Media #1

Abstract (Summary)
http://0-proquest.umi.com.maurice.bgsu.edu/pqdweb?index=0&did=348264411&SrchMode=1&sid=3&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS=1203002367&clientId=3340

The article is about how blacks are portrayed in the media. The article states that blacks are shown as both people who have achieved success and those of deviance. And it attempts to show how we should use more effective ways to address the racial issues. I chose this article because it relates to the movie that we watched in class The Power of Illusion and the Rosenblum and Travis article. The power of illusion in its self creates an image to those who may not know the subject matter or because that certain material is in the media, people begin to believe it.

You can make many connections between this article and that of the movie The Power of Illusion because they both in their own way talk about how media affects the way people are perceived. Also it addresses the idea that race is an illusion because we think that people are different just because of what is on the outside. The movie states that there has to be some biological evidence that distinguishes between the races. Race is external not internal. Its perception is created by us and how we use it to separate certain types of people. In fact in the movie that we watched a teacher did this experiment with his class that would show that a DNA make up may not differ that much from one race to another. For example one of the white kids thought that he would be in most relation to another white person in his group when actually his DNA matched up closer with that of some other race. This is not to say that this is the case in everybody, but it puts it into perspective that there is no biological answer to this idea of race. This article can also relate to the Rosenblum and Travis article because in their article it talks about how a census is used to distinguish between races or stereotypes. For an example the census might say black, white, Latino, and Asian which in fact you might be more than one but what ever your outward appearance is, that is how you are seen by others. It also classifies people into large groups such as all of the people that live or were born in Asia are Asian, when in fact there are many different types of races over there that we have decided to clump together to form one giant race. And it does not just stop with that plenty of others are involved. Again it just shows that any type of media can influence people’s perception.

I found this article to be interesting and thought provoking. It makes you realize how much media can affect the way we see things. Especially as a young person when you take a lot of things for face value. It is embedded into your thought process that this is how things are and depending on your race these are your “privileges” or the behavior that you should have.