Jurnal Komunikasi Malaysian Journal of Communication Jilid 32 (2) 2016: 525-544 ______________________________________________________________________________ MEDIA AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN MALAYSIA: AN ANALYSIS ON NEWS COVERAGE OF LANDSLIDE DISASTER IN KUALA LUMPUR JAMILAH AHMAD HABIBAH LATEH UNIVERSITI SAINS MALAYSIA Abstract Studies done on media reporting and the environment, particularly on natural disasters area less researched topic in Malaysia. This paper examines the representation of disaster news and analyses on how disaster news reports are being covered in local newspapers by taking a landslide case occurred at Taman Puncak Setiawangsa, Kuala Lumpur in December, 2012. The samples were taken from two local mainstream newspapers as a comparative study. Utusan Malaysia, being the major Malay newspapers in the country targets Malay readers, while The Star, an English-language daily, targets multi-ethnic and middle-class income readers. This study used quantitative and qualitative content analysis in identifying patterns of coverage by both newspapers. The analysis revealed that despite having their own principles, guidelines and ideologies; this study concludes that both newspapers have a lot of similarities in their reporting on this particular disaster. The main similarity is local environmental news is still predominantly presented as straight news. Keywords: Environmental news coverage, Malaysia, landslide, natural disasters, media discourse MEDIA DAN ALAM SEKITAR DI MALAYSIA: ANALISIS PELAPORAN BERITA BENCANA TANAH RUNTUH DI KUALA LUMPUR Abstrak Kajian mengenai pelaporan media dan alam sekitar terutamanya yang melibatkan bencana alam masih kurang dilakukan di Malaysia. Oleh itu, artikel ini mengkaji representasi berita mengenai bencana alam dan mengkaji bagaimana berita bencana alam dilaporkan di akhbar tempatan dengan mengambil bencana yang berlaku di Taman Puncak Setiawangsa, Kuala Lumpur pada Disember 2012 sebagai kajian kes. Sampel berita dikumpul dari dua akhbar arus perdana iaitu Utusan Malaysia dan The Star. Akhbar Utusan Malaysia, akhbar harian berbahasa Melayu mensasarkan pembaca dari kalangan orang Melayu manakala akhbar The Star, akhbar harian berbahasa Inggeris lebih mensasarkan golongan pembaca yang terdiri daripada pelbagai etnik dan berpendapatan sederhana. Kajian ini menggunakan kaedah analisis kandungan kuantitatif dan kualitatif dalam mengenal pasti corak pelaporan kedua-dua akhbar. Dapatan kajian menunjukkan, walaupun kedua-dua akhbar mempunyai prinsip, peraturan dan ideologi masing- masing, namun kedua-dua akhbar tersebut mempunyai persamaan yang banyak dari segi pelaporan bencana alam. Persamaan utama dapat dilihat menerusi pelaporan berita mengenai bencana alam yang kebanyakannya dilaporkan dalam bentuk berita langsung.