The evolving (re)categorisations of refugees throughout the ‘Refugee/Migrant crisis’

The UK media’s reporting of events in 2015 contained constantly evolving categorisations of people attempting to reach Europe and the UK, each with different implications for their treatment. A discourse analysis of UK media outputs charts the development of the terminology used to present the ‘crisis’ and those people involved. First ‘Mediterranean migrant crisis’ was used to present those involved as ‘migrants’ to be prevented from reaching Europe. Next it became a ‘Calais Migrant crisis’ in which ‘migrants’ were constructed as a threat to UK security, and then the ‘European Migrant crisis’ an ongoing threat to Europe. Photographs of a drowned child led to a shift to a ‘refugee crisis’ in which ‘refugees’ were presented in a humane and sympathetic way. When terrorist attacks were linked with the ‘crisis’ ‘refugees’ reverted to ‘migrants’. Findings are discussed regarding the impact of categorisation on debates about the inclusion and exclusion of refugees.