How newspapers portray suburbs: A paradox

Urban professionals are critical of the suburbs, but most North Americans live there. Research has suggested that a critical view of the suburbs also pervades entertainment media, but no systematic study has been undertaken to determine whether the same is true of news media. The research reported here is based on a systematic analysis of the content and tone of reportage and commentary about the suburbs in a leading local newspaper in both Toronto and Hamilton, Ontario, from 1990 to 2015. The major paradoxical finding is that although in this period most newspaper readers lived in the suburbs, coverage was predominantly and consistently negative in both cities. In Toronto, this was true for both the poorer inner and the more affluent outer suburban rings. Various explanations of the paradox are discussed. Future research should compare, for specific cities, coverage of both the inner city and the suburbs.