Presented annually, the NAACP Image Awards is the nation’s premier event celebrating the outstanding achievements and performances of people of color in the arts as well as those individuals or groups who promote social justice.

The NAACP Image Awards are an exciting, star-studded salute to the best in entertainment. Honorees, presenters and performers have included many of the major celebrities in America as well as international political figures and dignitaries. There are 36 competitive categories in the fields of motion picture, television, music and literature. There are also several honorary awards including the Chairman’s Award, The President’s Award and The Image Awards Hall of Fame.

The NAACP Image Awards originally aired late night for eight years in the “Saturday Night Live” time slot on the NBC Network. Since 1996, the NAACP Image Awards have been shown in primetime on the FOX network where they have become a major programming event.

To understand the importance of the NAACP Image Awards, they have to be placed in a social and historical context.

Ideas and images create the belief systems that control our individual and societal actions. When it comes to forming ideas, reinforcing stereotypes, establishing norms and shaping our thinking nothing affects us more than the images and concepts delivered into our lives on a daily basis by television and film. Accordingly there is ample cause for concern about what does or does not happen on television when there is little or no diversity in either opportunities or the decision making process.

The NAACP has been involved in the continuing struggle for greater participation by African Americans in the entertainment industry and portrayal of black people on the screen since 1915, when the organization launched a nationwide protest against the showing of the movie “Birth of a Nation" by D. W. Griffith. The film set in the period immediately after the Civil War, depicted black people as savages and the reconstruction era in our nation as a period of corruption. It remains today one of the most controversial films ever made.