Suicides in NYU: From Crime Theme to Crime Wave

New York University is regarded as an excellent school all over the nation. However, in recent years it has not been in the news in praise of its education, but for something with a more morbid tone - suicides. In 2004 there were at least 6 publicized suicides in NYU. In 2005, there were 5. Newspapers jumped on this (no pun intended), calling it a "string of suicides" that has "shocked" the nation. The articles about this issue range in the way they talk about the suicides in general, the students, the school, and the effects this has on other colleges. It is interesting to examine these differences and the implications they have on the way the media write about NYU and New York in general. Is this a true 'epidemic' or are the media blowing the issue out of proportion to create what Mark Fishman would call a "crime wave"?

Crime waves begin as themes. There are multiple incidents that are linked together due to a similar kind of crime. They might be the same crime happening on numerous occasions, or different crimes that can fall under one category as defined by the theme. Crime waves are "little more than the continued and heavy coverage of numerous occurrences which journalists report as a single topic" (Fishman). The suicides at NYU are all listed under the same category, although each story is different. The causes of the suicides vary - one was linked to drugs, another was having problems with her boyfriend - yet they are all grouped together into the category of "NYU suicides." This grouping makes it easy to use the collection of problems as a criticism of the school for being too stressful, or not having a good enough prevention strategy. Looking at each aspect of the coverage on these stories reveals the progression of a crime theme on suicides at NYU, into a full-blown crime wave.