TITLE:
Media Representations of Toronto’s Social Housing Communities and Their Implications
AUTHORS:
Felicia De Sousa
KEYWORDS:
Media Representations, Criminalization, Policing, Social Housing, Criminality
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.10 No.5,
May
13,
2022
ABSTRACT: This paper examines the different ways in which media representations
depict images of deviance amongst Toronto’s social housing communities. Social housing
communities within Toronto, specifically Regent Park and Jane and Finch, face
sensationalized crime coverage regularly and provide both internal and external
implications for those communities and their residents. As these communities
face extensive criminalization, the policing brought forth onto them is often
punitive in nature and proves less beneficial. Such observations have been
established by drawing on a series of qualitative and quantitative research
conducted on residents within said communities, along with empirical evidence
from criminologists that portray the realities of punitive policing. This paper
provides recommendations for policing that better protect Toronto’s social
housing communities and its members from hard policing tactics stemming from
inaccurate media representations.