Victorian Press and the Working Classes

The mainstream newspapers did not represent the working classes, as they were not considered part of the readership. The only representation came from radical newspapers such as the ‘Northern Star’.

The key concepts involved in discovering how the Victorian press represented the working classes it is important to choose an era of unrest amongst the working classes. Taking in to account that the Northern Star is the most well known of the radical working class newspapers, it is easy to map this to the Chartist period in Britain. Taking this as a guideline the period should be between 1838 to 1852, following the rise and fall of Chartism. To contrast the views of the Northern Star it is advisable to find another newspaper. The best would be the Leeds Mercury. Being a northern paper it will give good contrasting views to that of the Northern Star.

Taking in to account of the amount of issues available for both sets of newspapers it is paramount to filter them in some way. To do this I will take an issue every ten years or so from each and contrast the stories in each. In doing this it will enable me to look at certain i

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With this growth in readership it is clear that they can reach a great deal more people. Even the same types of classifieds are included. The American- Mexican war dominates the headlines within the Star.

In narrowing the search area in to just six papers it allows me to focus on each issue more as they may have some information that if I read over ten I could easily overlook a certain point. In China the capture of Canton has caused much unrest amongst the Chinese and the western powers.

This was the main argument upheld by the chartists throughout their existence. However they were not similar in content. In completing this method I will be able to exploit all of the information that was spreading around the Victorian press at this time. This shows a very empirical view from the mainstream paper. With all of this information or ‘Intelligence’ included in the issue it is clear to see the main story is that concerning the plight of the colony. With the final petition of the chartists being rejected for the amount of forged names on the petition the end of the Star also came about. How they deal with parliamentary debates, passing of acts and the normal stories of general interest. Having spent all this money on the army and navy the government in the opinion of lord Wellington was detrimental to the survival of the country.

Approximate Word count = 2899
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page double spaced)

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