Book review: Monish Bhatia, Scott Poynting and Waqas Tufail (eds), Media, Crime and Racism
| Date | 01 August 2020 |
| Published date | 01 August 2020 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1362480620930023 |
| Author | Angela Charles |
| Subject Matter | Book review |
930023TCR0010.1177/1362480620930023Theoretical CriminologyBook review
book-review2020
Book review
Theoretical Criminology
2020, Vol. 24(3) 540 –542
Book review
© The Author(s) 2020
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https://doi.org/10.1177/1362480620930023
DOI: 10.1177/1362480620930023
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Monish Bhatia, Scott Poynting and Waqas Tufail (eds), Media, Crime and Racism, Palgrave
Macmillan: London, 2018; 400 pp.: 9783030101084, £24.99 (pbk)
Reviewed by: Angela Charles, The Open University, UK
Media, Crime and Racism is an unparalleled offering to the world of criminology and
beyond. Unafraid to draw attention to the media and their failings, this compilation of
essays is bold, critical and powerful. Varied in its subject matter and capturing cities
worldwide, each essay offers an insight into the ways in which the media racialize crime
and categorize and label certain social groups as criminals and a threat to society. It is
timely, poignant and engages with contemporary issues, yet the collection remains
responsive to the roots and historical context from which racialization has stemmed.
Throughout the book there are references to the likes of the late Stan Cohen and Stuart
Hall. Hall’s work on signifiers is a thread that weaves its way through many of the
essays. They helpfully reaffirm the way his work from the late 1990s outlined the ‘prac-
tices of racialized exclusion’ and ‘racially-compounded disadvantage’ causing poverty,
unemployment and underachievement (Hall, 1999: 188).
The majority of the chapters use a qualitative lens to cover a variety of social groups
and their portrayal in the media, from Asian Pakistani men in northern England, Muslim
men in Germany, Black men in England and Canada to the Rohingya people of Myanmar.
Some chapters offer an alternative to the emphasis on qualitative analysis. Chapter 11, by
Kerry Moore and Katy Greenland, provides a content analysis of British...
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