The world has changed in 25 years: Re-examining media framing of Magic Johnson living with HIV-AIDS

4^th International Conference on HIV/AIDS, STDs and STIs

October 03-05, 2016 Orlando, Florida, USA

Edward M Kian

Oklahoma State University, USA

Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J AIDS Clin Res

Abstract :

In 1991, U.S. sports media were shocked when Ervin â�?�?Magicâ�? Johnson, a five-time champion for the Los Angeles Lakers and arguably then the worldâ�?�?s most famous basketball player, announced he had contracted the HIV-AIDS virus before immediately retiring as a player from the National Basketball Association. During that period AIDS was largely viewed as a death sentence that most Americans wrongly believed affected only gay men. Johnsonâ�?�?s historic announcement began to change that attitude. In a landmark study on media framing of homosexuality in sport, a textual analysis of national newspaper coverage of HIV-infected athletes Johnson, diver Greg Louganis and boxer Tommy Morrison found that most of the articles on Johnson and Morrison expressed shock that both athletes had contracted the HIV virus, while also noting multiple times that each athlete had proclaimed they were heterosexual. However, no article in any of the examined newspapers on the openly gay and more effeminate Louganis noted how he had contracted a virus that at that time was associated predominately with gay men. Johnson, however, has not only survived with HIV but returned to play and later coach in the NBA, co-captained the U.S. Olympic â�?�?Dream Teamâ�? in 1992, has constantly remained in great shape and is a highly successful businessmen and television commentator. He is one of the prime reasons public attitudes have changed toward far greater acceptance of those infected with HIV. This research used a textual analysis to examine media framing of Johnson and HIV this decade. A Lexus-Nexus academic search was used to locate all articles published in major U.S. newspapers from January 1, 2010 through August 15, 2016 that mentioned Johnson and HIV and/or AIDS in the same article. All articles were read and coded by two researchers to search for dominate themes, using the overarching frameworks of Connellâ�?�?s (1995) Hegemonic Masculinity and Andersonâ�?�?s (2009) Inclusive Masculinity to interpret results.

Biography :

Edward M Kian is the Welch-Bridgewater Endowed Chair of Sports Media in the School of Media and Strategic Communications. His research focuses on sport media, specifically examining the framing of gender, sex and LGBTQ in content, social media and Web 2.0, attitudes and experiences of sport media members and sport marketing. He has authored more than 85 journal articles, books, book chapters and conference papers.

Email: tedk58@aol.com