Separation by the Media

For my first post I want to focus on the picture that the Peninsula Hotel put out as an advertisement. This picture was first brought to my attention last year. My original thought about this photo was that it was just a coincidence that a black man was holding the door for a young white girl... that there was no deeper social meaning. Since then, however, I have given the whole thing a lot more thought. According to online sources this picture was not just a random snapshot but part of a photo shoot. Any photographer can tell you that a majority of the time a picture is supposed to tell a story or display a deeper meaning (especially when it comes to advertising). I thought to myself, what story does this picture tell? How can it be interpreted? If it were to be a white man holding the door for a black girl does the story change? I think the answer to that question is most definitely yes.

I believe we have been socially constructed to separate black and white in the different forms of media. I gained some key perspective on this thought last year when I attended a Communication celebration event. I was seated at a table with a professor name Damien ( I can not remember his last name). He specialized in African American studies and we were discussing perception. He started asking me questions like how many black teachers I had growing up, how many black doctors I went to, if my dentist was black... I think you get the idea. My answer to most of his questions was none. The point he was making is that growing up I had only seen white people in roles of professionalism  and authority. I had been constructed (not purposely) to draw attention to the difference. Ever since that day I have been trying to pay attention to how the media creates and spreads this idea. Last night I was watching TV and a commercial break came on, I watched closely and tried to see how diverse the people inside of the commercials were. What I found is that white men came up the most followed by white women. The only black people inside of the whole commercial break were part of the environment (not key characters). One key detail I picked up from this is that a bus driver was depicted as an older black man. That was a conscious choice someone decided to make. I connect the depiction of that man to the worker at the Peninsula Hotel. I think that the media is creating false identities and limiting what people may think of themselves and others.

Another place I noticed this was inside of movies. This concept is noted inside of Byron Bowers standup set at the Laughfactory in California. Click the link below to watch a 43 second video of his set.

Byron Bowers

Byron addressed multiple stereotypes inside of this segment but the fact about the Harry Potter series is true. Why do you think that is? Do you think that we are taking steps to eliminate this phenomenon? If so, where are the powerful examples?