Title: Media Portrayals and Black Male Outcomes | The Opportunity Agenda
Headings: Media Portrayals and Black Male Outcomes
Media Portrayals and Black Male Outcomes
Distorted patterns of portrayal
Underrepresentation in media portrayals
Negative associations exaggerated
Positive associations limited
The “problem” frame
Missing stories
Causal link between media and public attitudes
Impacts on thinking of black males themselves
Documentations of bias — conscious and unconscious — against black males
Unconscious patterns
Automatic responses
Hostility
General negative evaluation
African Americans’ own implicit biases
Conscious patterns
Practical consequences in lives of black males
Why media patterns are distorted
Bias among producers of media
Audience preferences
Incorrect assumptions about what audiences want
Lack of input from African Americans
Political motivations to traffic in stereotypes
Mistaken understandings

Content: Note that many studies refer to race without explicitly addressing gender, but many patterns, such as exaggerated associations with violence or sports, are clearly more relevant to males than to females.) For advocates and other communicators concerned with issues related to black male achievement, it is important to be sharply aware of this story, and the findings that support it, so that they can address the problem in an informed way. Note that other important components of the black male dilemma do not fall within the scope of this paper. Historical legacies of slavery and Jim Crow, the material and economic disparities related to that and other forms of historical racism, the role of the criminal justice system in controlling black males, the flow of resources toward and away from black males, and so on, are all important issues for understanding the current situation for black males in America. They will not be addressed here, however, except insofar as the distorted images in media make it easier for many Americans to tolerate, perpetuate, ignore or discount the many real disadvantages that black males face. This paper breaks the story down into five “links in the chain” (some of which have been studied and discussed more than others): Distorted portrayal of black (male) lives/experience
Why media patterns are distorted
Causal link between media and public attitudes
Documentations of the public’s bias — both conscious and unconscious — against black males
Practical consequences for the lives of black males
Distorted patterns of portrayal
In a wide range of ways, the overall presentation of black males in the media is distorted, exaggerating some dimensions while omitting others. Many scholars have contributed to a robust body of research documenting these distortions, which have several aspects. Underrepresentation in media portrayals
A number of researchers have essentially conducted “censuses” (of representations overall, of fictional characters, of characters in ads, and so forth) and compared these findings to the numbers of black men and boys that would be expected if racial bias were not at work. As this research has progressed, analysts have grown more sophisticated in the distinctions that they draw about where black males do and do not appear in the media.