McCormick Hosts Ethnic Media Leaders

The recent “McCormick Ethnic Media Conference: Strategies for Growing the Sector” brought some 30 leaders from across the nation to Chicago to discuss strategies, obstacles, lessons learned and impact of the work they do. The conference featured a public panel Friday, June 20 on “The State of Ethnic Media: Boom or Bust?” This public discussion was moderated by Community Media Workshop’s Thom Clark and featured Sandy Close of New America Media, Cristina Azocar of the Center for Integration and Improvement of Journalism at San Francisco State University and Juana Ponce de Leon of New York Community Media Alliance. Here are video excerpts from that lively exchange:

• Thom Clark of CMW introduces the panel and discusses the results of his organization’s research into Chicago’s 200 ethnic news outlets (click here)
• Panelists discuss challenges facing ethnic media
(click here
• Juana Ponce de Leon discusses the vibrancy of the ethnic media in a city where 40% of residents are foreign-born (click here)
• Cristina Azocar discusses the research conducted by SFSU on opportunities and threats to EM nationally (click here)
• Sandy Close on the role and strengths of EM (click here)
• Sandy Close on EM and advertising potential (click here)
• Closing comments on MSM v EM v the death of journalism (click here)

A highlight of this event was a spoken word performance by Esther Ikoro and Adam Gottlieb of Young Chicago Authors (click here)

Photo above by Demetrio Maguigad of Community Media Workshop