The public’s view of top athletes such as Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods is that these men are athletes first and black men second, according to Tony N. Brown, assistant professor of sociology at Vanderbilt University.
When black athletes reach star status, they many times are able to transcend the racial boundaries experienced by many black men and essentially become "raceless" ñ until they make a public mistake, Brown added.
"Black athletes of Kobe’s caliber ñ and even athletes of lesser talent ñ who are strongly identified with sports often lose a connection with their perceived racial community until something happens that re-racializes them," Brown says.
Brown believes "raceless" black athletes are vulnerable to some degree because they actually believe they have transcended their racial status ñ but, he says, this is not so and likely never will be so.
Brown served as lead researcher on "There’s No Race on The Playing Field: Perceptions of Racial Discrimination Among White and Black Athletes," a new study showing similar levels of agreement among white and black college athletes that racial and ethnic discrimination is no longer a problem. This finding is significant because whites and blacks have never agreed when it comes to perceptions of racial and ethnic discrimination ñ not since the 1930s when researchers first started tracking social science survey data.
Media Contact: Princine Lewis, (615) 322-NEWS princine.l.lewis@vanderbilt.edu