Summary of Recommendations

Report of the Amateur Athletic Foundation of
Los Angeles, November 1995
Don Sabo, Sue Curry Jansen, Danny Tate,
Margaret Carlisle Duncan and Susan Leggett
Editor, Edward Derse
Copyrighted. Republished with permission

This study analyzes the stories that American television tells when it covers international sports events. We sought to determine whether the narratives, metaphors, framing devices, and production practices used by television to cover these events differed according to race, ethnicity, or nationality of athletes.

Discussions of race relations within sport gained public and academic attention during the late 1960s. During the 1970s and 1980s, sport media organizations sometimes were criticized for racist depictions of athletes of color. These critiques served as a touchstone for the public, journalists, and broadcasters to discuss how racial prejudices are reflected in sport media. A number of research studies showed that televised sports sometimes reinforce racial stereotypes. Partly in response to growing public and scholarly interest, as well as increasing pressures from minority advocacy groups, sport media professionals have looked more closely at racial issues in sports during the 1990s. For example, NBC aired a special, hosted by Tom Brokaw, on the Black male athlete, and CNN and ESPN produced documentary series on Black athletes in 1990 and 1991.

Several research studies have focused on representations of athletes of color in televised athletic events (Jackson, 1989; Rainville & McCormick, 1977). And in recent years, a number of scholars in communication studies and sociology have turned to the internationalization of sport media (Bellamy, 1993; Lule, 1992; Maguire, 1993; Real, 1989; Tunstall, 1977; Whannel, 1992). This report intends to supplement and update previous research, and to promote discussion of the treatment of race and ethnicity by sport media producers.

The study examined seven televised international sports events occurring between 1988 and 1993: the 1988 Olympic Winter Games, 1990 Goodwill Games, 1991 Pan American Games, 1992 Olympic Winter Games, 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, 1993 World University Games, and the 1993 World Track and Field Championships. The broadcasts were aired on several different networks. Sport competitions, personal profiles, and opening and closing ceremonies were analyzed for their treatment of race, ethnicity, and nationality. In all, this study examined media treatment of 161 athletes from 31 competitions. We also studied the racial/ethnic composition of broadcast images by commentators and interviewers.

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