This thesis analyses socio-discursive representations of migrants in the French and Italian press by comparing two major discursive moments: the 2015 European “migration crisis”, primarily associated with people from the Middle East, particularly Syria, and the displacement caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. More specifically, it examines the terms used to name these people (*migrant* and *réfugié* in French; *migrante*, *rifugiato* and *profugo* in Italian) to determine how their meanings are constructed in discourse and how they contribute to differentiated framings of human mobility. Theoretically and methodologically, this research lies at the intersection of discourse analysis and corpus linguistics, two disciplines within the digital humanities. Naming is understood here as an anthropological act of meaning-making in discourse. To this end, the study draws on the notion of the lexico-discursive profile, which makes it possible to describe the preferential properties that a lexical unit acquires through contact with its semantic, syntactic, textual, enunciative and interdiscursive environments. The methodological framework is based on four press corpora (FR_2015, IT_2015, FR_2022, IT_2022), compiled according to linguistic-cultural and temporal variables. It adopts a mixed-methods approach combining a lexicographic and terminographic analysis of the naming terms, quantitative exploration using IRaMuTeQ and Sketch Engine, and qualitative interpretation of the discursive configurations identified. Combining specificity and factorial analyses with the study of keywords, collocations and grammatical relations, alongside close reading of the source texts, makes it possible to identify regularities without separating linguistic forms from their conditions of production. The findings show that the terms examined are neither equivalent nor stable. *Migrant* and *migrante* are preferentially associated with border crossings, arrivals by sea, control measures and security-oriented framings. Given their dual nature as terms that confer a legal status and as words circulating in general language, where they lose their binding legal force, *réfugié* and *rifugiato* tend instead to activate semantic features associated with forced flight, vulnerability and the need for protection. *Profugo* occupies an intermediate position, centred on the experience of exile and uprooting, but can also be incorporated into categorisation practices that distinguish between “genuine” and “bogus” exiles. The diachronic comparison reveals distinct trends. In 2015, a shift in framing occurred between the beginning of the year, when Syrian migrants were often treated as a public problem to be managed, and the period from September onwards, when, following debates and events that profoundly affected public opinion, they were increasingly referred to as *réfugiés* or *profughi* and thus humanised. In 2022, Ukrainians were described as *réfugiés* or *profughi* from the outset of the war and placed within a humanitarian framing grounded in solidarity. Differences between the French and Italian corpora do not obscure a shared tendency to construct hierarchies of migrant figures according to their origins, the causes attributed to their displacement, their presumed proximity to host societies and their degree of legitimacy. This research thus confirms the central role of the media in co-constructing socio-discursive representations of contested categories and their referents. It identifies distinct profiles for each of the naming terms analysed and therefore calls for sustained critical attention to widely disseminated discourses on migration and their potentially harmful effects on how the people concerned are perceived and recognised as legitimate.
La construction socio-discursive des réfugiés ukrainiens et syriens : une analyse outillée et contrastive des représentations médiatiques italiennes et françaises
VERCELLI, ELENA MARGHERITA
2026-11-13
Abstract
This thesis analyses socio-discursive representations of migrants in the French and Italian press by comparing two major discursive moments: the 2015 European “migration crisis”, primarily associated with people from the Middle East, particularly Syria, and the displacement caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. More specifically, it examines the terms used to name these people (*migrant* and *réfugié* in French; *migrante*, *rifugiato* and *profugo* in Italian) to determine how their meanings are constructed in discourse and how they contribute to differentiated framings of human mobility. Theoretically and methodologically, this research lies at the intersection of discourse analysis and corpus linguistics, two disciplines within the digital humanities. Naming is understood here as an anthropological act of meaning-making in discourse. To this end, the study draws on the notion of the lexico-discursive profile, which makes it possible to describe the preferential properties that a lexical unit acquires through contact with its semantic, syntactic, textual, enunciative and interdiscursive environments. The methodological framework is based on four press corpora (FR_2015, IT_2015, FR_2022, IT_2022), compiled according to linguistic-cultural and temporal variables. It adopts a mixed-methods approach combining a lexicographic and terminographic analysis of the naming terms, quantitative exploration using IRaMuTeQ and Sketch Engine, and qualitative interpretation of the discursive configurations identified. Combining specificity and factorial analyses with the study of keywords, collocations and grammatical relations, alongside close reading of the source texts, makes it possible to identify regularities without separating linguistic forms from their conditions of production. The findings show that the terms examined are neither equivalent nor stable. *Migrant* and *migrante* are preferentially associated with border crossings, arrivals by sea, control measures and security-oriented framings. Given their dual nature as terms that confer a legal status and as words circulating in general language, where they lose their binding legal force, *réfugié* and *rifugiato* tend instead to activate semantic features associated with forced flight, vulnerability and the need for protection. *Profugo* occupies an intermediate position, centred on the experience of exile and uprooting, but can also be incorporated into categorisation practices that distinguish between “genuine” and “bogus” exiles. The diachronic comparison reveals distinct trends. In 2015, a shift in framing occurred between the beginning of the year, when Syrian migrants were often treated as a public problem to be managed, and the period from September onwards, when, following debates and events that profoundly affected public opinion, they were increasingly referred to as *réfugiés* or *profughi* and thus humanised. In 2022, Ukrainians were described as *réfugiés* or *profughi* from the outset of the war and placed within a humanitarian framing grounded in solidarity. Differences between the French and Italian corpora do not obscure a shared tendency to construct hierarchies of migrant figures according to their origins, the causes attributed to their displacement, their presumed proximity to host societies and their degree of legitimacy. This research thus confirms the central role of the media in co-constructing socio-discursive representations of contested categories and their referents. It identifies distinct profiles for each of the naming terms analysed and therefore calls for sustained critical attention to widely disseminated discourses on migration and their potentially harmful effects on how the people concerned are perceived and recognised as legitimate.
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