Race And Ethnicity Should Be In The Spotlight Summary

In the article “Why the Media’s Role in Issues of Race and Ethnicity Should be in the Spotlight,” Dana Mastro aims to address the association between race and ethnicity and the media. The importance of this topic comes from the fact that the United States as well as the rest of the world have yet to rise above race. The author first focuses on the importance of the topic that is being researched. The main reason that Mastro is doing research on the relationship between the media and race/ethnicity (this is used throughout the article for ease) is that there are still complications surrounding race (p. 1). Media has control over many aspects of society including policy making and relationship expectations between ethnic groups. Media also influences how people view themselves. This article’s goals that the focus is on are (1) demonstrating how the exposure to these representations influence a person’s perception of self and identity, (2) how media can prompt prosocial and antisocial outcomes and shape attitudes in society, and (3) how to limit the negative consequences that are made by the exposure to portrayals in the media (p.2). Mastro wants to inform people about this relationship so that the media can be used to make policy changes.

This is mostly due to the fact that schools and other communities are still segregated. For example, “Blacks and Latinos reside in neighborhoods clustered around their own racial/ethnic group, with disproportionately high levels of minority representation” (p.2). Because of this, some of the only interaction that people get with ethnicities that are different than themselves is through the