Caught in the web of scapegoating : national coverage of California's Proposition 187

dc.contributor.advisorJensen, Roberten
dc.contributor.advisorWhitney, D. Charles (David Charles), 1946-en
dc.creatorWilliams, Christopher Newell, 1951-en
dc.date.accessioned2012-09-07T17:47:38Zen
dc.date.available2012-09-07T17:47:38Zen
dc.date.issued2008-05en
dc.descriptiontexten
dc.description.abstractThe current heated national debate over immigration policy is a reminder of the contentious relationship the United States historically has had with its immigrant population, especially those who enter the country without proper documentation. For example, a major issue confronting California voters in 1994 was Proposition 187, a plan to deny social services to the state’s undocumented immigrants, the vast majority of whom were nonwhite. In this study, I argue that this issue took place during an immigration “panic,” one of several that took place in the United States during the 20th century. In these “panics,” which also occurred in the 1930s, the 1950s and the 1970s, undocumented immigrants served as convenient scapegoats for larger social ills. A significant and under-researched aspect of these events was the role played by the major U. S. mainstream media in perpetuating this scapegoating process. The study takes an in-depth look at how the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times covered the 1994 debate over Proposition 187, which occurred during the most recent of these immigration panics. It concludes that these newspapers’ coverage of 187 was shaped by the discourse of California’s elite politicians (both liberal and conservative) that focused on the predominantly non-white population of undocumented immigrants as “the problem.” By framing the undocumented as deviant, this coverage helped perpetuate the elite “blame the victim” discourse that diverted public attention from other issues facing the state, such as the fact that California was enduring its most significant recession since the Great Depression.en
dc.description.departmentJournalism and Mediaen
dc.format.mediumelectronicen
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2152/17820en
dc.language.isoengen
dc.rightsCopyright is held by the author. Presentation of this material on the Libraries' web site by University Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin was made possible under a limited license grant from the author who has retained all copyrights in the works.en
dc.subject.lcshCalifornia.--Proposition 187 (1994)en
dc.subject.lcshIllegal aliens--Services for--Californiaen
dc.subject.lcshIllegal aliens--Education--Californiaen
dc.subject.lcshNew York timesen
dc.subject.lcshLos Angeles timesen
dc.subject.lcshMass media--Influenceen
dc.titleCaught in the web of scapegoating : national coverage of California's Proposition 187en
thesis.degree.departmentJournalismen
thesis.degree.disciplineJounalismen
thesis.degree.grantorThe University of Texas at Austinen
thesis.degree.levelDoctoralen
thesis.degree.nameDoctor of Philosophyen

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