Citizen Journalists as Interpretive Discourse Communities: A Study of AMH Voices in Zimbabwe (2014–2018)

ABSTRACT This study focuses on news discourses by citizen journalists at the citizen journalism and alternative media platform of AMH Voices in Zimbabwe between the years 2014–2018. Central to the study was an endeavour to demonstrate how the multidimensional crisis in Zimbabwe supported the emergence of citizen journalism and how citizen journalists constructed alternative political narratives and counterhegemonic discourses of the crisis on the platform. The theoretical point of departure is that of interpretive communities. Zelizer (1993. “Journalists as Interpretive Communities.” Critical Studies in Mass Communication 10 (3): 219–237) observes that journalists become an interpretive community when they are united through shared discourses and collective interpretations of key public events. The argument is that AMH Voices emerged as an interpretive community of citizen journalists bound by common counterhegemonic interpretations of the crisis. The methodological approach to data analysis was critical discourse analysis which allowed the researcher to investigate meanings, emerging themes and ideological bias of citizen journalism. The study established that citizen news discourses at AMH Voices were mostly framed in non-dominant perspectives using interpretive news writing styles to express alternative political narratives, challenge the status quo and advocate for radical political change. The interpretive writing style foregrounded the citizen journalists’ interpretations, opinions and emotions regarding the crisis.