Colour referents (cont'd)
The use of colour referents and prejudicial phrases are obviously discriminatory,
however, when combined with sensationalised media reports, supported by
authoritative sources, the public domain has little need to doubt the validity
and reliability of the report. The actual purpose of the referents is explained
well by Schissel (1997) who states:
In general, racial references serve both journalistic and ideological
purposes. They promote the image of the young offender and his/her family
as unlike the viewer/reader, and in doing so, they create identifiability
in the stereotype of the young offender. Furthermore, such images play
on already existing racialised biases in the community and use these biases
to create anxiety in the reader.
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