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The Role of Television in Ending Segregaation in the United States

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The Role of Television in Ending Segregaation in the United States

In 1964 segregation was banned in public places as part of The Civil Rights Act. Leading on from this, things for black Americans improved until in the 1987 17 large US cities even had black mayors. But before these times there was segregation everywhere, from schools and restaurants to buses and water fountains. Black and white Americans simply did not mix. The decision for desegregation leads from a number of things, with various forms of media playing a central part, including television, and without this, could desegregation really have been obtained at all?

By the time of desegregation in the USA, almost everybody had a …show more content…

Previously it was unheard of for a black person to have a role in any film, unless it was a degrading role such as a slave or an old cleaner. White men were more likely to dress up as Negroes instead, but as the years passed there was a gradual change of the image of black people and they were eventually accepted as stars, thanks especially to remembered actors such as Sydney Poitier.

Images were shown both on television and in newspapers and books. Photographs such as Source C, a picture of Elizabeth Eckford on her first day at Little Rock High School showed the truth. We can see how the white citizens are reacting to the enrolment of black pupils at their school, which once again provokes sympathy from the white American's who were not fully aware of what was happening around them, especially in the north, where racism wasn't nearly as extreme as it was in the southern states.

Various forms of literature

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