Hello Reader
Yes, I’m addressing you—one of the handful of robot-verified humans who reads this newsletter. Happy new year. I hope you’re well.
I wanted to share with you a proposal that I recently submitted to a fellowship program. I call it anarchist journalism (or “decolonizing the news”), mostly because there is no hierarchy to the newsroom—everyone from the participating community is an editor. With anarchist journalism, news becomes mutual aid that supports the community as it works to address underlying problems. It won’t make one red cent in revenue. In fact, that’s the idea: to obliterate journalism as a business and to let the community exercise it to their benefit.
Herein lies the irony: Destroying an industry requires money, not to buy supplies or pay salaries, but to keep a roof over my head. I may be done with capitalism, but it ain’t done with me. If you know of a fellowship program or New York-based foundation that might financially support this work, hit me up.
Please enjoy the proposal bellow. Pro tip: You can probably skip to the section titled “Objective,” as well as to the numbered list under “Methods.” As always, I welcome your thoughts.
Be well and stay safe.
Jennifer
Introduction
Over the next 30 years, white Americans are expected to become a minority of the US population1; in New York City, non-Hispanic whites are already a minority.2 However, the racial composition of most American newsrooms remains predominantly white, particularly in positions of leadership.3 The lack of diversity in the newsroom, the journalistic standard of “objectivity” that mutes non-white perspectives, and a business focus on appeasing white audiences create a media landscape that ignores the information needs of marginalized communities.4 Furthermore, the continual loss of local news outlets exacerbates the exclusion of communities from civic discourse,5 especially where community members do not engage governing institutions by choice or by necessity, or where language, cultural or social differences impede engagement.
To improve their reporting, some news organizations do reach out to community members and their advocates on the premise that they are the true experts on their communities. However, these news organizations retain an extractive institutional relationship with the community6: community members provide information to the newsroom; in turn, the newsroom constructs a narrative that “elevates” the story to the attention of influential white audiences. Reportage becomes an act of colonialism that extracts agency from the community and reinforces the distinction between governing institutions and the governed. Very little consideration is paid to how the community addresses conflict without intrusion from governing institutions or organizations from outside the community.
Objective
To better serve the community and to encourage self-determination, reportage can be done by the community itself under a mutual-aid (horizontal) organizational structure.7 Each participating community member becomes an editor with equal authority to make decisions. Likewise, each participant can serve as a reporter, photographer, social media editor, etc., as their skills and interests allow. Decisions that are traditionally made by a lead editor or publisher are instead made by consensus of participating community members.8
With a mutual-aid structure, the newsroom no longer behaves as an institution—it becomes intrinsic to the community. This “leader-full” newsroom is empowered to create more relevant, more impactful forms of journalism that disrupt the negative influence of mainstream media and galvanize the community to take action. More importantly, community members become stewards of the first draft of their history and contribute a more accurate depiction of themselves to governing institutions.
Methods
All organizing will be performed in conjunction with a community-based group serving low-income, mostly immigrant residents of Corona, Queens, New York.
Participation in the [redacted] fellowship will give the project a transdisciplinary foundation that includes an examination of how colonialism and white supremacy affect the immigrant experience; a better understanding of how anti-Black racism shapes society and politics, both in the United States and around the world [should have included “anti-Indigenous racism” here]; a look at how sexism and feminism play into local economies and personal finances; and an exchange of best practices in community organizing, program development, culturally sensitive instruction and storytelling.
This project will be executed in two stages:
A media-literacy program will be offered that examines current standards of journalism (eg, what qualifies as news, context, objectivity, etc.), modes of storytelling, ethical interviewing and engagement, and mainstream media as a business. Participants will decide how existing news coverage serves the community, and which practices in journalism should be retained, altered or abandoned.
Existing media-literacy programs can be modified to meet the community’s needs. Program development and community workshops will take an estimated six months, or most of the fellowship.Program participants and others in the community may choose to develop a journalism project. It could take the form of an individual news story; a short-term project (eg, photography exhibit, zine, performance, etc.) or a longer-term, recurring project (eg, print publication, WhatsApp engagement, podcast, etc.); a collection of objects and oral histories; or other modes of information exchange. The community would choose by consensus the project’s focus, form and duration.
Also at this stage, community members could expand their storytelling skills by learning from and teaching each other writing, photography, multimedia and social-media skills, and archiving practices. This could be done via community-hosted workshops or through other organizations in Queens.
This stage of the project would launch in the latter half of the fellowship and would likely extend beyond its time frame.
[The remainder of the proposal package contained samples of my work and my resume.]
Vespa J, Medina L, Armstrong DM. Demographic turning points for the United States: population projections for 2020 to 2060. US Census Bureau. March 2018; revised February 2020. https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2020/demo/p25-1144.pdf.
Quick facts, race and Hispanic origin: New York City. US Census Bureau. July 1, 2021. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/newyorkcitynewyork.
ASNE newsroom diversity survey. News Leaders Association. 2018. https://members.newsleaders.org/diversity-survey-2018-tables.
Alamo-Pastrana C, Hoynes W. Racialization of news: constructing and challenging professional journalism as “white media.” Humanity & Society. December 20, 2018. doi.org/10.1177/0160597618820071.
Deshan Crittenden L, Wenzel A. For BIPOC communities, local news crisis extends beyond major cities. Columbia Journalism Review. September 1, 2020. https://www.cjr.org/analysis/for-bipoc-communities-local-news-crisis-extends-beyond-major-cities.php.
Belair-Gagnon V, Nelson JL, Lewis SC. Audience engagement, reciprocity, and the pursuit of community connectedness in public media journalism. Journalism Practice. 2019;13(5):558-575. doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2018.1542975.
Bernstein E, Bunch J, Canner N, Lee MY. Beyond the holacracy hype. Harvard Business Review. July–August 2016. https://hbr.org/2016/07/beyond-the-holacracy-hype.
Spade D. Mutual aid: building solidarity during this crisis (and the next). Brooklyn, NY: Verso. 2020.