The spectacle of the ‘Other’: Media representations of same-sex sexuality in Senegal

This article examines media representations of same-sex sexuality in Senegal, and analyses how same-sex sexuality has been covered in a selection of Senegalese newspapers since the early 2000s. Drawing on Stuart Hall’s perspective on the role of mass media and ideology and the theory of Critical Discourse Analysis, this article describes how discourses produced by selected Senegalese newspapers generate and circulate ideological meanings. This article intends to underline the ways in which Senegalese media have come to fabricate a certain image of gay and lesbian people, often portrayed as deviant, mad or abnormal.