Race and Sex in Prime Time: A Look at Occupations and Occupational Prestige

A content analysis of 10 week-long samples of network prime time broadcast between the fall of 1997 and the fall of 2006 found that the leading characters in programs defined by racial diversity differ in terms of their distributions of men and women as well as racial groups. Occupations and occupational prestige also differ depending upon the racial diversity of the programs in which the characters are found. Programs with mostly minority casts, while the most equitable in terms of the proportions of men and women, provide the least diversity in occupations and occupational prestige, particularly for Black women.