Rating the YouTube Indian:Viewer Ratings of Native American Portrayals on a Viral Video Site

Online outlets for user-generated content (UGC) like YouTube have created environments for alternative depictions of marginalized groups, as UGC can be contributed by anyone with basic technology access. Preliminary findings on UGC relating to Native Americans confirm some favorable departures from the distortions prevalent in the old media. The interactive nature of UGC environments allows for addressing this question by examining audience ratings of online user-generated videos (UGV) as a function of Native American portrayals presented in the videos. This study sought to assess audience reactions to UGVs relating to Native Americans. This study provides a couple of knowledge gains. First, by exploring the relationships between racial portrayals and audience ratings, it expands the literature on audience interaction with race-related media content. Second, this research moves the study of audience reactions to racial cues into a new mediated context and expands the literature on novel mass communication dynamics. The publicly displayed video ratings not only are expressions of audience reactions but also have the potential to shape the opinion climate about Native Americans and their cultures. The results of this study indicate that UGV depictions of Native Americans did influence audience ratings of these messages. The results suggest that audiences responded favorably to the videos showing positive, counterstereotypical characteristics of Native Americans. (Contains 2 tables and 47 notes.)