Home> Archive> 2014> Volume 4 Number 3 (May 2014)
IJSSH 2014 Vol.4(3): 233-237 ISSN: 2010-3646
DOI: 10.7763/IJSSH.2014.V4.353

Public Perceptions of Minorities in America: Political Correctness in U.S. History Textbooks, Before and After 1970

Chung Hyun Lee

Abstract—There have been various social movements throughout history to protect minorities from discrimination and infringements of their rights. However, as we can see from many historical cases, these movements are not direct representative of changes in public perceptions. This paper used political correctness as conveyed in textbooks – changes in the term referring to African Americans and increased reference to African American and female public figures – in order to demonstrate the actual impacts of these movements on public perceptions. The examined differences, which are the disappearance of the term negro and appearance of the term African-American, and increased mentioning of African-American and women public figures in text book, considering the fact that textbooks reflect value-sensitive publishing, indicate that public opinion regarding minorities changed after the active social movements of the 1960s and 70s.

Index Terms—Political correctness, minorities.

Chung Hyun Lee is with the Korean Minjok Leadership Academy, Republic of Korea (e-mail: sw021360@gmail.com).

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Cite: Chung Hyun Lee, " Public Perceptions of Minorities in America: Political Correctness in U.S. History Textbooks, Before and After 1970," International Journal of Social Science and Humanity vol. 4, no. 3, pp. 233-237, 2014.

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