Social Class and the media
The powerful influence most
denied in the United States
Social stratification

In all societies there is some form of
hierarchy

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Distribution of social rewards/values is not
entirely equal in any society
Hierarchy varies

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How steep
Bases for hierarchy
Social Class

Stratification within a society based on a
number of variables

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Income
Education
Breeding (Tastes)
Blood (Old rich v. nouveau riche)
Does class exist in America?

Largely denied by U.S. culture


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“Classless society”
“The belief that the United States is a
classless society or, alternatively, that
most Americans are “middle class”
persists . . . despite pervasive
socioeconomic stratification”
(Bullock, Wyche and Williams, 2001)
Reasons for denial

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Meritocracy
 Market system
Equal opportunity
 Legal blindness to most demographic
differences
Upward mobility
Overshadowed by other concerns
 Race
 Sex (Gender)
 Religion
 Nationalism
Yes—social class exists in
America


Vast differences among Americans in their
incomes, property, power
Life chances are significantly influenced
by social class at birth

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Education
Access to technology
Network of opportunities

But things are getting better, right?
What about social mobility?

Mobility among classes is relatively common in the United
States, but:


Children of the rich tend to be afforded a great deal of advantage in
education, networking, ability to try and fail, etc.
People of different classes have fairly limited personal contact

Geographic segregation


Intermarriage across widely differing social classes is uncommon
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PRIZM
Cinderella
Pretty Woman
Princess and the Pea
The Nanny
Old money tends to maintain the class position of the next
generation
Greatest access to higher circles has been through technology
Social class affects:

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Media access/choice
Content preferences
Interpretation of media content
Representation within media content
Power over media
Social class and media use

Access to media

More expensive media tend to be used more by the
relatively well-to-do


Literacy levels

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Digital divide
Written materials
Taste cultures

“High culture” v. “low culture” (popular culture)

Opera v. hip-hop
Internet use by household income
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Use Internet
LT
$15K
$1525K
$2535K
$3550K
$5075K
$75K+
Source: Mediamark Research, Inc.

iPods/MP3 players are gadgets for the upscale. Fully
18% of those who live in households earning more than
$75,000 have them; 13% of those living in households
earning $50,000 to $75,000 have them; 9% of those
living in households earning $30,000-$50,000 own them
and 7% of those living in households earning less than
$30,000 have them. (20% of respondents did not tell us
their household income.)

Source: Pew Internet and American Life Project
Content Preferences
Source: NEA 2002 Survey of Participation in the Arts
0.6
0.5
0.4
<$20K
$20-50K
>$50K
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
Primetime
Daytime
Source: 2000 Porter Novelli Healthstyles Survey
Interpretation of content

Class-based worldview influences
interpretations
Stereotypes

Just as for African Americans or women,
etc. there are stereotypes that go with
being working class or lower class

Usually negative for those lower on the status
hierarchy
What are lower-class women
like?

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Trashy
Oversexed
Unsophisticated
Domestic

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Kids
Dependant/“Golddigger”
Focused on men
What are lower-class men like?

Violent

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Brutish
Dominant
Stupid
Ignorant
Focused on cars, sports, sex
Racist
Sexist
Engage in hair-brained schemes to get ahead
Lack taste
Representation

Over-representation of professionals and
relatively well-to-do on TV

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Parallel situation in film, though more varied
Working class and poor ‘invisibility’

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Except as cops and criminals
Occasional representations are often
stereotypic
When lower- and working-class
people are depicted
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Tend to be portrayed as foolish or ignorant

“Trailer trash” can be portrayed in ways that would
cause significant outcry if applied to racial minorities,
etc.
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Archie Bunker
Homer Simpson
Seen as sexist, racist, violent, unintelligent and
entirely lacking in taste

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Jerry Springer
WWE
Blue Collar Comedy
Clampetts go to Maui
Prime Time programming

Early television included a number of
working-class leads

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Ralph Cramden
Marty
More recent examples
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All in the Family
Roseanne

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However, the tone of Prime Time is
heavily white-collar/professional or upper
class
The main exceptions are law enforcement
personnel in “cop shows,” ‘reality’ shows
and daytime talk shows

Often connect poor and working class with
negative depictions, low culture
Soap operas

“On soap operas, single mothers are typically
portrayed as White, upper-middle-class
professionals, with nurturing male friends and an
abundance of reliable child care providers
(Larson, 1996).”

“Teenage girls who were heavy viewers of soap
operas were more likely than lighter viewers to
underestimate the relationship between single
motherhood and poverty and to overestimate the
percentage of single mothers in high-paying jobs.”
Media facilitate “classless
society” myth by:
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Presenting the interests of the well-off (e.g.,
stock, financial portfolios, and leisure time) as
general concerns
Downplaying the structural economic concerns
(e.g., job security, income) of the working class
and poor, and
Emphasizing shared interclass concerns (e.g.,
safety, crime)
Portraying the middle class as the norm, with
little representation of interclass tension
Content analysis of Newsweek
1993-1995

De Goede (1996) found that “the language used
in the articles reinforced strong ingroupoutgroup class-based distinctions,
simultaneously extolling the moral superiority of
the middle class while degrading the values and
behaviors of the poor.”

Single African American mothers and teenage
mothers often the focus of these negative articles
Depictions of drug crimes

“Although the ‘typical’ drug consumer and
dealer is an employed, high-schooleducated European American man, the
majority of arrests depicted on realitybased crime programs involve African
American and Latino men in densely
populated, urban areas (Anderson, 1994).”
Tabloid news shows
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Tabloid news shows tended to “focus on
stories involving upper-class criminals,
particularly celebrities, whereas
“highbrow” news programs were more
likely to focus on stories involving
working-class, unemployed criminals.”
Also tend to show “rags to riches” stories
or the “hollowness of wealth”
Welfare Recipients

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“Welfare recipients are among the . . . the most
hated and stereotyped groups in contemporary
society”
Only one among 17 stereotyped groups
(feminists, housewives, retarded people, Blacks,
migrant workers, etc.) that respondents both
disliked and disrespected.

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Lacking both competence and warmth
However, most common group of welfare
recipients is poor children
Media representations concentrate on their
mothers
Connection to race

European Americans greatly overestimate
the percentage of African Americans who
are poor
Stereotypes in media and popular
culture
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African American men—members of
“threatening and violent underclass”
African American women—welfare queens or as
“ignorant, promiscuous women caught in a selfperpetuating ‘cycle of dependency’”
Emphasis on African Americans tends to render
white poor ‘invisible’ in popular culture

Popular music draws heavily from urban
lower class and rural working class
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Rap
Hip-hop
What does all this lead to?
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Blaming the victim

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Support for a heavily hierarchical reward system
Low self-esteem among ‘lower classes’
Ability of the well-to-do to engage in modern
“Social Darwinism”

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Personality failure rather than structural disadvantage
Don’t have to face their own responsibility for poor
conditions many live under
Exultation of self-interest

Mean World (for real)

Their personal shortcomings lead to a need for
care from professionals

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
Problems stem from personal failings (not society,
actions of others)
Jerry Springer
WWE
Implies that social policy should protect the
populace from a dangerous, personally lacking
group rather than treating a structural problem

“By dedicating little broadcast time or
print space to stories that openly discuss
class privilege, class-based power
differences, and inequalities, the poor are
either rendered invisible or portrayed in
terms of characterological deficiencies and
moral failings (e.g., substance abuse,
crime, sexual, availability, violence).”