ABSTRACT
This chapter explores Madonna's music videos within the context of multiple racial and ethnic categories and examines readings given to several of Madonna's videos in order to understand how racial and ethnic differences play an important role in the videos' reception and interpretation. Several videos were screened in a given class, followed by a period of silence so that the students would have the opportunity to respond to the open-ended questions. The other reading formation refers to Hispanic/Latino(a) /Mexican-American culture and serves to ground their readings of Madonna's videos. This example of cultural affirmation privileges ethnic identity in establishing a particular interpretation of the video. The dominant reading pattern seemed to be one of distance or separation from Madonna's popular culture realm. The universalizing of romantic love defuses the focus on the setting as well as the politics of the representations. These responses are typical of the Pollyanna identity position.
