A Glance in their Direction: The New York City Press and their Coverage of African Americans during World War II

<p>My thesis examines the New York City press’ interpretation of African Americans and the Civil Rights movement of World War II. I seek to determine in what measure the press reported on African Americans in the military and at home during the war including segregation of the Armed Forces, and the riots of 1943. Through examining the white and black media’s perception of these events I hope to elucidate how the press wrote about the topic of race during the period and if there was any change in their reporting on race due to the war. Although addressed marginally in the context of African American history I believe this to be an underwritten facet in the fields of African American and World War II history as well as the history of the press. I pursued my study through researching publications of the period including the <em>New York Times</em>, the <em>New York Herald Tribune</em>, the <em>New York Age</em>, and others in the microfilm archives. I also consulted such works as Nat Brandt’s <em>Harlem at War: The Black Experience in WWII</em> for an understanding of the setting as well as Patrick Washburn’s <em>The</em> <em>African American Newspaper: Voice of Freedom</em>. My work has shown that the war did provide an impetus for a slight change within the city’s reporting of African Americans, taking a less biased tone and placing stories concerning African Americans in a more prominent capacity. The war thrust a number of stories concerning African Americans that the press could report under the banner of war in addition to the race factor which was not deemed a selling point. Black citizens went from being barely mentioned except in cases of criminal acts and musicians to being written about as warriors and patriots.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

MA History

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

History

Year dc:date.available

2014

Author dc:creator

• LoSasso, Michael

Contributors dc:contributor

• Larry Greene, Ph.D
• Dermot Quinn, Ph.D

• African American
• Media
• World War II
• Newspapers/Press
• Race Riots
• Race Relations
• American Studies
• Arts and Humanities
• Social History
• United States History

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholarship.shu.edu/dissertations/2062

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholarship.shu.edu:dissertations-3101