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This paper is an attempt to provide a satisfying theoretical framework for how stereotypical representations in media texts can link social-level racial myths with individual-level cognition. Barthes' theories about semiotic signs and myths are examined and linked with models from cognitive psychology concerning human memory and processing of categorical information. Using language as a medium, Livingstone's interpretive framework is proposed as the link that connects mythical social understandings with real cognitive processing phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how the conservative legal movement's successful countermobilization of the politics of rights enables U.S. Supreme Court outcomes that exacerbate racial and ethnic inequities while solidifying the privileged position of others in the name of equality. A comparison of two pivotal Supreme Court cases involving native entitlements-Morton v. Mancari (1974) and Rice v. Cayetano (2000)-illustrates how appeals to formal, as opposed to substantive, equality work in effect to support existing hierarchies. At the same time, the conservative legal movement's success provides progressive social actors with opportunities to reframe the discourse. We suggest that a critical questioning of strategies predicated on appeals for equal rights may be necessary to advance the interests of native populations in the current environment, and we identify an alternative way of working for native interests, one that escapes the constraints of equality doctrine by appealing to broader claims of social justice.