HARVARD GAZETTE ARCHIVES

Panel Examines African Americans in the Media

Journalists meet at Kennedy School to discuss the media's images and coverage of African Americans

By Sally Baker
Assistant Director, News Office

Panelists participating in a discussion of "Images of African Americans in the Media" sit beneath a projected picture of O.J. Simpson at the Kennedy School.

"Americans lead really isolated lives," Boston Globe Managing Editor Greg Moore told a capacity audience at the ARCO Forum Tuesday evening, Dec. 1. "So a lot of what they learn about people who are different from themselves, different races in particular, they learn from what they read, what they see, what they hear. That's where the media come in."

Moore was among six journalists participating in a panel discussion, "Images and Coverage of African Americans in the Media," sponsored by the Harvard Foundation, the Harvard-Radcliffe Black Students Association, the Kennedy School Black Student Caucus, and the Institute of Politics Student Advisory Committee. The panel, moderated by S. Allen Counter of the Harvard Foundation, was unified in one opinion- African Americans aren't portrayed realistically in either news or entertainment programming - but divided about the sources of the problem and about its potential solution.

Montel Williams, host and owner of the syndicated The Montel Williams Show, said African Americans and anyone else who objects to programming have obvious recourse. "You have to hold the media accountable for the images it broadcasts," he said. "If you don't like the images, write to the sponsors." Williams said that having full control of his show - "every check that's signed, I sign" - gives him the freedom to present positive images of African Americans. But with the second-highest ratings for a nationally syndicated talk program, was a hard sell at its birth in 1991 and remains a hard sell today. "I still have stations saying, 'A bald-headed black man, that won't work in my community,' " Williams said.

Bay State Banner publisher Melvin B. Miller '56 noted that African-American newspapers played a central role in pushing certain stories, such as the Civil Rights Movement, onto the national agenda, and that despite declining readership and revenues, those papers still serve a critical purpose. Publications like his "are organized to tell the truth and carry the banner for black interests," Miller said. "We can complain all we want [about the mainstream media]. But what we really need is our own voice."

But it is now possible, said Michel McQueen '80, a correspondent for ABC's Nightline, to surround yourself with African-American media. "You can get your news from BET [Black Entertainment Television], you can get your entertainment from WB and UPN, and that [involves] a whole different set of challenges about the kind of images that are being presented," McQueen said. "To be fair, we need to have a full conversation. As Reverend Jackson says, 'If you're going to tell the story, tell it all.' " That includes, she said, gathering data about "who we see on TV and what they do." McQueen called for more academy-based research on the consequences of an overwhelmingly male- and white-dominated media.

Sports coverage, said Boston Globe columnist Derrick Jackson, appears to present positive images of African Americans - until you examine what is said and written about black athletes as opposed to white athletes. A white athlete who does well is credited with intelligence and savvy, Jackson said, while an outstanding black athlete's achievements come, according to the media, as the result of in-born, "unteachable" skills.

Christopher Lydon, host of the WBUR program The Connection, said he wondered that anyone expected much of television or of the mass media in general. "I don't see anything on TV that smacks of reality," he said, adding that the discussion on race from callers to The Connection is so well-reasoned and thoughtful that "I think we're doing much better than we give ourselves credit for and that it's time to listen again."