‘The Devil Other’: Crime News Discourses and Foreign Nationals in Malaysia

Abstract

Crime news is considered as the most salient news among Malaysian. For the past 10 years, the relationship between the increasing number of foreign nationals in Malaysia and the increasing crime rate/crime reporting become and issue discussed from the grass root to the members of the Malaysian parliament. This article analyses recent news discourses surrounding foreign nationals in Malaysian crime reporting. Four English language daily newspapers are investigated over the year of 2016 which are The Star, The New Straits Times, The Sun, and The Malay Mail. The paper argues that foreign nationals is  the ‘ideal’ other which cause them to be associated to various negativity. Constructing foreign nationals as problematic, deviant, and as ‘the devil’ can be discussed as an act to fit with the hegemonic idea that foreign nationals as a major threat to the public socially, economically, and environmentally. The paper also explores the various issues/stories highlighted in the local crime news involving foreign nationals that draw new landscapes of Malaysian social pattern.