Race, Gender, Hollywood: Representation in Cultural Production and Digital Media's Potential for Change

Abstract

Since its inception, the Hollywood industry has played an instrumental role in the mass dissemination of popular culture, both within the United States and globally. Yet, White men have almost exclusively created the narratives and myths that comprise Hollywood cultural production, while narratives by women and racial/ethnic minorities are fewer and less prominent. This article gives an overview of current research on racial and gender inequality in representation in the production of Hollywood film and television in the United States, with a focus on the contemporary era. Research on Hollywood cultural production points to a problematic trend of disadvantages in opportunities and outcomes facing women and racial/ethnic minorities, leading to the prevalence of stereotypes and a lack of diversity on‐screen. However, transformations in technology that alter the production and dissemination of media present the possibility of decreasing inequality for women and racial/ethnic minorities.

Unapologetic Blackness in Action: Embodied Resistance and Social Movement Scenes in Black Celebrity Activism

“…Yet, when these gatekeepers are overwhelmingly white, most cultural productions are biased to privilege white perceptions. Erigha (2015a:79) clarifies this problematic when stating, “Because cultural products are inextricably linked to meanings derived from the people working in culture industries, at stake in the production of popular culture is the ability for various social groups to develop and disseminate their own meaning systems.”…”

New York Yankees and Hollywood Anglos: The persistence of Anglo‐conformity in the American motion picture industry

“…There is a considerable body of work on the sociology of Hollywood and the lack of minority representation both on and off screen (Erigha ; Hunt and Ramon ; Bielby and Bielby ). Our work adds to this literature, but focuses more on the relative representation of ethnic categories among white Americans in the motion picture industry than between whites and others.…”

How Movies with a Female Presence Fare with Critics

“…Erigha (2015) argues that there are three types of representation within the film industry: numerical representation ("a social group's presence or absence on-screen"), centrality of representation (whether a social group is included at the core or the margins of the industry), and quality of representation (whether members of a social group have the chance to play "multi-dimensional, multi-faceted roles") (pg. 79).…”