Violence: Race

Abstract

Violence and race have a tremendous impact on health outcomes in the United States and around the world. Scholars from a variety of fields, including criminology, sociology, communication, and public health, agree that populations experiencing racial discrimination and stigmatization and/or violence and brutality often also experience health inequalities and poor health outcomes. Race and violence have an impact both at the macro, systemic level, where minorities experience institutional racism, unfair treatment, and police violence, and at the micro, psychosocial level, where cultural and social processes influence individuals' predisposition to violence. The constructs of violence and race are both intricately related to health because they create an inequitable social structure that brings minority individuals closer to harmful situations and decreases their ability and desire to seek medical assistance and voice their concerns. With the rise of the “Black Lives Matter” movement more attention has been given to the topics of race and violence and the ways they impact minority communities. Although some health communication scholars have studied the relationships between race, violence, and health, a great deal more work is needed to better understand structural racism, the resulting violence, communicative erasures, and health inequalities racism creates, and how health communication can mitigate the impact of race and violence on minority health.