Citation

Pepin JR. Sociol. Spectr. 2016; 36(3): 123-141.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2016, Mid-South Sociological Association, Publisher Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/02732173.2015.1108886

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Portrayals of celebrities perpetrating Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) are ideal for understanding the association between gender and racial privilege in representations of social problems. Unlike prior scholarship on framing of IPV, with celebrity perpetrators, race can be analyzed as an important aspect. Using 330 news articles about 66 celebrities, I find patterns of reporting consistent with male privilege that sanctions men's violence against women, whereas the differential treatment of Black men fosters a racialized interpretation that pathologizes Black men. Black men's IPV is more often criminalized, with criminal imagery included 3 times more often in articles about Black celebrities than White celebrities. By presenting violence as an escalation of mutual conflict and excusing it due to mitigating circumstances, such as inebriation, White men's violence is justified 2½ times more often than Black men's IPV. These findings contribute to sociological understandings of racial privilege in the social construction of IPV.

Language: en