ABSTRACT
This chapter details the disparity between the upwardly mobile position of black people on television and the acutely disadvantaged position of many black people in society. It focuses on the positive consequences of this disparity, particularly the role played by positive TV images in countering traditional stereotypes of African Americans. The chapter addresses some of the less sanguine consequences of televisual distortion. The problem concerns the picture of the United States painted by The Cosby Show and goes beyond the series itself. The economic system effectively subjugates most black people. African Americans, having been placed at the bottom of the economic pile, are forced to struggle against inequalities in material and educational resources. The American dream that The Cosby Show promotes is built on the cracks in an otherwise fairly solid class system, which ensures that most poor people will stay poor and most rich people will stay rich, in cycles that inexorably revolve from one generation to the next.
