Minority Discrimination in America

Minority Discrimination in America

Carlos Campos
University of Texas at El Paso
Professor Jose Luis Gomez
Rhetorical and Composition 2

Minority Discrimination in America

Minority Discrimination in American Culture

Recently, due to the presidential election of this year, it is more evident that there is a
wide amount of discrimination against minorities in the United States. Thanks to different types
of social media, discriminations against minorities can be made public. As a result of this, there
can be a significant raise in awareness for this issue and quite possibly, as an outcome, a stop can
be put to this issue. The discrimination against minorities is not a new issue, but due to the recent
events, of this year, there has been a sparking of this issue, meaning that there are more cases
where discrimination towards minorities is more noticeable and openly done in restaurants, at the
workplace, and other public places. Thanks to social media and people raising awareness on this
issue, this is something that will no longer be ignored, nor tolerated any more. The way that this
issue of discrimination towards minorities is coming into the light is through two different types
of genres. The first type of genre being an article from The New York Times, titled Donald
Trump Gets Earful in Spanish as Latino Outlets Air Disdain. The information that this genre
covers and it is presenting is how minorities are viewed by American people, in part by those that
belong to high social classes and share similar social standards, and it covers the reactions that
minorities have towards the hateful comments that this type of people are making to reference
minorities. What this genre shows, is how those type of people go on to generalize a whole
culture as all evil doers, and that is just not the case. The second genre is a video provided by
Univision Noticias titled Driving While Hispanic: Hidden Camera Video Reveals Racial
Profiling in Arizona. What this video shows is how police categorize, and profile minorities. It
shows how this kind of people discriminate minorities by the way they look. In addition it shows
how they search for any type excuse to look down at minorities and categorize them as criminals.
This are two different types of genres which show different information on the issue of

Minority Discrimination in America

discrimination towards minorities. Both of this different genres will be analyzed, as well as
compared with one another throughout this genre analysis paper.
Audience and Purpose
For the first genre being discussed, The New York Times article titled Donald Trump
Gets Earful in Spanish as Latino Outlets Air Disdain written by Ashley Parker, published on
August 26, 2015. This genre article is quite long, it contains an abundance of information that
can take the audience around ten minutes to read. The purpose of this genre was to be
informative, to show how the presidential election is affecting minorities in America. The way
that this genre show it, is by addressing one issue that happened recently with a Hispanic reporter
and a candidate running for president. This incident took place in a press conference, once the
candidate knew who the reporter was, it took little time for the reporter to be taken away,
showing how he was discriminated. The second genre is a video from Univision Noticias titled
Driving While Hispanic: Hidden Camera Video Reveals Racial Profiling in Arizona. This
genre type video can take the audience just over five minutes to watch it. The purpose of this
video is to inform and addresse the obvious discrimination minorities face in America while
being out in the streets. The way that the video informs the audience on the issue of
discrimination is through an experiment they conducted, which involved a Hispanic male driving
on the street, obeying all the traffic laws, and being stopped by a law enforce officer with the
excuse that the Hispanic man was breaking the law. Which is proven to be a lie in the video
because there is proof of it, by showing exactly what the Hispanic man was doing it proofs that
no laws were broken. This provides evidence that the Hispanic male was stopped because the
officer clearly saw that the driver was a Hispanic male.

Minority Discrimination in America

The intended audience for the first genre, The New York Times article, is young adults,
as well as elder people, for example, older than forty that are concerned with the presidential
elections and the immigration issues as well. There is no targeted age group that this genre is
aiming at, most of the intended audience is those concerned with politics. The information
presented in this genre allows the people to understand the political issues regarding minorities,
the views politicians have and the consequences they are creating with their choices and plans
for minorities. Knowing the audience that this genre has, it can be clear that the audience has a
good view on what type of discrimination minorities have, and how minorities are reacting to
this issue. The genre is trying to raise awareness on the issue and make the audience have an
opinion to change what is happening to minorities. For the second genre, Univision Noticias
video, the intended audience they were aiming for, is people of all ages, not necessarily
minorities, but of all racial background to show how American culture views minorities and the
way they are being treated by the law and other people of a different racial background. The
intended audience of this genre can be well aware of the purpose of the video, which is to raise
awareness on this issue and prevent this type of incidents from happening ever again. Awareness
is the general intent of this genre, as well as encourage the audience to act on the issue too and
have an open opinion to do something to stop or change things for minorities. In The New York
Times article and the Univision Noticias video change a formal language that is appropriate for
the intended audience of each respective genre. The way both of this genres differ, is in the
knowledge the intended audience needs to have in order to understand what is going on. For the
second genre, the audience does not require knowledge on politics, or political stand points,
other than to know how minorities live in this society, and this genre shows just how minorities
live every day. As for the first genre, it does require an understanding on politics to some extent,

Minority Discrimination in America

and basic knowledge on who are the candidates that are running for the presidential election with
their stand points, and with their views, on minorities and how they should be dealt with. This
genre shows how Hispanics are reacting to the hate that some candidates are showing towards
them.
Rhetorical Issues
Each genre has a rhetorical style, and the way that each genre expresses it, shows to be
different, the way they are shown and applied have a unique way.
Ethos
For the first genre, the informations credibility is established with the recent events taken
place this year with the Hispanic reporter being discriminated, and being kicked out by the
candidate running for president. The evidence is clear since its been on other media outlets, and
the genre reinforces this with quotes taken from other Hispanic and Latino media outlets with
their take on the issue of discrimination. This is helpful on achieving the purpose on showing the
effects of discrimination by the candidates part on the Hispanic reporter and all the other
minorities in America. For the second genre, the video is full of credible information and
evidence that effectively helps achieve its purpose. The evidence points to obvious
discrimination towards the Hispanic community. The evidence is an experiment that they made,
which effectively showed and proved their point on minority discrimination. The differences
between this two genres it that, the first genre took quotes and described the effects of
discrimination from other media outlets, and the second genre focused on showing exactly what
happens to minorities and how they are discriminated. The message on both genres was

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effectively delivered, both provided credible sources of information and evidence to support their
statement.
Pathos
The first genre does not appeal to emotions directly, but rather indirectly, by putting the
evidence they gathered and letting the audience decide on what to think and feel on the issue.
The evidence provided shows a reporter asking to be let alone and then taken away by orders of
the candidate. It also provides evidence of the thoughts of other media outlets and how
displeased they are with the candidates actions. It does not appeal to a certain emotion, and the
way the information is presented can be interpreted by the audience as they want. The second
genre tries to appeal to the audience humble side, by showing the look towards minorities and
the situation they are in with people of other races and other social statues looking down on
them. It also attempts to cause an emotion of eagerness to do something about this issue.
Logos
With the first genre, logos is present throughout the whole article. The way logos is
utilized in this genre is by not trying to persuade the audience in one way but by letting the
audience choose by their own reasoning. It established the evidence and it lets the audience take
a stand on what they think is correct, what is right and wrong. The second genre attempts to
make the audience take their side by presenting the evidence and choosing reasons why the issue
is wrong, why discrimination should stop.
Structure and Delivery
With the main topics of each genre, the way the information was shaped by each genre
respectively is different. In the first genre, the article began with quotes said by other media

Minority Discrimination in America

outlets on how they viewed the candidate with displease, this grasped the audience attention by
taking a side to the issue of minorities being discriminated. It had a large amount of information
that may discourage the audience from reading the whole article. With the second genre, the
video began with a statement that made the audience think on the issue if it is morally correct or
if deserved. The information was concise and delivered in a time consistent manner allowing the
purpose of the video to be noted. In the two genres, the first one needed to be more to the point
as the second genre was.
Conclusion
Both genres discussed the main topic of discrimination towards minorities in a well
formal manner to the audience. The first genre aimed more at politics than the second one which
was focused more on the social manner of the issue. But, the first one allowed more
interpretation of the content being provided. Each genre demonstrated sides to the issue, for
example the first one had given the opportunity to side with either point of the issue, as
compared to the second one that allowed only one side to be taken. Discrimination towards
minorities in America is a serious issue that both of this genres are trying to address in order to
attempt a change on this issue, and this genres raised awareness with clear points.

Minority Discrimination in America

8
References

Noticias, Univision. (2012, November 14). Univision News - Driving While Hispanic: Hidden
Camera Video Reveals Racial Profiling in Arizona. Retrieved September 5, 2015, from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcQbuSEEoh0
Parker, A. (2015, August 26). Donald Trump Gets Earful in Spanish as Latino Outlets Air
Disdain. Retrieved September 6, 2015, from
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/27/us/politics/latino-news-media-offended-by-donald-trumpshows-it-in-broadcasts.html?_r=0