Ever since Spain became an immigration country, unaccompanied foreign minors – often referred to by the acronym ‗menas‘– have become the subject of media coverage. This study departs from the premise that the media constructs reality. Media representations of migrants must therefore be examined to uncover their impact in the social world. This research analyses representations of unaccompanied foreign minors in the press editorials published between 2018 and 2022. Frame analysis informs the theoretical framework of this thesis and it is applied through the constant comparative technique.

This work uncovers seven different frames. Whereas the victim/threat dichotomy is the most prevalent throughout the newspapers, positive representations are also found. While newspapers within the liberal-conservative political spectrum frame unaccompanied minors in both positive and negative ways, this is not the case for the far-right and left-wing newspapers. The analysis also finds changes in framing according to decisive political events.