In Black and White: Coverage of U.S. Slave Reparations by the Mainstream and Black Press

Abstract

ABSTRACT The issue of reparations being awarded to descendants of U.S. slaves has appeared on both the media and policy agendas; this study examines differences in how four mainstream and four Black newspapers covered this issue. A content analysis revealed that the majority of the slavery reparations articles were printed in the Black press, and a larger percentage of Black press articles were pro-slavery reparations. Both mainstream and Black newspapers most often covered the issue in a legislative context rather than moral or legal one, and both rarely addressed slavery reparations in the context of its potential positive or negative effect on relations between U.S. Blacks and Whites. A larger percentage of mainstream press articles compared slavery reparations with other reparations such as those paid to Japanese internment survivors, Holocaust survivors, and American Indians than did the Black press. In short, the results of this study indicate that Black press coverage of slavery reparations differed from that of the mainstream press during the 20-year period examined. Keywords: Black presspressrace relationsU.S. slavery reparationsnewspaperscontent analysis Teresa Mastin and Shelly Campo contributed equally to this paper. A version of this article was presented at the Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research, Chicago, November 2002. This research was supported in part by Middle Tennessee State University's 2002 Summer Faculty Research Grant, a summer grant from the Department of Communication, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell University, and in part by the Cornell Presidential Research Scholars Program. It was also supported in part by the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station federal formula funds, Project NYC-131401 received from Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture or the other funding sources. Notes Note. Wash. = Washington. Note. χ2(2, N = 539) = 8.7, p < .01. 1. Individual inter-coder reliability scores: effect of slavery reparations on U.S. Black/White race relations, .98; spokespersons for the issue, .97; number of slavery reparations articles, 1.00; overall tone of article, .95; coverage context, .92; and independent versus comparative coverage, 1.00.