On Aug. 10, 2014, one day after 18-year-old Michael Brown was fatally shot by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, the hashtag #IfTheyGunnedMeDown began appearing on Twitter after an attorney in Jackson, Mississippi, posted it with two photos of himself -- one showing him positively and the other stereotyping him negatively. The text urged others to consider which photo would be used by the media to report on his theoretical death by police.

Meredith Clark and Tracy Everbach, two faculty members in the University of North Texas' Frank W. and Sue Mayborn School of Journalism, examined how #IfTheyGunnedMeDown was used by activists to draw attention to what they perceived as negative media stereotypes of young men of color.

Clark, an assistant professor who researches Black Twitter -- a social media identity that focuses on issues related to the African-American community -- examined The New York Times' and the St. Louis Post Dispatch's coverage of Brown's death during the week of Aug. 10.  Everbach spoke to C.J. Lawrence, the creator of #IfTheyGunnedMeDown, and others who used the hashtag -- all African-American or Hispanic males ranging in age from 17 to mid-30s.

The researchers discovered that both The New York Times and the St. Louis Post Dispatch used media frames -- emphasizing Brown's past struggles, his growing up a rough neighborhood and his parents not being married, among other facts, to influence readers' perceptions of him, Clark says. She decided to analyze The New York Times' coverage in particular because "it's considered as a newspaper of record."

"The Times' characterization of a young African-American man was for a national and international audience, and the hashtag was largely a reaction to that," she says.

Lawrence had posted a photo of himself speaking at his 2003 college graduation, with former President Bill Clinton laughing in the background, and a contrasting photo of himself dressed as Kanye West for Halloween -- and holding a bottle labeled Hennessey cognac, which was actually filled with soda.

Following Lawrence's lead, the other users of #IfTheyGunnedMeDown posted photos of themselves acting respectably and photos of themselves that could easily be interpreted as negative.

"All of those who used the hashtag and posted photos said they related to Michael Brown and felt like young African-American men should be more accurately portrayed in the media," Everbach says.

Clark and Everbach presented part of the research at the Midwinter Conference of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. They plan to expand the research by analyzing coverage from two weeks after the shooting, to determine if the use of #IfTheyGunnedMeDown altered the media framing, particularly after The New York Times published a story about the hashtag.

Everbach may be reached at 214-995-8464. Clark may be reached at 850-559-1839 or on Twitter at @meredithclark.