The History of Colorism/Skin Color, Gender and the Media The history of colorism in the U.S. and its prevalence in the media is basically the history of the U.S. and its approach to legitimate representation of race in the media. As Hunter notes, “Colorism, or skin color stratification, is a process that privileges light?skinned people of color over dark in areas such as income, education, housing, and the marriage market” (237). At the same time, media representations of darker skinned people have been viewed as being more authentic and legitimate (Hunter). This can be seen in the film The Negro Soldier, directed by famed Hollywood producer Frank Capra during WWII. In that film, the African American community was depicted for the first time as being equal to whites: the representation was authentic and legitimated by the dark skinned tone of the community. As German points out, the film was meant to “overcome racial tensions by uniting all Americans behind the war effort, while postponing African American demands for immediate equality” (67). The media in the U.S. prior to that film had been used to portray African Americans as lazy, stupid and apish: “eating watermelons, loafing, singing and dancing,” as German states (59). Cripps and Culbert note that the film made it possible for people in the U.S. to stop thinking about race as a barrier for a moment, as it showed...
Of course the purpose of the film was to get blacks to join the war effort and once the war was over, America quickly got back to its Jim Crow ways.References
Cripps, Thomas and David Culbert. “The Negro Soldier (1944): Film Propaganda in Black and White.” American Quarterly Vol. 31, No. 5, Special Issue: Film and American Studies (Winter, 1979), pp. 616-640: The Josh Hopkins University Press.
German, Kathleen M. Promises of Citizenship: Film Recruitment of African Americans in World War 2. University Press of Mississippi, 2017.
Hunter, M. “The persistent problem of colorism: Skin tone, status, and inequality.” Sociology Compass, 1.1. (2007), 237-254.
Media Ownership Concentration The author of this report is asked to do a Marxist analysis of a media conglomerate and what does or tends to happen when a single corporate structure owns multiple publications and how the forcing out or limiting of other publications can lead to a stunted and incomplete view of reality due to an artificially limited marketplace. The company used as an example in this report is Time
Media Archaelogy and Videogames In today's world, the rapid development of technology has opened worlds of vast information and entertainment that are instantly accessible at the touch of a button. The relationships created in this way not only involve those we interact with online or via gaming, but also our own perception, the mental imagery we create and the apparatus we use to access these. A researcher who truly wants to
Media Violence The potential relationship between media violence and actual aggression comes to the forefront of public discussion, but unfortunately this discussion rarely takes into account the science related to the relationship between media violence and aggressive behavior. In particular, there is a widespread assumption that media violence directly causes aggression and aggressive behavior, and this assumption has become so common that even secondary scholarly discussions of the evidence have taken
Media Communications Representation of characters and role models in different media outlets is based on perceptions and preconceived notions held by the producer, co-producers, and audiences at large. Only those representations are drawn that largely resonate with current meanings given to people, characters, places, and objects.The paper presents two theoretical approaches to study media and its impact at large. Theory of social constructivism provides framework to assess the meanings given to
Media Audiences Marxist media theorists discuss the media in terms of their role as 'ideological apparatuses'. Explain the key notions behind this research, paying particular attention to the concept of hegemony and the media's role within it. What is 'hegemony', and why is it important to audience studies? Marxist theorists emphasizes on the role of mass media in reproduction of status quo, however there is no school of thought regarding his theories.
Media Review News story - Union Serves 72-Hour Strike Notice at Viking Air The CAW (Canadian Auto Workers Union) has announced a 72 hours strike while making a bargain with the Viking Air management. As per the notice, the Union will go on strike by 12 noon on Thursday, 19th January (CAW, 2012). The union's national spokesperson Gavin McGarrigle said that it had been over a year since skilful workers had been waiting
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now