Class Dismissed: How TV Frames the Working Class (2005) (trailer)

8

Based on the book by Pepi Leistyna, Class Dismissed navigates the steady stream of narrow working class representations from American television's beginnings to today's sitcoms, reality shows, police dramas, and daytime talk shows.

Featuring interviews with media analysts and cultural historians, this documentary examines the patterns inherent in TV's disturbing depictions of working class people as either clowns or social deviants -- stereotypical portrayals that reinforce the myth of meritocracy.

Class Dismissed breaks important new ground in exploring the ways in which race, gender, and sexuality intersect with class, offering a more complex reading of television's often one-dimensional representations. The video also links television portrayals to negative cultural attitudes and public policies that directly affect the lives of working class people.

Featuring interviews with Stanley Aronowitz, (City University of New York); Nickel and Dimed author, Barbara Ehrenreich; Herman Gray (University of California-Santa Cruz); Robin Kelley (Columbia University); Pepi Leistyna (University of Massachusetts-Boston) and Michael Zweig (State University of New York-Stony Brook). Also with Arlene Davila, Susan Douglas, Bambi Haggins, Lisa Henderson, and Andrea Press.

Trending Videos
How America Invented Race | The History of White People in America
9 min - The white “race” was invented by rich Virginians in 1676 in the aftermath of a populous rebellion of impoverished, indentured, and enslaved Africans and Europeans now known as Bacon’s...
A Case for Color Blindness | Coleman Hughes
14 min - Racial inequality provokes passionate opinions and varied ideas of how to build a fair, equitable society. One topic that's been contentiously debated for generations is color blindness: the...
Born Sexy Yesterday: A Hollywood Movie Trope That Maybe Needs to Die
18 min - "This video essay is about a gendered trope that has bothered me for years but didn’t have a name, so I gave it one: Born Sexy Yesterday. It's a science fiction convention in which the mind of a...
Our Food is Killing Us
25 min - In this video essay, I examine the causes and destruction of our current industrialized food system. Specifically, I dive into the capitalist commodification of food, and how most of the...
Reading Library
Culture In Decline
The Big Picture
* Recommended

Hi there.

I bet you've seen some great "films for action" that aren't in our library yet. 

Why not add that documentary or video directly to our library? Half of our best content was added by members. Submissions just need to be non-fiction, embeddable (like from Youtube or Vimeo), and related to activism or changing the world in some way. 

Here are some more tips on adding videos. We'd love you to become a regular contributor! 

Cheers,
The Films For Action team