Virtual athlete or ultimate nerd? A framing analysis of eSports in Flemish printed media

Abstract: Despite the rapid and global increase in popularity and media focus of eSports, many issues remain, not least in terms of how the media portray eSports (players). Considering Flanders (Belgium) has been relatively slow to follow this global uptake, this article adopts an inductive framing approach to analyze exhaustively how eSports are portrayed in 103 Flemish newspaper and magazine articles. Results indicate eSports were represented via eight frames spread across the categories ‘game/industry’ and ‘players’. On the one hand, the Flemish printed media legitimize eSports via comparis... Mehr ...