Abstract-There have been various social movements throughout history to protect minorities from discrimination and infringements of their rights. However, as we can see from many historical cases, these movements are not direct representative of changes in public perceptions. This paper used political correctness as conveyed in textbooks -changes in the term referring to African Americans and increased reference to African American and female public figures -in order to demonstrate the actual impacts of these movements on public perceptions. The examined differences, which are the disappearance of the term negro and appearance of the term African-American, and increased mentioning of African-American and women public figures in text book, considering the fact that textbooks reflect value-sensitive publishing, indicate that public opinion regarding minorities changed after the active social movements of the 1960s and 70s.
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