Race and Media Studies

Race and media studies is a transdisciplinary field that extends beyond the simple equation of race studies + media studies = race and media studies. Scholars of race and media studies ought to possess expertise in the best of race studies, media studies, and race and media studies so as to contribute meaningfully to our understanding of the entanglement between race and media. This call is not meant to discourage emerging or experienced scholars from engaging with the work of race and media studies; rather, it is meant to ask for the same level of care and attention given to dominant fields of studies. Failing to heed this call for theoretical, methodological, and empirical rigor and care threatens the integrity of race and media scholarship and undermines the critical contributions and interventions offered by those committed to this field study. That critical contribution: shifting the focus from the what of race to that technological, symbolic, and organizational infrastructure that creates, sustains, transforms, and destroys race.