Ronald L. Jackson

Michael L. Hecht

Sidney A. Ribeau

Exploring Identity and Culture (Volume in Lea's Communication Series)

African American Communication

Jamie E. Moshin

For years, research concerning masculinities has explored the way that men have dominated, exploited, and dismantled societies, asking how we might make sense of marginalized masculinities in the context of male privilege. This volume asks not only how terms such as men and masculinity are socially defined and culturally instantiated, but also how the media has constructed notions of masculinity that have kept minority masculinities on the margins. Essays explore marginalized masculinities as communicated through film, television, and new media, visiting representations and marginalized identity politics while also discussing the dangers and pitfalls of a media pedagogy that has taught audiences to ignore, sidestep, and stereotype marginalized group realities. While dominant portrayals of masculine versus feminine characters pervade numerous television and film examples, this collection examines heterosexual and queer, military and civilian, as well as Black, Japanese, Indian, White, and Latino masculinities, offering a variance in masculinities and confronting male privilege as represented on screen, appealing to a range of disciplines and a wide scope of readers.

Identity Politics in TV, Film, and New Media

Communicating Marginalized Masculinities

Kimberly R. Moffitt

Simone Adams

One of the most popular shows to come out of Shondaland, Shonda Rhimes’s production company, is ABC’s political drama Scandal (2012–18)—a series whose tremendous success and marketing savvy led LA Times critic Mary McNamara to hail it as "the show that Twitter built" and Time magazine to name its protagonist as one of the most influential fictional characters of 2013. The series portrays a fictional Washington, DC, and features a diverse group of characters, racially and otherwise, who gather around the show’s antiheroine, Olivia Pope, a powerful crisis manager who happens to have an extramarital affair with the president of the United States. For seven seasons, audiences learned a great deal about Olivia and those interwoven in her complex world of politics and drama, including her team of "gladiators in suits," with whom she manages the crises of Washington’s political elite. This volume, named for both Olivia’s team and the show’s fans, analyzes the communication, politics, stereotypes, and genre techniques featured in the television series while raising key questions about the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, and viewing audiences. The essays range from critical looks at various members of Scandal’s ensemble, to in-depth analyses of the show’s central themes, to audience reception studies via interviews and social media analysis. Additionally, the volume contributes to research on femininity, masculinity, and representations of black womanhood on television. Ultimately, this collection offers original and timely perspectives on what was one of America’s most "scandalous" prime-time network television series.

Race, Gender, and the Politics of Representation in Scandal

Gladiators in Suits

Mark C. Hopson

How do Black men imagine who they are and what they must do ...within their families, communities, and the world?&ltBR> The essays in this collection both ask and attempt to answer this question. Based in communication, and drawing from diverse disciplines, &ltI>Masculinity in the Black Imagination seeks to address identity, race, and gender by examining the communicative dimensions of Black manhood. The collection works to define, deconstruct, and contextualize the interactive practice of masculinity as both a local and global phenomenon.

Politics of Communicating Race and Manhood

Masculinity in the Black Imagination

African American Communication and Identities brings together key essays concerning communicative aspects of African American identities. This book explains the disciplinary dimensions of African American communication literature: communication theory & identity; language & rhetoric; relational contexts; gendered contexts; organizational & instructional contexts; mass mediated contexts. This is the first anthology of well-known essays concerning the study of both African American communication and African American identities, showing how each mutually informs the other.

Essential Readings

African American Communication & Identities

Traces the origins of Black body politics in the United States and its contemporary manifestations in hip-hop music and film.

Identity, Discourse, and Racial Politics in Popular Media

Scripting the Black Masculine Body

Cultural identities are negotiated within the interaction of individuals and groups but the exchange is often more deleterious for marginalized groups than it is for whites. This book offers a new conceptual approach to defining the cultural self in order to gain insight into the process and outcome of intercultural interaction.

Ronald L. Jackson

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