Hollywood Diversity Report: Latinos Continue to Be Severely Underrepresented in Films

A report released July 31 from Dr. Stacy L. Smith and the Media, Diversity & Social Change (MDSC) Initiative at USC Annenberg concluded that top-grossing Hollywood films have done very little to change the industry’s diversity record, noting that Latinos are still some of the most underrepresented groups—reaching its lowest mark since 2009.
A report released July 31 from Dr. Stacy L. Smith and the Media, Diversity & Social Change (MDSC) Initiative at USC Annenberg concluded that top-grossing Hollywood films have done very little to change the industry’s diversity record, noting that Latinos are still some of the most underrepresented groups—reaching its lowest mark since 2009.
The following chart, which appears in the “Inequality in 900 Films” study, lists the prevalence of film characters based on race and ethnicity from 2007–2016. Last year, the study said that Latino characters made up just 3.1 percent of all the film characters it tracked. In 2015, that figure was at 5.3 percent. The lowest percentage for Latino characters was 2.9 percent in 2009.
 

A report released July 31 from Dr. Stacy L. Smith and the Media, Diversity & Social Change (MDSC) Initiative at USC Annenberg concluded that top-grossing Hollywood films have done very little to change the industry’s diversity record, noting that Latinos are still some of the most underrepresented groups—reaching its lowest mark since 2009.
The following chart, which appears in the “Inequality in 900 Films” study, lists the prevalence of film characters based on race and ethnicity from 2007–2016. Last year, the study said that Latino characters made up just 3.1 percent of all the film characters it tracked. In 2015, that figure was at 5.3 percent. The lowest percentage for Latino characters was 2.9 percent in 2009.

“There has been no meaningful change in the percentage of Black/African American, Latino, Asian or Mixed Race/Other characters across the years evaluated,” the study said.
In addition, the study explained, “films approximating U.S. Census percentages are infrequent. In 2016, only 1 movie featured proportional representation of Latinos on screen. A higher percentage of films are representative of Black (19 movies) and Asian (21 movies) characters….

To read full story, please visit: http://latinousa.org/2017/08/08/hollywood-diversity-report-latinos-continue-severely-underrepresented-films/

Scroll to Top