Summer Research

"My bro from down the road yeah...Got sent away for seven and a half years for holding his fork...Justa fork blud, he was feeding his baby."

An Investigation into how black British teens that become involved in street crime are represented in media.

This essay will investigate how black British teens that become involved in street crime are represented in the media. It will also consider why these young black British adolescents are involved in street crime in the first place and consider how this phenomenon might be influenced by the media. We can agree that street crime has become an increasing talking point over the recent years and that some urban areas have seen a dramatic increase of both gun and knife crime. It has been argued that: “We won’t stop this by pretending it isn’t young black kids doing it,” suggesting that the representations are based on reality. Thus, this quote would link to the ‘hypodermic needle theory’ as this theory relates to the way in which the audience are injected with information, which they see within the media, in a specific text. For instance, the opinions that hooded teenagers that partake in gun and knife crime, the audience are therefore influence in to agreeing with the stereotypes and ideologies distributed. In terms of the negative interpretation of black adolescents within the media it is debated here whether or not actually these stereotypes are in all true. In actual fact, what we have to take on board is who is behind what is shown on our TV screens and also mainstream media. Furthermore, how this stereotype is obeyed as far as entertainment is concerned, i.e. Adulthood, Kidulthood, bullet boy etc and also the modern media news.
Ever since slavery, contemporary black people have been abused by socially and subject to negative stereotyping. In this contemporary day and age, there are negative labels which linger heavily over black youth and their culture. Yet stereotypes have been generated about black people because of the ways that they conduct themselves in public on the streets, and the way in which they draw attention to themselves, in addition, to racist, hegemonic values dominating in many media outlets. So, stereotypes about black ethnic groups transpire because of the way they dress, for instance, wearing big black hoodies, baseball caps and wearing their trousers somewhat low down. But these styles are influenced by the media in the first place: “US gangster films such as Get Rich or Die Tryin’ has countless features which enable young adolescents to replicate.” This successful film stars 50 Cent who is and constructed a global icon for both black and white youths today. So these dress conventions are often artificial and constructed for black British teens to imitate. Ferguson argued that: “Wars, murders, racist attacks are part of the seemingly endless flow of media representation of black British teens” . Equally leading cultural theorist and sociologist, Stuart Hall (1972-79), talks about the misrepresentations that black people experience from the media along with the negative representations which are illustrated in society.
Stuart Hall also identifies that there were three main stereotypes linked in with black ethnic groups which were also repeatedly reinforced through media. These three main stereotypes were ‘the native figure, the clown and the slave figure.’ This shows what is often portrayed in contemporary news with relevant examples being black youths involved with gun and knife crime. “Black people are more likely to be stopped and searched that white people.” The law says that, the police have the rights to stop and search people if they believe that this person could have a weapon on them or even drugs. Having said that, when the police are conducting these stop and searches, how many of those people would be black? From the media, those being stopped and searched are black which suggests the stereotypes followed are directly linked in terms of what the TV shows.
This is a common representation highlighting the idea of violence and unacceptable behaviour amongst what most black people feel as ‘the other’. The audience seeing these stereotypes show black male teenagers within the news which are likely to become intolerant as a result it could be seen as normal to those of the ethnicity to conduct themselves like this which links in with moral panic. In addition, could it be debated that the media control what people think and their views? “The media do have the ability to marginalise such groups and give a rise to these intolerant people.” This quote signifies that the audience can easily be convinced because of the pessimistic portrayal and representation of black male teenagers frequently shown across the news. This may become extremely possible that the viewers have off-putting views upon black ethnic group of people.
Galtang and Ruge’s theory successfully shows the main news values when the news is being presented. The key element of a value that they identified was the key point of how big a story is. It therefore raises questions in terms of, “Is the story popular enough in order to be distributed in to the news?” This intends the force of not having a story which is not popular enough which represents black people in way which is consistently a negative portrayal. In addition, the argument from this is that within black teens famous celebrities being portrayed in the UK are undoubtedly more negative pictures rather than positive ones. For instance, those teenagers that are involved in ‘Gangster rap or UK Grime’ music are more likely to be causing street crime. "There needs to be a collective effort to combat underachievement and low aspirations amongst our young black men. These kids need realistic alternatives to show them that every opportunity is available to them." So the lyrics and more importantly the purpose of the music often related to how much these people use gun and knife and at the same time partaking in gangs which would lead to drugs.
Therefore, the influence of the music may restrain black youths to look up to the artists they believe are positive role models rather than negative ones. “Negative stories are more likely to grab headlines for the smallest of things, having said that, positive performances are more or less uncared for.” Young black UK celebrities such as Craig David, Chipmunk etc represent tremendously positive representation of thriving black artists who were also raised in hard working urban areas within the capital city of London. However, both artists mentioned above have stereotypical backgrounds and whether their success has ever been highly spoken of despite their success is a matter to be brought up. Even in UK films, do all UK films represent black males as positives? And would it be reasonable to suggest that UK based films are not remotely successful even across Europe? Having said that, there is no question that UK based movies are enormously dependable on their support just from UK audiences which would mean that the representations within the films must be sensible and not to go against the stereotype. “Adulthood, a new year, a day to remember, Adulthood takes you through all the nitty-gritty of London showing you an indication of what life is like for these young black British teens in particular.” This movie persists of both gun and knife crimes along with clearly distributed sex and alcohol. So, does this create a moral panic within society because of the stereotype that is being portrayed in films as of Adulthood?
"White people using their power to exclude black or Asian people from opportunities for good health care, education and employment" suggests that black people shouldn’t have the top level success and therefore should remain a lower class and remain with lower class jobs. However, positive black British movie directors such as Noel Anthony Clarke have increased, with Noel Clarke being one of many black British directors setting out examples and being encouraging role models. Having won a BAFTA award winning English actor, director and screenwriter from London. He is best known for playing Wyman Norris in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet and Mickey Smith in Doctor Who. Clarke appeared in and wrote the screenplay for Kidulthood and wrote, directed and starred in the sequel, Adulthood which gained £1, 209, 2319 from the opening weekend of its release. The success of Noel Clarke has moved from negative representation of black British people from the media to the new era of multi talented actors or has it?
On the opinions that people have stereotypical views of black ethnic teenagers as “thugs”, “bad influences” and “causing nuisance” then these black male teenagers would even more so be linked with these headings. Does this subsequently fabricate further moral panic within contemporary society? For the simple motive that this stereotype is being portrayed within movies like Adulthood, also to what measure would the involvement of the storyline have on the viewers? According to Auteur theory it could be hinted that the movie is predominately accounting on the directors’ opinions. In terms of the negative approach, along with the stereotypical views of black British teens especially in movies such as ‘Kidulthood’ and ‘Adulthood’ there is no question that the setting of the movie will give it the expectancy of the stereotype to be addressed from the viewers.
A prime reference of this would be the estate housing where you see young black British teens living in, by showing this to the audience; the audience are quickly able to sum up the stereotype of young black youths as criminal offenders. These types of areas are also shown in the news, when a serious crime takes place such as gun or knife crime. “For a number of years, there were a limited amount of black British people working on television however, every time there was black British people they were shown to be as problems” “There is a pattern of insulting stereotypes in cinemas hovering around black culture.” Endless repetitive of negative representations in films will sooner or later construct additional moral panic within contemporary society. Having said that, when these stereotypes are acted out in movies, is it more likely that the audience might consider agreeing with the stereotype that is being addressed? Furthermore, if audiences have made their judgements in terms of believing about the stereotypes then black British teens could therefore have a conclusion of believing and start to live up to the stereotype and tolerate others to believe that they might be correct. Following, Auteur’s theory with the news in the UK also could be reliable on who produced the news stories and whether or not it is news worthy linking it to Gultang and Ruge’s theory. “Every story from the news is influenced by the mentality of the editors and writers.” If the increase of negative representation of black British teens is publicised frequently then moral panic will also mount which will then gradually affect the youths who are in gangs.
In recent years there are no doubt that there have been many changes that involve in contemporary UK news. In terms of the print media, certain tabloids express their views and opinions extremely clearly. It is important to discuss about the print media has many of the audiences consume this platform of media. This will allow me to investigate the stereotypical and racist comments from a tabloid paper against black British teens. There was a specific article that has been discussed openly via a tabloid newspaper about a young lad who suffered severe stab wounds in south London not so long ago. “It’s our people committing such outrages crimes, and I just don’t understand why.” The news puts into perception that the place of black people within contemporary society as it proved that black British teens have no fears what so ever about the law. “Black lives are progressing to be worthless, has harsh as it sounds that’s the way it’s looking.” Moreover, the constant ideology of black British teens acting this way has gathered fright in society.

In conclusion, it could be debated that the core ideology would be that the thought of black teenagers are notorious and always involved in crime one way or the other. The suggestion that negative representation that are being represented through the contemporary UK news increase the moral panic within society on the assumption that black teenagers are allied with the ‘typical’ representations and stereotypes. Consequently, black youths could therefore exist up to the stereotypes by conducting these street crimes and at the same time allowing the audience to perceive views upon a particular group. The observation of black British adolescents which therefore emphasises and generates moral panic from the vision that most black British youths execute crimes, reason for this could be due to the fact that a small quantity of positive news are rarely distributed within the contemporary UK news.

Word Count: 2,211