REPRESENTING POWER AND IDEOLOGY IN TIKTOK NEWS HEADLINES: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF RADAR BANDUNG AND RADAR CIANJUR

Abstrak

This study investigated how digital news media constructed events, social actors, power relations, and ideology through linguistic representation in news headlines. The study aimed to identify the representation strategies employed by both media outlets and examine how linguistic choices contributed to the construction of meaning in digital news discourse. This research used a qualitative method with applied Critical Discourse Analysis using Fairclough’s three-dimensional framework and Van Leeuwen’s theory of social actor representation. The data were obtained from 17 pairs of headlines published on the official TikTok accounts of Radar Bandung and Radar Cianjur. The findings revealed that Radar Bandung tended to employ active, explicit, and informative structures that clearly represented actors and responsibilities, whereas Radar Cianjur frequently used passive constructions, evaluative expressions, and impact-oriented representations emphasizing emotional engagement and audience attraction. The study also showed that linguistic choices shaped the representation of accountability, authority, and social relations within discourse. The findings indicated that digital news headlines were not neutral texts but discursive constructions that actively shaped public perception and social reality through language and representation strategies. Future researchers are encouraged to examine larger datasets and different digital media platforms to gain a broader understanding of representation strategies in contemporary news discourse.