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Framing The Crisis In The Merrimack Valley: The Opioid Epidemic, White Despair And Authoritarian Populism On The New England Borderlands, Gyuri Kepes

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines how discourses and ideologies about the opioid crisis were framed, produced and constructed in the geographic specificity of the Merrimack Valley in the period leading up to the 2016 presidential election. Applying the theoretical and methodological frameworks offered by the cultural studies tradition, this dissertation project attempts to map out the complex interplay between the news media, law enforcement, policymakers, and citizens in producing, circulating, amplifying, framing and sustaining public anxiety about the opioid crisis in the Merrimack Valley and beyond. Employing a mix of qualitative and quantitative forms of inquiry, including interpretation of data collected through …