Using Media Literacy to Explore
Stereotypes of Mexican Immigrants
Lucila Vargas and Bruce dePyssler
Exposure to the mass media is now a central means by which young people learn and
internalize the values, beliefs, and norms of our political system, a socialization that lays
the foundation for much of later political life.1
David Croteau & William Hoynes
Historically, many Americans have held negative feelings toward immigrants. This
appears especially true, as recent political campaigns and voter initiatives indicate, in the
case of Mexican immigrants. Media misrepresentations of immigrants, and particularly
Mexicans, play a significant role in shaping public attitudes and opinion.
For those without any first-hand experience, the media are the main source of
information, assumptions, and sentiments about immigrants and their U.S.-born
descendants. For immigrants, media portrayals constitute America’s evaluation of them
and their immigrant experience. In describing the role of film as a social educator, Carlos
E. Cortés writes that Hollywood movies offer a kind of popular curriculum on
immigration.î2
In this article, we examine media portrayals of Mexican immigrants, and the interplay
between these images and portrayals of U.S.-born Latinos. Examining media images has
become a pedagogical imperative because media saturation in the form of billboards,
movies, radio, television, and the Internet has reached levels scarcely imaginable just 25
years ago. By the time they graduate from high school, children will have spent 50
percent more time in front of a television set than in front of a teacher, says Madeline
Levine.3 Children between the ages of 2 to 11 watch 28 to 30 hours of television a week,
and view between 300 and 1,600 advertisements a day, while young adolescents (12 to 14
years old) watch an estimated 26 hours of television per week.4 Later in adolescence,
teenagers do shift away from television viewing, but become heavy consumers of
recorded music, making up 25 percent of all record, CD, and cassette sales.5
Beginning with a short look at Mexican immigration, we proceed to examine media
stereotypes of both Mexican immigrants and U.S.-born Latinos, since we believe these
portrayals buttress one another. The public and media producers often fail to distinguish
between these groups. One consequence of this failure is that Mexican immigrants and
their descendants seem to maintain forever the status of permanent immigrant, while
European arrivals are able to melt in and become real Americans. Perhaps this is why
Mexican Americans are sometimes offended by the question, "Where are you from?" It
may also explain their occasional irritation with the expectation of others that they speak
Spanish.
Finally, we suggest a media literacy framework. Above all, media literacy is the ability to
read media texts critically. It involves developing cognitive, emotional, aesthetic, and
moral abilities for interpreting media messages. Its purpose is to give students control
over the influence of media. We hope this media literacy approach to the
misrepresentation of Mexican immigrants and U.S. Latinos will be useful for social
studies teachers working with immigrant and non-immigrant students.
Immigration the Misunderstood Threat
We are a nation of immigrants that sometimes feels threatened by the complex
socioeconomic and political phenomenon of immigration. Ten million immigrants were
granted legal permanent resident status in the United States between 1987 and 1996. In
1996, the U.S. admitted 915,900 legal immigrants, of whom 18% (163,572) originated
from Mexico. About 1.9 % (5 million) of the total U.S. population is illegal, or
undocumented. The Mexican undocumented population has grown about 150,000
annually since 1988.6
A longitudinal analysis of national opinion polls from 1937 to 1990 shows that,
historically, most Americans have favored restrictions measures in immigration.7 A 1993
Newsweek poll found that 60% of respondents stated that immigrants are a bad thing for
the country.8 Much hostility has been directed at undocumented Mexicans. But it has also
been directed at documented workers, and even at those Mexican Americans, who were,
as they say, crossed by the border when the U.S. seized half of Mexico’s territory in
1848.
Failing to understand the complex political and economic forces behind transnational
immigration heightens our inability to think clearly about immigrants. A common
perception is that people emigrate to flee poverty, overpopulation, and economic
stagnation. But Alejandro Ports and Rubén G. Rumbaut question this perception in a
book indispensable to the social studies teacher, Immigrant America: A Portrait:
... contrary to the conventional portrait of Mexican immigration as a movement initiated
by the individualistic calculations of gain of the migrants themselves, the process has its
historical origins in North American geopolitical and economic expansion that first
restructured the neighboring nation and then proceeded to organize dependable labor
flows out of it. Such movements across the new border were a well-established routine in
the Southwest before they became redefined as immigration, and then as illegal
immigration.9
As has happened elsewhere for example, in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, El
Salvador, Taiwan, South Korea, and the Philippines U.S. political, economic, and
military linkages set in motion the conditions supporting immigration. A popular
immigrant saying puts it this way: We're here because you were there.
Immigrants in the Mass Media
While Latino media (e.g., Spanish-language TV stations and newspapers, as well as
bilingual and English-language magazines) now thrive in the United States, the influence
of the general-market media remains paramount. We focus on the images offered by the
latter. However, teachers should be aware that Mexican immigrant youth are often
exposed to alternative images from Latino media.10 There is little doubt that media offer
powerful representations of immigrants. Though students may receive contradictory
messages, such as when a PBS documentary celebrates the many contributions of
immigrants, on the whole they do not see immigrants faring well in news and
entertainment media. And this repeats a historical pattern.
For example, a content analysis of immigration coverage in leading news magazines that
spanned 110 years (1880-1990) and included Time, Life, Atlantic Monthly, and Readerís
Digest, concluded that most magazines advocated restrictive immigration policies:
The large majority of the magazines surveyed (and they represent a cross section of the
industry) were always ambivalent about how many foreigners ought to be allowed to
come to our shores. In the time span of the survey, there were always more people who
wanted to settle in the United States than the magazines thought ought to be permitted;
and they seemed always to be coming from the wrong countries. When the largest influx
of immigrants was coming from eastern and southern Europe, the magazines bemoaned
the loss of the sturdy, independent, hard-working northern and western Europeans. When
the direction shifted and the neighboring southern countries of the Western hemisphere
were the major sources of origin, the European immigrant of yesteryear took on a rosy
glow.11
Immigration during the 19th century was dominated by immigrants from Ireland,
Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Norway/Sweden. From 1900 to 1920, the
largest immigrant groups were from Italy, Austria/Hungary, and the Soviet Union. Since
1961, Mexicans have been the largest immigrant group.12 In their content analysis, Simon
and Alexander found that Mexicans and other Latin American immigrants, as well as
those from Asia and the Pacific, were seen as social and economic burdens unable to
assimilate into U.S. culture.
The general-market media is anti-immigrant sentiment hardens when it comes to people
of color. In her content analysis of three elite U.S. dailies in cities that are traditional
immigrant areas (Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles), Katrina Pomper says that press
over covers Asian and Hispanic immigrants, but almost ignores Europeans. This indicates
a clearly racist pattern. She concludes that overall this study offers a gloomy picture of
immigrant coverage.î13
Stereotypes of Mexican Immigrants and U.S. Latinos
Media use stereotypes to convey meaning expeditiously that is, as a kind of shorthand. In
a 15-second advertisement, an audience might be shown that an elderly woman is a
grandmother by seating her in a rocking chair and having her knit. Such stereotypes,
positive or negative, simplify the communicator’s job. They get a lot of communicative
work done quickly.
In the general-market media, stereotypes of Mexican immigrants are overwhelmingly
negative. In part, this is because most foreign minorities are constructed by the media as a
problem. Whenever immigrants make the news these days, it seems it is always bad
news, says John J. Miller.14 This trend is compounded for Mexican immigrants by the
fact that media images of U.S. Latinos have long been negative.15 In this way, two fields
of meanings intersect to portray Mexican immigrants negatively. Jorge Quiroga
underscores the overlap between media stereotypes of U.S. Latinos and images of
impoverished Latin American immigrants. U.S. Latinos, he writes, are irregularly
presented as uneducated immigrants who are unable or unwilling to help or speak for
themselves.î16
Two types of media representations of Mexican immigrants and other Latinos can be
distinguished. One is of immigrant groups who come in waves or as a rising tide. The
other is of individual immigrants, who appear most often in entertainment media.
Group Representations
Although we found no studies comparing the two, our reading suggests that media
representations of Mexican immigrants as a group are much more common than images
of them as individuals, especially in the news. Who hasn’t seen some television crew film
of a herd of poor Mexicans swiftly weaving their way through the borderline traffic jams
near San Diego? It’s a grim sight, and it feeds popular misperceptions, says Miller.17
When media present group portrayals of Mexican immigrants, these people typically
appear as outsiders unable or unwilling to assimilate, as welfare cheats draining society,
or as people who do not pay taxes wresting jobs from citizens who do.18 Here, media
foreground immigrants caught in criminal activity as well as illegal aliens, often
neglecting to distinguish between documented and undocumented immigrants. This
stereotype appeals most to conservative appetites.
Studies of television networks and major newspapers (key media sources that establish
the standards of the journalistic profession) are not encouraging. In their annual analyses
of news stories broadcast on three networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) in 1995, 1996, and
1997, Rod Carbeth and Diane Alverio have found what they describe as a network
brownout, in which the total number of stories focusing on Latinos and Latino-related
issues has fluctuated between 1 to 3%. They also show that when Latinos do appear, it is
most often in affirmative action, immigration, welfare, crime, and drugs stories.19
In the news, there is a complex juxtaposition of stock-in-trade media portrayals of
Mexican immigrants as criminals (ìllegals or smugglers of drugs and people) and as
victims (naïve peons). A 1992-1995 content and textual analysis of North Carolinas most
influential newspaper, the Raleigh News and Observer, found Latinos consistently
portrayed either as criminal aliens or as helpless victims/peons.20 Here, the immigrant is
stripped of the courage and strength characteristic of a survivor in a patronizing media
construction that evokes pity from outsiders and humiliation on the part of the immigrant.
The victim/peon portrayal appeals to liberal appetites.
A CBS news report on migrant farm workers provides a group portrait of Mexican
immigrants. The video is of undocumented immigrants caught crossing the border. Dan
Rather is voiceover says:
These two are both prototype and stereotype of the migrant worker: a husband and wife
she is seven months pregnant; he is a farm worker. They are two of thousands who will
try to cross the Rio Grande this night without papers, without money, and without
prospects.21
One is left with a sense given this desperate and humiliating beginning that had the
couple eluded border patrols, their child would inevitably become one of the Latino
criminals apprehended in the reality-based television program Cops. Such victims,
alongside criminal aliens, are the stock-and-trade background of Hollywood films like
Borderline (1980, starring Charles Bronson) and The Border (1982, starring Jack
Nicholson).22
Individual Representations
In contrast to group representations, portrayals of individual Mexican immigrants are
rare. This runs in tandem with the scarcity of images of Latinos in the general-market
media. As mentioned, general-market media seldom make clear distinctions between
recent immigrants and U.S.-born Latinos. Latinos are consistently portrayed more
negatively than any other racial or ethnic group concludes a literature review on Latinos
and the media done by the largest national Latino advocacy organization, the National
Council of La Raza.23 This review reports on data found in several studies that have
systematically monitored minority inclusion in the media, such as the Annenberg School
of Communications massive Cultural Indicators Project directed by George Gerbner.
It is unusual for Latinos to play lead characters either on films or in television series. For
instance, in 1994, only 11 of 800 national prime time roles were played by Latinos.24
Only once has a Latino family been the focus of a prime time series (ABC ís short-lived
Condo).25 Latinos are scarce in magazine advertisements, too. One recent study found
that only about 1 in 21 ads contained a Latino model, and just 1 in 45 contains a Latino in
a major role.î26
Latinos do, however, appear as supporting players and background figures for example,
as the law-breakers and victims in fiction and reality-based programs.27 Typically, they
are portrayed in narrow stereotypical ways. Film researchers have identified six Latino
media stereotypes: (1) dark lady, (2) Latin lover, (3) female clown, (4) male buffoon, (5)
half-breed harlot, and (6) bandito.28 Sometimes these stereotypes appear in combination.
For instance, the Frito-Lay Frito Bandito advertising campaign created a bandito-buffoon.
The dark lady and the Latin lover were established early in Hollywood with the
prototypes of Dolores del Río (Mexican, 1930s) and Rudoph Valentino (Italian, 1920s).
These fair-skinned and European-looking Latino stereotypes had irresistible erotic appeal
to Anglos. Though considered positive, these stereotypes reduce the diversity of a large
social group to a few characteristics, as well as highlighting real class and/or race
distinctions that exist among Latinos.29 The representation of recent Mexican immigrants
seldom draws on these stereotypes, since these immigrants are constructed as an
underclass.
The female clown and the male buffoon appear more often. They provide comic relief
and have an uncanny ability to make fools of themselves. They speak funny English.
They are unable to control their emotions. Desi Arnaz, Lucy is husband in I Love Lucy,
and Carmen Miranda, the Brazilian famous for her fruit-covered hats, played early
versions of these stereotypes. Rosie Perezís character in It Could Happen to You (1994) is
a recent example of the female clown.
The bandito is dirty, irrational, treacherous, and violent. In silent greaser films, this
stereotype was so distasteful that the Mexican government once banned these films.
Common in early westerns, the bandito has managed a comeback as drug lord and innercity gangster. Like the bandito, the half-breed harlot has difficulty controlling her
passions. She is a slave to her sexuality.
Typically, banditos and harlots are not major characters, but they often play minor roles
in film (e.g., Terminator 2, 1991; Pretty Woman, 1990) and television (e.g., Hunter and
Hill Street Blues). A shameless construction of Latino youth as both banditos and harlots
can be found in the recent film 187 (1996).
Negative group and individual stereotypes of immigrants and Latinos are rarely balanced
by positive representations, such as lawyer Victor Sifuentes played by Jimmie Smits on
NBC ís ìL.A. Law (1986-1994). One has to turn to Latino media to find the economic
and cultural contributions of Mexican immigrants and U.S. Latinos in the foreground.
Immigrant hardships are constructed differently in Latino media. For instance, Univision
and Telemundo (U.S. Spanish-language television networks) often portray immigrants as
courageous survivors even as entrepreneurs who persist in holding families together
despite adversity. Chicano films, such as The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez (1982) and My
Family/Mi Familia (1995), portray Mexican immigrants who possess strength, dignity,
and pride group identities that are culturally reaffirming for Latino youth.
A Media Literacy Approach for Social Studies
Research suggests that teen attitudes toward current affairs derive more from the mass
media than from teachers, parents, or peers.30 This influence calls for a commensurate
educational response, one that alerts students to the power of the media, enables them to
apply critical skills when examining media texts, and helps them problematize their
media experiences.
Media literacy attempts to meet this challenge by tapping students’ media-based
perceptions and helping them to interpret media texts by identifying the interests and
processes that guide their production. Widespread media literacy is essential if all citizens
are to wield power, make rational decisions, become effective change-agents, and have
an active involvement with media writes Len Masterman.31
The media literacy movement has hammered out a conceptual framework that is
extremely useful for the social studies educator. What follows is a brief tour of the
movement’s key principles, 32 plus suggestions on how social studies teachers can apply
this framework in their classes.
> The starting point for media literacy is this: Media do not provide a window on the
world; rather, they present constructions of reality. Media producers select small pieces
of the real world and use them as building blocks in their constructions. All media
content is the end product of innumerable filtering processes, selections, and choices
made by certain social actors typically white, male, and middle class. Social studies
teachers can apply this fundamental concept of media literacy to help students
deconstruct media images of Mexican immigrants and U.S. Latinos.
> All media texts can be deconstructed because all are constructions. Deconstructing
news texts, however, is the biggest challenge, since the realism of news media makes it
seem that they are reflecting or transmitting reality. Teachers might begin by examining a
newspaper story on Mexican immigrants. Ask students who they think assigned this
story, who did the reporting, and who made the editing choices (most likely non-Latinos,
since Latinos constitute just 2.2% of the U.S. journalistic workforce).33 Then explore and
discuss what biases might be operating on this story (by offering common sensei
assumptions about immigrants, by influencing the approach to the story, or by
determining the selection of people to interview).
> Media texts are produced within, and thus shaped by, a number of overlapping
contexts. Teachers should help students appreciate how different production contexts
such as historical, political, social, economic, or aesthetic shape media images of
Mexican immigrants. The teacher might show film clips of Mexican immigrants from a
mainstream Hollywood movie such as The Border, and from an independent Chicano
film such as My Family/Mi Familia. The class can then discuss how the differing
contexts may have influenced the strikingly different representations of Mexican
immigrants in these two films.
> Media rely on languages or codes to create meaning. The conventional symbol
systems that media use are complex and layered rhetorical forms. A film, for example,
combines the expressive code of editing (a grammar that takes the viewer from one shot
or scene to another) with other cinematic codes (camera angles and movement, sound,
color, costume, and acting) to advance a convincing plot. Similarly, a newspaper conveys
meaning using such journalistic conventions as story placement, headlines, and graphics.
Understanding how these languages like the discovery that the laughter accompanying a
sitcom is canned is critically liberating. Teachers can, for example, guide students into an
exploration of how filmmakers can use media languages to portray a Mexican immigrant
as a bandito/gangster by helping students to consider plot devices, camera angles, light,
soundtrack, costume, casting, and other choices.
> Media representations contribute to our definitions of social reality. They are public
textbooks and their representations are pregnant with value, especially for those
becoming socialized.34 Media sell products, ideas, personalities, and worldviews. At best,
they define reality and exercise a form of cultural leadership, by articulating relatively
stable and coherent ways of seeing the world, and by offering models for appropriate
attitudes and behavior. Given this, it is critical that social studies teachers help students
think through their attitudes and assumptions about Mexican immigration and how these
might have been influenced by powerful media portrayals.
> Audiences actively interpret media texts. Meaning-making is an interaction between the
text and a culturally bound reader. In the final analysis, meaning is an interpretation
constructed by media consumers in the act of reading media texts. But the cultural tools
that readers interpret with are not uniform. Social location gender, class, age, race,
ethnicity, and other social distinctions shape readers interpretive frameworks. Teachers
can help students understand this by asking students to compare their interpretations of,
for example, advertising images of Latinos. Teachers can point out that, because social
location favors one interpretation over another, media representations of Mexican
immigrants are likely to be interpreted in significantly different ways by Anglo and
Latino students: the former may interpret Taco Bell's recent advertising campaign using
the Chihuahua, Dinky, as funny and into big deal while the latter might interpret it as an
affront.
Final Remarks
Immigration is a complex process that social studies teachers must explore with students.
In this article, we have examined the tendency of the general-market media to portray
Mexican immigrants negatively. These media constructions shape non-immigrant
students’ views on Mexican immigration, and they are likely to diminish the self-esteem
of both Mexican immigrant and U.S. Latino students. Using a media literacy approach,
the social studies teacher has a unique opportunity to guide students to a rich appreciation
of immigration generally and Mexican immigration specifically. With this approach, the
social studies teacher can help future citizens in our democracy make well-informed,
objective, and morally sound decisions.
Notes
1. David Croteau, William Hoynes, Media/Society: Industries, Images, and Audiences
(Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, 1997), 212.
2. Carlos E. Cortés, Them and Us: Immigration as Societal Barometer and Social
Educator in American Film, in Robert Brent Toplin, ed., Hollywood as Mirror: Changing
Views of Outsiders and Enemies in American Movies (Westport: CT: Greenwood, 1993),
53.
3. Madeline Levine, Viewing Violence. How Media Violence Affects Your Childs and
Adolescents Development (New York: Doubleday, 1996), 6.
4. W. James Potter, Media Literacy (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998), 90, 139.
5. Levine, 157.
6. U.S. Department of Justice, 1996 Statistical Yearbook of the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1996), 13, 15, 18,
21, 197. On the web at: http://www.ins.usdoj.gov/ statyrbook96/index.html.
7. Rita J. Simon and Susan H. Alexander, The Ambivalent Welcome: Print Media, Public
Opinion and Immigration (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1993), 41.
8. Tom Morganthau, Newsweek (Aug. 9, 1993), 16-23.
9. Alejandro Portes and Rubén G. Rumbaut, Immigrant America: A Portrait (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1990), 226.
10. Federico A. Subervi-Vélez and Susan Colsant, The Television Worlds of Latino
Children, in Gordon L. Berry and Joy Keiko Asamen, eds., Children and Television
(Newbury Park (REF): Sage, 1993), 227. The authors convincingly argue that the
television worlds of many Hispanic children in the United States are potentially more
complex than the single television world of Anglo children.
11. Simon and Alexander, 244-245. The content analysis was performed on a cross
section of the industry that included the following publications: North American Review,
Saturday Evening Post, Literary Digest, Harperís, Scribnerís, Atlantic Monthly, The
Nation, Christian Century, Commentary, Commonwealth, Readerís Digest, Time, Life,
Newsweek, and U.S. News and World Report, plus editorials from The New York Times.
12. US Department of Justice, 1996 Statistical Yearbook, 14.
13. Katrina Pomper, Reinforcing Stereotypes: Press Coverage about Immigrants by The
New York Times, The Los Angeles Times and The Chicago Tribune, 1985-1994.î Paper
presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education and Mass
Communication, Anaheim, CA, Aug. 1996, 18-19. Pomperís study examined a 10-year
period for each newspaper and used a random sample of 296 immigrant-related stories
indexed under the term immigration.
14. John J. Miller, Immigration, the Press and the New Racism, Media Studies Journal 8,
no. 3 (Summer 1994), 19-28.
15. For comprehensive reviews of the media portrayal of U.S. Latinos, see Clint C.
Wilson and Felix Gutiérrez, Race, Multiculturalism and the Media (Thousand Oaks, CA:
Sage, 1996) and Federico A. Subervi-Vélez, Charles Ramírez Berg, Patricia
Constantakis-Valdez, Chon Noriega, Diana Ríos, and Kenton T. Wilkinson, Mass
Communication and Hispanics, in Felix Padilla, ed., Handbook of Hispanic Cultures in
the United States: Sociology (Houston, TX: Arte Público Press, 1994), 301-57.
16. Jorge Quiroga, Hispanic Voices: Is the Press Listening? in Clara E. Rodriguez, ed.,
Latin Looks: Images of Latinas and Latinos in the U.S. Media (Boulder, CO: Westview
Press, 1997), 21, 36-56.
17. Miller, 27.
18. Eric Schlosser, In the Strawberry Fields, Atlantic Monthly (Nov. 1995).
19. Rod Caret and Diane Algeria, Network Brownout: The Portrayal of Latinos in
Network Television News, Washington, D.C., June 1996; Network Brownout 1997: The
Portrayal of Latinos in Network Television News, Washington, D.C., June 1997; and,
Network Brownout 1998: The Portrayal of Latinos in Network Television News,
Washington, D.C., June 1998. All three content analyses were prepared for the National
Association of Hispanic Journalists using the online Vanderbilt University Network
News Archives. Approximately 12,000 stories were analyzed each year.
20. Lucile Vargas, Genderizing Latino News: A Content and Textual Analysis of a Local
Newspapers Coverage of Latino Current Affairs, unpublished study. Using the Raleigh
News and Observers CD-ROM archives, the author searched 181,088 news items and
found 259 items with Latino content. Standard content analysis techniques were used to
classify the datasets 259 items, and a textual analysis was conducted on the datasets 16
front-page stories. Photocopy available from the author at: School of Journalism and
Mass Communication, CB #3365 Howell Hall, University of North Carolina, Chapel
Hill, NC 27599.
21. CBS, Inc. CBS Reports: Legacy of Shame Transcript of television program (June 20,
1995), 2.
22. David R. Mariel and María Rosa García-Acevedo, The Celluloid Immigrant: The
Narrative Films of Mexican Immigration, in David R. Maciel and María Herrera-Sobek,
eds., Culture Across Borders: Mexican Immigration & Popular Culture (Tucson, AZ:
Univ. of Arizona Press, 1998), 149-202.
23. Lisa Navarrete and Charles Kamasaki, Out of the Picture: Hispanics in the Media
(Washington, D.C.: National Council of La Raza, 1994), 1.
24. Wilson and Gutiérrez, 102.
25. Federico A. Subervi-Vélez, Interactions between Latinos and Anglos on Prime Time
Television: A Case Study of Condo, in S. Chan, Ed., Income and Status Differences
between White and Minority Americans: A Persistent Inequality (Lewiston: NY: Edwin
Mellen, 1990), 303-36.
26. Charles R. Taylor and Hae Kyong Bang, Portrayals of Latinos in Magazine
Advertising, in Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly 74, no. 1 (Summer
1997), 285-303, 297. Taylor and Bang examined a representative sample of 1,616 ads
from nine magazines in 1992-1993 (Time, Newsweek, Good Housekeeping, Vogue,
Business Week, Fortune, Scientific American, Popular Science, and Popular Mechanics).
27. S. Robert Lichter and Daniel R. Amundson, Distorted Reality: Hispanic Characters in
TV Entertainment, in Latin Looks, 57-72.
28. Charles Ramírez-Berg, Stereotyping in Films in General and of the Hispanic in
Particular, in Latin Looks, 104-20.
29. Clara E. Rodríguez, Visual Retrospective: Latino Film Stars, in Latin Looks, 80-84.
30. Croteau and Hoynes, 212.
31. Len Masterman, Teaching the Media (London: Routledge, 1985), 13.
32. Renée Hobbs, the Seven Great Debates in the Media Literacy Movement, in Journal
of Communication 48, no. 1 (Winter 1998), 16-32.
33. David H. Weaver and G. Cleveland Wilhoit, The American Journalist in the 1990s
(Arlington, VA: Freedom Forum, 1992).
34. Cortés, 53.
Teaching Resources
Books
Teachers wishing to bring media literacy to the study of social issues such as immigration
will find background information and instructional support in the following books:
Brown, James A. Television Critical Viewing Skills Education. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence
Erlbaum, 1991.
Buckingham, David, and Julian Sefton-Green. Cultural Studies Goes to School: Reading
and Teaching Popular Media. Bristol, PA: Taylor and Francis, 1995.
Croteau, David, and William Hoynes. Media/Society: Industries, Images, and Audiences.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, 1997.
Grossberg, Lawrence, Ellen Wartella, and D. Charles Whitney. MediaMaking: Mass
Media in a Popular Culture. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998.
Masterman, Len. Teaching the Media. London: Routledge, 1985.
Potter, James. Media Literacy. (REF)
Silverblatt, Art. Media Literacy: Keys to Interpreting Media Messages. Westport, CT:
Praeger, 1995.
with Ellen M. Enright Elliceiri. Dictionary of Media Literacy. Westport, CT: Greenwood,
1997.
Websites
The following websites offer specific ideas for teaching media literacy and/or broader
theoretical discussions of media and their effects. For additional websites on this topic,
see the pullout in Social Education 61, No. 5 (September 1997).
The Media Literacy Online Project
http://interact.uoregon.edu/MediaLit/Homepage
Media Literacy Clearinghouse
http://www.med.sc.edu/medialit.shtml
Directory of Media Literacy Sites Worldwide
http://cfn.cs.dal.ca/cfn/CommunitySupport/AMLNS/internet.html
Center for Media Literacy
http://www.medialit.org/
The Media and Communication Studies Site
http://www.aber.ac.uk/~dgc/mcs.html
Lucila Vargas is assistant professor in the School of Journalism and Mass
Communication at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Bruce dePyssler is
assistant professor in the Department of English at North Carolina Central University in
Durham.