Blacks at the office, blacks on TV: A study

While the news of the Pakistani Times Square suspect still percolates in the media stratosphere, I thought I'd share a recent race-based study I conducted with a group of students in a mass media and public opinion course here at UW. We will present these results and the implications of our research this coming Thursday.

We investigated perceptions of hiring equality between blacks and whites over time, and portrayals of blacks in professional positions on primetime TV for the same time period. "Professional positions" were those that required a high level of intellect or academic/managerial training (doctors, lawyers, nurses, detectives). Athletes and talent judges (Randy Jackson, e.g.) were not considered professional, as their jobs are not intellectually-based or a result of academic or managerial training.

We hypothesized that:

1. Public perception of hiring equality among blacks and whites would increase over time.

2. The prevalence of blacks in professional positions on primetime TV would increase over time.

Our public opinion data came from Gallup polls. From 1963 to 2009, Gallup collected responses to the following question:

"In general, do you think that blacks have as good a chance as white people in your community to get any kind of job for which they are qualified, or don’t you think they have as good a chance?"

Graphing the responses revealed a trend toward greater public perception of hiring equality over time (see top graph above).

For the media analysis portion of our project, we coded for the presence and number of black professionals in each of the top 10 shows (in terms of viewership) for each year from 1963-2009. We used the Internet Movie Database for character lists and descriptions. After testing intercoder reliability (98%), each of the five researchers coded 94 shows.

After combining our coding results, we found an increase in both the number of shows with black professionals and the number of black professionals in each show. For simplicity's sake, the graph above shows only the increase in the number of shows with black professionals, and not the increase in the number of black professionals per show.

The above graphs compare the public opinion and media trends. These graphs indicate that as perceptions of hiring equality among blacks and whites increased, so too did the prevalence of blacks in professional positions on TV. These results support both our public opinion and media hypotheses.

Of course, every study has its limits. We only looked at the top 10 shows for each year, and there may have been other influential shows that did not make that list (Roots, e.g.). Furthermore, our data collection began with the Civil Rights years, and that is undoubtedly an influential factor to be considered in any subsequent analysis of race politics over this time period.

It is important to note that we cannot claim causation from our results. But even so, the correlation between public opinion and media content leads us to ask: What does this mean?

These results are hopeful, indicating that we have made progress both in society and on screen. These results speak well of Equal Opportunity Employers and their commitment to their claims, and they speak volumes about the progress minorities--blacks in particular--have made in the entertainment industry.

We should also take these results with a grain of salt. It would be wrong to look at these trends and claim, "See! We're equal!" Hardly. Workplace discrimination is not only yesterday's problem, and whites, professional or otherwise, still outnumber blacks on screen.

In sum: Progress? Yes. Success? Not so fast.

Immigration law is not Jim Crow

Should illegal immigrants be admitted to U.S. high schools? Should they be able to enroll in our colleges or enlist in our military? And if they get a degree, should they be able to apply for any job for which they are qualified?

The answer to all these questions is yes, according to the Dream Act, a federal bill that would impact 16 million illegal immigrants living in the United States.

Claremont Graduate University professor Will Perez, Ph.D, reports on the Dream Act and the United We Dream Coalition, advocating for passage of the Act and detailing the social and economic benefits of granting said rights to undocumented immigrants. He presents a solid argument, listing the challenges faced by these undocumented students and stressing that many of them came to the United States with their parents; they had no choice in the matter. Should they be punished for their parents actions? Perez says no.

Perez draws on his research to show that undocumented students are some of the most socially active today. Pair this with increased economic output from allowing them to get into higher-level, and higher paying, jobs, and you have greater returns for all of us, he says.

So what are the problems with Perez's assertions? For one, I'm not sure he's going to convince any anti-immigration stumpers that the Dream Act is right and good. You can present all the arguments in the world, but at the end of the day, these students are not American citizens. I consider myself pretty pro-immigration, pro-amnesty and pro-education, and this essay was even hard for me to wrap my head around. Unless Perez focuses more on personal relevance for the anti-amnesty camp, those against the Dream Act will continue to prevent its passage.

The other, more glaring problem with this article is Perez' comparison of the Dream Act to another fight for equality: "The similarities between the civil rights movement and current immigration reform movement are numerous," he writes.

I disagree. While the general theme--equal rights--may carry through both movements, the circumstances are not comparable. Under the 14th Amendment, African Americans living in America became U.S. citizens. Under the 15th Amendment, blacks were given the right to vote. Undocumented immigrants have not been granted citizenship or voting rights. The civil rights movement was a fight for rights granted by U.S. citizenship, while the Dream movement is a fight for the extension of citizenship rights to non-citizenship in America.

While the idea of granting undocumented immigrants the rights of citizens may rile anti-immigration groups, the comparison to civil rights may distance the pro-amnesty/immigrant rights groups from both his argument and the Dream Act itself. A well-meaning article then becomes its own worst enemy, to the detriment of 16 million.

Photo Credit: The Orlando Sentinel