Dividing the Threat: Puerto Ricans and Racial Conflict in the New York Times, 2010-2015

• In Event: 1284 - Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 21. Race/Ethnicity and Media

Abstract

In recent times, Puerto Rican migration to the United States has skyrocketed as a result of various political and economic factors faced by the people of Puerto Rico. I focus my attention on how Puerto Ricans are represented in newspapers through narratives of belonging, exclusion, and/or perceived threat. I seek to answer is: what is the relationship between how Puerto Ricans are understood by the New York Times and the narratives of belonging and threat in this newspaper? To answer this query, I perform a content analysis of the paper of record, the New York Times. My findings suggest that there has been a change in how Puerto Ricans are constructed in the NYT. I argue that Puerto Ricans are not only framed as explicit threats in relation to other Latinos, while also being framed as possessing some sort of color capital that can be transferred over to particular spaces. The NYT constructs boundaries that reinforce while also transform what groups are perceived as threats and in what social circumstances these threats are relevant.

Author

• Bianca Gonzalez-Sobrino, University of Connecticut