Page 475 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

| Representat ons of Race

An era of affluence and excess is ushered in during the Reagan years, reflected in televi-
sion programs such as Dynasty and Dallas, which were about extremely wealthy white
businessmen and their families who had made their fortunes in the oil industry.
1990s—The Rodney King beating is caught on home videotape.
The LA uprisings are seen across the country, even internationally, as representing “race
riots” and civil unrest in the United States.
O. J. Simpson is seen driving a white Bronco in a slow-speed police car chase; the
O. J. Simpson trial becomes one of the most watched media events in television history.
Reactions to the O. J. Simpson trial and its verdict are clearly divided along racial lines,
demonstrating, on one hand, a distrust in the criminal justice system that many have
had for deeply historical reasons, as well as, on the other hand, a return to tropes of
black masculinity (as threatening) and white femininity (as idealized and innocent) that
informed people’s judgments.
2000s—The attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, marks a new era
in the representation of American patriotism and national identity, often positioned in
opposition to “undemocratic” or “extremist” Others.
The Oprah Winfrey Show celebrates its 20th year. The program has become the most
popular daytime talk show on television, and Oprah Winfrey is not only one of the
most powerful people in the business of media, but she is an undeniably influential
figure in the culture and politics of American life today.

whaT is a sTErEoTyPE? whaT is ThE
FunCTion oF a sTErEoTyPE?
While there are specificities to different racial and ethnic groups, there are
also commonalities in the general pattern of maintaining a status quo social hi-
erarchy (social order) through the use of images and stories in American media
culture. These images have taken the form of visual tropes or deep-seeded ste-
reotypes such as: black men as threatening, black women as “sassy,” Asian and
Asian American women as exotic yet passive, Asian and Asian American men
as lacking “masculinity,” Latinos assumed as being noncitizens, Native Ameri-
cans as so-called “noble savages,” and more recently, those who look to be Mid-
dle Eastern as “suspected terrorists”; the suspicion of those who are Islamic as
so-called enemies to democracy has become particularly intense since the start
of the second war in Iraq in 2003, with news images being perceived by some
with a sense of threat. This list names just a few of the associations linked to
images of racialized figures that we see on television. All, however, contribute
to a larger discourse of ideal whiteness—and Americanness—by representing
nonwhite races in a lesser or undesirable position.
A stereotype is a kind of iconic shorthand; it is a “controlling image” that in-
volves a process of objectification, subordination, and justification (Hamamoto
1992, p. 4). The function of a stereotype is to display and express power. Using
stereotypes is not only a way to disempower, debase, or humiliate the target
of a stereotype, it is also a means to benefit the comparative figure, that is, the