Digital Commons Network^™

Portrayals Of Gender And Race In Instagram Advertising: An Exploratory Content Analysis, Taylor Moore

Honors College Theses

Race and gender stereotyping is a longstanding problem in the world of advertising. This research utilized content and statistical analysis to answer three questions regarding race and gender stereotyping in Instagram advertising: (1) what portrayals are being shown? (2) how are these portrayals being shown? And (3) are diverse advertisements reinforcing or challenging stereotypes? Tweny advertisements were chosen off Instagram to analyze. Through an analysis of literature on the topic, a code book defining race, person of color, sex, gender, and gender expression was created. Using these variables and classifying the ads as a stereotype/counterstereotype/neutral, allowed for the creation of …

Right Turn At Reality: A Rhetorical Analysis Of Right Wing Negotiations On Race And Masculinity In Online Spaces, Andrew R.J. Hart

MSU Graduate Theses

The effects of right wing politically charged violence are more visible now than at any other point in recent American history. The Internet, and social media more specifically, has become a crucial nexus point in the dissemination of decentralized Alt-Right propaganda. The visual nature of social media has increased the importance of images a means of communication. Through this thesis, I analyze artifacts coming out of these spaces representing a conversation between creators and audiences, and how they work dialogically to introduce and reify symbols of white masculine supremacy within this subgroup. Through this process, I find multiple recurring patterns …

Who Do They Think We Are? Analyzing Misrepresentation Of Races In Netflix Original Films Using Critical Race Theory And Social Identity Theory, Jacob Osseck

Theses

In a society like today’s, racial misrepresentation can be found across a vast number of different forms of media. Racial misrepresentation has been found in television portrayals of characters within series and programs during primetime television. This sort of misrepresentation creates obstacles for certain minorities to overcome prejudice, racism, and bigotry that oppresses their ingroup. A content analysis of 20 Netflix Original films which were chosen through random purposive sampling, to include comedy and drama genres, was conducted for the research. The analysis produced results that helped explain that Netflix’s representation of minorities through inclusion has improved for Blacks, yet …

Cultivation Theory: Media Effects Toward Consumer Evaluations Of The Criminal Courts, Lindsey Dale Elliott

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

A substantial body of literature connects media effects to consumer perceptions of the criminal justice system. Research on the topic of cultivation theory has highlighted that an increased fear of crime within the general populace, due to an exaggeration of violence and criminal activity in the mass media, has spurred increased support for punitive policing, harsher sentencing, and positive feelings toward capital punishment. However, no research exists to explicate the cultivation of consumer perceptions toward the criminal courts. This study examines the impact of media consumption through television, the internet, and social media on consumer evaluations of the criminal courts. …

Encroachment: College Athletes’ Experiences With Identity Development As Affected By Media Representations Of Social Justice Demonstrations, Madison Remi Vanwalleghen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study was conducted to understand how communication and identity are experienced by Black university athletes in asking about their experiences and how they gauge mainstream media portrayals of Black NFL athletes making verbal or physical statements about or in protest of social injustice, racism, and inequality in America. I interviewed five university athletes identifying as Black/African American or Mixed- Race using media representations of Black NFL athletes’ protests since the NFL has dominated mainstream media headlines regarding recent athletes’ protests, especially in connection to the Black Lives Matter social movement. I also used several theories to interpret the data …

Framing And Newspaper Coverage Of Racial Integration, Amy Unruh

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

For many Americans who grew up in the 1960s, the first published information about Africans came directly from Africa, in the form of exotic photographs and stories in National Geographic. Susan Goldberg, Editor in Chief of National Geographic, addressed the issue of race portrayals in the magazine, reflecting on the realization that National Geographic often provided readers “their first look at the world” while rarely acknowledging the struggles of race in the United States. The magazine displayed full-color photographs depicting Africans from many nations, dressed in native clothing and jewelry, positioned in settings that implied dignity, beauty and strength. Meanwhile, …

Does This Grant Them Agency? An Analysis Of The Female Athlete As Portrayed In Espn's Body Issue, Aubri Mckoy

Senior Independent Study Theses

Since 2009, one of the world’s largest and most circulated sports mediums, ESPN, has been publishing an annual nude magazine. Formerly known as ESPN’s Body Issue, this magazine seeks to highlight aesthetics of the athletic form, as well as the power of testimony told through the inhabited bodies of the magazine’s featured athletes. Over the years, the magazine has featured many identities, including the representation of varying races, genders, body types, physical abilities, and sports. This study particularly examines the representation of a Black woman athlete, Tori Bowie, as featured in the magazine’s tenth edition. Furthermore, this study focuses on …

Cw Is Open To All: Post-Difference Representation And Hegemonic Time-Travel Narratives In Dc's Legends Of Tomorrow, Claire Elizabeth Hackett

Theses and Dissertations

My thesis examines how a post-difference perspective, where diversity is shallowly embraced, can influence the characters and narratives of a television show, with DC’s Legends of Tomorrow as the prime example. Legends is a great example of this because it is an ensemble show that features characters who are from different races, religions, sexualities, ages, genders and historical time periods. A post-difference lens myopically pushes the narrative that everyone in society is equal, and the discrimination faced by marginalized communities is no longer relevant. This perspective is problematic because it reinforces how whiteness is the norm in society, and the …

Must Stay Woke: Black Celebrity Voices Of Dissent In The Post Post-Racial Era, Lily Kunda

Institute for the Humanities Theses

In today’s racially charged climate there is an expectation that black celebrities cry out #BlackLivesMatter, get on the field to #TakeAKnee and be #UnapologeticallyBlack whenever they are in the spotlight. This climate transcends what was once seen as a post-racial America— a time where the media portrayed race as no longer being an issue— and encourages black celebrities to address racism. Prior research on black celebrities by Sarah J. Jackson, Ellis Cashmore, bell hooks, James Baldwin and others acknowledges the historical burden placed on black celebrities to publicly discuss racism and represent blackness in order to challenge dominant narratives. Today, …

Local Vs. National: How Twitter Reflects News Coverage Of Colin Kaepernick Protests, Jared Paul Joseph

LSU Master's Theses

Local and national media dedicate different levels of coverage to issues depending on its relevancy to their audiences. This study uses news outlets’ social media activity to show that coverage discrepancies occurred with former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s National Anthem protest. Because his protest reached national headlines, Kaepernick suffered the same fate of many protesting athletes in the past. This study will show how national media carried his story to national headlines and framed his protest negatively. The findings show that local media were the least active among the three media levels, local, regional and national, in covering the Kaepernick …

Documenting An Imperfect Past: Examining Tampa's Racial Integration Through Community, Film, And Remembrance Of Central Avenue, Travis R. Bell

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research examines the Civil Rights Movement in Tampa, Florida through documentary film to recognize an imperfect past and visually reconstruct Central Avenue as a physical and Thirdspace site of remembrance located at an intersection of race and community. Motivated by an ethnographic approach and through community engagement, Tampa Technique: Rise, Demise, and Remembrance of Central Avenue is a 54-minute film that explores Central Avenue’s rise to prominence through segregation, its physical and symbolic demise as a racialized site of communal space, and how it is remembered through collective and public memory in the location it once occupied. Documentary film …

An Impossible Direction: Newspapers, Race, And Politics In Reconstruction New Orleans, Nicholas F. Chrastil

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis examines the racial ideologies of four newspapers in New Orleans at the beginning and end of Radical Reconstruction: the Daily Picayune, the New Orleans Republican, the New Orleans Tribune, and the Weekly Louisianian. It explores how each paper understood the issues of racial equality, integration, suffrage, and black humanity; it examines the specific language and rhetoric each paper used to advocate for their positions; and it asks how those positions changed from the beginning to the end of Reconstruction. The study finds that the two white-owned papers, the Picayune and the Republican, while political opponents, both viewed …

Looking Back At The Media's Future: A Mixed Method Analysis Of Race And Gender Bias During The 2008 Democratic Presidential Primary Season, Tim Vance

Dissertations

Political knowledge has been defined as the individual’s ability to recall candidate names, personal characteristics, and qualifications. Furthermore, it is the ability to identify election issues, current campaign developments, and recognize connections between candidates and issue positions (C. Atkin & Heald, 1976). I posit that political knowledge has become much more…and much less.

I have introduced, in this paper, a number of sources for political learning: ads, newspapers, YouTube, and television news. All hold some interest for investigation as political knowledge sources, but methodology cannot be standardized across all sources. As such, the focus of the qualitative part of this …

Analyzing Television News: Pro-Social & Anti-Social Effects Of Criminal Depictions & Information Processing On Race Perceptions, Eunette Gentry

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This quantitative research is a content analysis of network affiliate crime reporting statistics in Las Vegas. As part of this study, six months of news content in Las Vegas was recorded in order to gather pertinent sociological information about crime reporting techniques and its potential effects on public perceptions of crime and race. Pertinent issues such as media-image affect on viewers, biases within reporting information, and gatekeeping within the media are analyzed. This study adds substantive knowledge through empirical research to existing literature that asserts media depictions do shape and/or affect perceptions and attitudes about crime and race. Data sources …

Slipping Into Darkness: An Ideological Critique Of Racial Inequality Coverage In Milwaukee Newspapers, 2010-2014, Enrique Brown

Master's Theses (2009 -)

This ideological critique assessed mainstream and African American newspaper coverage on racial inequalities such as racial segregation and infant mortality in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from 2010 through 2014. Employing Cultural Studies, Critical Race Theory, and Class Theory, this textual research analyzed the texts of 405 reports, columns, and editorials from The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Milwaukee's mainstream paper of record, and The Milwaukee Courier, the city's premier African American newspaper. The study discovered important convergences in the Courier and Journal Sentinel's portrayal of racial inequalities as indicators of a racially diseased city and nation. However, the research also revealed important differences in …

Trust, Credibility And Authenticity: Race And Its Effect On Audience Perceptions Of News Information From Traditional And Alternative Sources, Sadaf R. Ali

Wayne State University Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to investigate audience perceptions of trust, credibility and authenticity in news information coming from traditional and social media sources, especially focused on how securitization amplifies the effects of news frames regarding race and culture. Research in race and media suggests that citizens of nations who look like the "other" will be framed differently than those of nations that look like "us." The study examines the effects of securitization and how exceptionalism coupled with framing can create an atmosphere where American culture has become securitized, in particular the ways in which multiculturalism due to increased …

Leadership Bias: The Case Of The Cherokee Freedmen, Kristi Barnett Williams

LSU Master's Theses

Journalists inform residents living on or near Native American reservations about key policy issues. Since most tribal councils own and operate their news outlets, retaliation towards journalists working for the tribe is a real concern if the leadership does not appreciate the message. In response to the threat of retaliation, some tribes, like the Cherokee Nation, have legal protections for journalists. The Cherokee Nation’s newspaper, the Cherokee Phoenix, operates under the guidelines of the Cherokee Independent Press Act (CIPA) originally passed in 2000 and amended in 2009. CIPA was the first of its kind in Indian Country. This thesis analyzes …

Burn, Boil & Eat : An Intersection Analysis Of Stereotypes In The Most Influential Films Of All Time, Roslyn M. Satchel

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This research builds upon the work of Entman & Rojecki (2001) in examining the ways the most influential movies use racial stereotypes in media frames. The results of this study contribute to the rather limited mass media research and body of knowledge regarding the media content that attracts the largest and most enduring audiences in the new media landscape. As ten of the films that have generated the most revenue, the movies in this sample constitute a genre of movies that are also a prime feature of on-going publishing, cable, internet, digital gaming, DVD, and movie sequel franchises. If, as …

How African-American And Hispanics Perceive Their Racial Equality In American Advertising, Denise Michele Pallais

LSU Master's Theses

This study focuses on how African-Americans and Hispanics perceive their racial equality in American advertising. A survey was conducted to find out the African-American and the Hispanic perceptions about how these ethnic groups saw themselves depicted, and the way they are stereotyped by the U.S. media. Overall, the study found that there was no difference between race and the level of perception between these two ethnic groups. However, age appears to be the only demographic variable that affects the African-American and Hispanic perception of discrimination. In addition, the study also exposed that African-Americans are mostly portrayed in the athletic advertising …