Media and Minorities

Theorizing Minority Misrepresentations  23
sequences. This representational impasse should come as no surprise; after
all, it’s been over 45 years since the Kerner Commission11 declared, “the media
report and write from the standpoint of a White man’s world.” But the
prospect of representing diversity and differences in a balanced, objective and
contextual manner appears to go against the grain of a mediated logic.12 This
representational gridlock suggests it’s time to shift the burden of blame from
newsmedia “acting badly” to representations “acting logically” because of
what they are intrinsically inclined to do. I propose a theoretical framework
that scuttles the conventional wisdom taken to explain newsmedia misrepresentations
of migrants, peoples and minorities. However counterintuitive this
assertion may appear on the surface, I will argue that mainstream newsmedia
may be interpreted as if they constituted white ethnic media whose ‘systemic
whiteness’13 informs the mediated bias of media-minority representations.
Reference to the concept of “systemic whiteness” is consequential. It not only
demonstrates how diversity discourses and minority frames are so structured
in a white Eurocentricity that even seemingly inclusive coverage is “couched
in compromise.”14 It also magnifies the magnitude of the challenge in fostering
more representative representations.
In this paper, I contend that any theorizing of minority misrepresentations
gains explanatory traction by reframing mainstream newsmedia as if
they were white ethnic media whose mediated images of peoples, migrants
and minorities superimpose a pro-white preference over an anti-minority
bias. The Eurocentric discourses that “filter” minority realities, experiences
and aspirations through the mediated prism of a white media lens are shown
to be systemic and consequential rather than systematic and contrived. The
ensuing argument points to a paradox: “Whitestream” media may be conscious
of the criticism directed at them; however, more positive and inclusive
11 Kerner Commission, Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders
(Washington DC: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1968), 366.
12 Myria Georgiou, “Media Representations of Diversity: The Power of the Mediated
Image,” in Race and Ethnicity in the 21st Century, eds. Alice Bloch and John Solomos
(Hampshire: Palgrave McMillan, 2009): 166–181; Alemán, “Locating Whiteness.”
13 In contrast to those who see white privilege or entitlement as a state of mind (‘mindset’),
systemic whiteness refers to its status and role as an unwritten organizing principle
of society and its institutions and policies. (See Alemán, “Locating Whiteness.”) More
specifically, systemic whiteness can be viewed as an ideology imbued with the power
to normalize white power and privilege; a universal standard against which others are
judged and criticized; a lens through which whites see themselves and others, without
awareness that they are doing so and an implicit Eurocentrism with a corresponding tendency
to see, think and evaluate reality from the perspective of white interests and experiences
taken as universal and superior. (See Gabriel, Whitewash.) See also the previous
footnote entries for racialized and framing.
14 Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Racism without Racists: Color-blind Racism and the Persistence of
Racial Inequality in the United States (Lanham, MD
© 2016, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen
ISBN Print: 9783525300886 — ISBN E-Book: 9783666300882