News Coping and Resistance: An Examination of Entertainment as Self-Care in the Digital Black Press

Abstract

Scholarship on the mainstream press in the United States has argued that in the new media age, consumers prefer entertainment while journalists prefer hard news—yet digital Black press journalists and readers value both types of content. In the Black press, entertainment is produced and consumed as an alternative to mainstream media's often unfavorable hard news coverage of African Americans. The race-based trauma that African Americans experience through news consumption can negatively impact mental health and cause news avoidance, but some are resisting this by creating spaces for Black joy online. This research uses interviews with journalists and focus groups with readers to investigate the utility of entertainment news content in the Black press. I find that entertainment in the digital Black press contributes to positive and comprehensive coverage of the African American community, gives consumers a means to cope with or protect themselves from reading traumatic news coverage on topics such as Black Lives Matter, and can act as a form of self-care. I conclude that digital Black press entertainment content can counteract communal stress for African Americans who may experience high levels of news-related anxiety.

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