Assessing Diversity in News

1. Assessing Diversity in News

2. Minorities in the News: What’s Missing • Tom Huang: “What’s missing in our coverage are the everyday acts and opinions, quirks and foibles, that make Asians individuals, that make them human.”

3. Minorities in the News: What’s Missing? John B. Russwurm and Samuel E. Cornish, 1827

4. Minorities in the News: What’s Missing? • “Too long has the publick been deceived by misrepresentations, in things which concern us deeply, though in the estimation of some mere trifles; for although there are many in society who exercise toward us benevolent feelings; still there are others who enlarge upon the least trifle, which tends to the discredit of any person of color; and produce anathemas and denounce our whole body for the misconduct of this guilty one.” • “From the press and from the pulpit we have suffered much by being incorrectly represented. Men, whom we equally love and admire, have not hesitated to represent us disadvantageously, without becoming personally acquainted with the true state of things, nor discerning between virtue and vice among us. … Our vices and our degradations are ever arrayed against us, but our virtues are passed by unnoticed.”

5. Minorities in the News: What’s Missing? Kerner Commission, 1968 • “The media report and write from the standpoint of a white man’s world. The ills of the the ghetto, the difficulties of life there, the Negro’s burning sense of grievance, are seldom conveyed.” • Quoting a black citizen: “[T]he average black person couldn’t give less of a damn about what the media say. The intelligent black person is resentful at what he considers to be a totally false portrayal of what goes on in the ghetto.”

6. Minorities in the News: What’s Missing? Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, 2010 • 1005 adults surveyed August 12-15, 2010

7. Minorities in the News: What’s Missing? UNITY, survey of members, 2010 • 95% believed MSM inadequately covered race & race relations • 14% believed their producers and editors were knowledgeable about race • 14% believed MSM had helped improved race relations

8. What does research tell us? Patterns of coverage Recent examples Proposed solutions

9. Amount of Coverage Coverage of blacks between 1950 and 1980 • New York Times, Atlanta Constitution, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune • Increased coverage in each succeeding decade • Never more than 4% of news hole (Carolyn Martindale, “Significant Silences: Newspaper Coverage of Problems Facing Black Americans.” Newspaper Research Journal 15, no. 2 (1990): 102-115.)

10. Amount of Coverage Coverage of Latinos on network TV news, 2002 • ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC aired 728 primetime hours of news • 5.68 hours (.78%) devoted to Latino-related issues; 120 stories • (Serafin Méndez-Méndez and Diane Alverio, “The Portrayal of Latinos in Network Television News, 2002,” National Association of Hispanic Journalists.)

11. What’s News? Crime Of 120 stories about Latinos: • 39% crime • 18% terrorism • 9% illegal immigration

12. What’s News? Crime • Local TV news coverage of race at 26 stations in 12 cities, 2003 (596 stories) • Leading topic: crime (22% of all stories) (Poindexter, Paula M., Laura Smith & Don Heider. “Race and Ethnicity in Local Television News: Framing, Story Assignment and Source Selections.” Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, 47, no. 4 (2003): 524-536.)

13. Crime in News vs. Crime Statistics 200 local TV news stories about crime, Los Angeles, 2006 (Travis Dixon and Cristina Azocar, “The Representation of Juvenile Offenders by Race on Los Angeles Area Television News,” Howard Journal of Communication 17, 2006, 143-161.)

14. Crime in News vs. Crime Statistics 185 Network News Stories: Missing Children, 2005-07 (Seong-Jae Min and John Feaster, “Missing Children in National News Coverage: Racial and Gender Representation of Missing Children Cases,” Communication Research Reports, 27(3): 207-216.)

15. Sourcing Patterns 596 Local TV news stories at 26 stations in 12 cities, 2003 (Poindexter, Paula M., Laura Smith & Don Heider. “Race and Ethnicity in Local Television News: Framing, Story Assignment and Source Selections.” Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, 47, no. 4 (2003): 524-536.)

16. Sourcing Patterns Network TV News, 2008 • 75% of white reporters’ sources were white • 50% of minority reporters’ sources were minorities Presidential Campaign Coverage, 2004 • White reporters used minority sources in 5% of their stories • Minority reporters used minority sources in 15% of their stories • (Lynn C. Owens, “Network News: The Role of Race in Source Selection and Story Type.” Howard Journal of Communication 19, no. 4 (2008): 355-370.) • (Geri Alumit Zeldes and Fred Fico, “Broadcast and Cable News Network Differences in the Way Reporters Used Women and Minority Group Sources to Cover the 2004 Presidential Election,” Mass Communication and Society, 13: 512-527, 2010.)

17. Sourcing Patterns 104 Looting Scenes on Network News, Hurricane Katrina (Kirk Johnson, Mark Dolan and John Sonnett, “Speaking of Looting: An Analysis of Racial Propaganda in National Television Coverage of Hurricane Katrina,” Howard Journal of Communication, 22:302-318, 2011.)

18. Words & Images

19. Words & Images

20. Words & Images

22. Summary • Amount of coverage of minorities is small • Somewhat disproportionate attention to crime • Missing white children newsworthy • Whites tend to dominate as sources • White reporters tend to have white Rolodexes • Careless word choices and labeling may offend

23. Proposed Solutions Diversify the Newsroom • Mixed evidence of effectiveness • Diversity viewed as a “cost center”

24. Proposed Solutions Community Outreach • Total Community Coverage • Race and Media Forums

25. Proposed Solutions • Content Auditing • Self-monitoring tools