Representation and Reality in the Portrayal of Blacks on Network Television News

Abstract

This paper probes the images of African Americans in a thirty-day sample of videotaped news programs on ABC, CBS, and NBC, and in a computer analysis of verbatim transcripts of ABC's nightly news program for one year. Network news appears to convey more stereotyped impressions — a narrower range of positive roles — for blacks than for whites. Representations of whites in network news are more varied and more positive than of blacks, not because of conscious bias, but because of the way conventional journalistic norms and practices interact with political and social reality. The findings raise theoretical and normative questions about journalists' ability to “represent” the “reality” of black America while adhering to the professional practices that currently shape network news.