again in contemporary cultural and political spheres, as a total of around 1.7 million asylum-seekers were living in Germany at the end of 2018 (Gaul et al) and, according to the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (Federal Agency for Civic Education), 20.8 million (25.5% of the total population) people with a Migrationshintergrund (migration background)  were living in Germany in 2018, of which 9.9 million (12.1%) were Ausländer (foreigners) and 10.9 million (13.3%) Germans with a migration background (“Bevölkerung mit Migrationshintergrund”). The famous statement by Chancellor Merkel “Wir schaffen das” (We can do it) in view of the refugee crisis in 2015 brought the controversial issues of a German Willkommenskultur (culture of welcome) and the integration of foreigners into German culture back into today’s debate (“Sommerpressekonferenz von Bundeskanzlerin Merkel”). 

The period of analysis, 2010-2020, while broad, is dynamic and curious in relation to the events within the timeframe, specifically the 2015 European Refugee Crisis. Although for the purposes of this research the photographs offer a balanced selection across the years, in completing the initial search for photographs I noticed the great and relatively sudden increase in the number of visual representations of refugees in the media at the beginning of 2015.