All Articles Tagged "black journalists"
Black Beauty With Buzz: Dodai Stewart, Editor at Jezebel.com
Dodai Stewart is an editor at Jezebel.com who has enlivened the offerings of this dynamic women’s blog since 2007. Based in New York City and part of Gawker Media, Jezebel is renowned as a respite for intelligent women looking to seriously discuss celebrities and jest about the absurdities of politics. Dodai is an African-American editor there who lends her seasoned expertise to this successful mix, parlaying her background as an executive editor and writer at magazines into her delightful execution in one of today’s most lauded media roles: star blogger. It is thrilling to see a black woman shine in such a prominent position, helping Jezebel.com generate monthly page views in the millions with her quick-witted perspective on the hottest issues of the day. Here is what this black beauty with buzz has to say about writing, pop culture and women working together politically for our greater empowerment.
It’s wonderful to see a woman of color at the helm of a powerful web site geared towards a general female audience. How do you use this platform to bridge the gap between the audiences in terms of understanding and perspective?
I do not attempt to write anything that makes sweeping generalizations about black people. I could never write from the vantage point of “black people are like this.” I try to write with honesty, from my personal perspective, which is as a woman of color. Explaining where I’m coming from can open the mind of someone who perhaps never considered how a woman of color might feel about a certain subject.
In particular I have noticed that online discussions between white and black women tend to quickly dissolve into blame games and negativity. Could the medium be used to promote better synergy between these groups?
Even if online discussions between black women and white women do dissolve into blame games and negativity — I am not sure that this is always the case — but at least there’s an open line of communication happening, with a diverse range of viewpoints. Although our commenter community is incredibly vocal, they are actually a very small percentage of our readership. So for every conversation that seems to dissolve and go nowhere, there are possibly a couple of hundred other people who digested the information and didn’t come away with the same negative result. But I believe, in most cases, a conversation is never a waste of time. Exchanging ideas is how we learn and grow.
Top 10 Black Multimedia Mavens to Watch
By Dreux Dougall
You might call these people visionary artists, as they are able to craft their media communications so well. You might call them thieves in the night, because they are able to steal your attention so quickly. But we call them “multimedia mavens”: the top African-American writers, TV personalities, activists, speakers, and techies that dominate their fields. In their mission to broadcast their work into your homes, onto your phones, and into your lives they have used social media, radio, publishing, television and more — truly, to use an old phrase, “any means necessary.” These 10 stars have rocketed to the top of the list of people you must watch in the coming years for their creative and intelligent use of multifarious media forms to uplift and entertain the masses. These are the Top 10 Black Multimedia Mavens to Watch.
Keli Goff
Novelist, Political Writer, Blogger & TV Pundit
“While I enjoy working in multiple platforms (blogs, books and television), I love the immediacy of writing online,” the multi-talented media maven told The Atlanta Post. “It’s a really great feeling when I highlight a particular issue in my columns and hear from people who say they wrote a letter to a member of Congress, or signed a petition or gave money to a cause because I highlighted it in my work. On days when I hear that I feel like I’ve done my job and maybe, just maybe helped contribute something positive to the world.” This is the mission of Keli Goff: to bring change to the world one blog post or television appearance at a time. Goff set her sights on being a political pundit and writer back in 2008, and has seen great success as the author of the best-seller “Party Crashing.” This ground-breaking tome chronicles the rise of Obama’s youth supporters and opened doors for her as an analyst on shows like “Anderson Cooper 360″ and “The Dylan Ratigan Show.” Her biggest accomplishment so far? Finishing her exciting first novel, “The GQ Candidate,” extending her media reach into the field of fiction.
Huffington Post Launches Black Platform
(Huffington Post) — Today the National Association of Black Journalists is meeting for its annual convention in Philadelphia (I’ll be speaking there this morning, after Eric Holder and a taped message from President Obama). In a nice moment of synchronicity, today is also the launch of our newest section, one that I’m particularly excited about: HuffPost BlackVoices. Surveying the current national and international landscape, I often feel that we are living in a split-screen world. And depending on what part of the screen you are looking at, you will have a very different perception of where things stand — it alters everything you think about the present, and dramatically affects your view of the future. And nowhere is this split-screen reality more pronounced than in the African-American community. On one side, it’s a bleak picture: we see the African-American community besieged by crushing unemployment, rampant foreclosures, widening income and wealth disparity, and a disproportionate number of men in jail.
Al Sharpton Defends MSNBC Deal
(The Root) — Pointing out that he and MSNBC have not yet consummated a deal, the Rev. Al Sharpton responded to black journalists questioning his credentials for an MSNBC hosting gig in an exclusive interview withThe Root. Sharpton emphatically stated that he is an advocate, not a journalist. If he accepts the offer, he said, it would be in that role. The format under consideration at MSNBC is not for news but for opinions and advocacy, he said.
NAACP Criticizes CNN for Lack of Black Anchors
(LA Times) — CNN’s newly announced prime-time news lineup has come under fire by the NAACP, which claims the slate continues a multi-network trend that excludes African Americans from prime-time slots as anchors and hosts. ”As CNN announced their new schedule, a glaring omission was present — no African Americans were hosts or anchors in their prime time lineup,” NAACP President and Chief Executive Benjamin Todd Jealous said in a statement. “The NAACP is deeply concerned with the lack of African American journalists in prime time, both on cable and national network news shows.”
Val Warner: Chicago's Answer to Oprah
(Uptown) — It takes a certain type of tenacity to anchor a morning newscast. With her genuine likability and keen work ethic, Valerie “Val” Warner has found her niche in this most competitive profession. For the past six years, the 37-year-old mother of two has captivated Chicagoans as coanchor of WGN-TV’s Morning News. Her infectious appeal caught the eye of execs at WLS-ABC 7 who were developing a new program to replace the coveted 9 a.m. slot that media legend Oprah Winfrey has occupied for the past 25 years. Now, Warner — who will cohost the highly anticipated local show Windy City Live — reminisces about her start in journalism and the legacy she hopes to build in Chicago media.
Convictions in Murder of Oakland Journalist
(CNN) — The Alameda County District Attorney said a guilty verdict “is very satisfying to us,” after an Oakland, California, jury convicted Yusuf Bey IV in the death of prominent African-American journalist Chauncey Bailey. Bey, the owner of Your Black Muslim Bakery, was found guilty of three counts of first-degree murder, covering the deaths of Bailey and two other people killed in the weeks before Bailey’s death. ”Through Bey’s own actions and by his direction, he has brought extreme violence to Oakland and has victimized many people and our community at large,” District Attorney Nancy O’Malley told reporters at a news conference after the verdict was read. “And in his arrogance, Bey believed he was above the law … until now.”
Dean Baquet New Managing Editor of New York Times
(The Root) — In what’s being called a “historic and sudden shake-up” at the New York Times, Jill Abramson has been named the first female executive editor, and former Los Angeles Times Editor and Executive Vice President Dean Baquet will take over as managing editor. According to the Daily Beast, “There was a plausible rival [for the executive editor position] in the person of Dean Baquet, the Washington bureau chief, who moves up to managing editor. Baquet was a dynamic editor of the Los Angeles Times before resigning amid the wreckage of Tribune Co. budget cuts. He may still become the first African-American editor of The New York Times.”
Don Lemon on Life After Coming Out
(AOL Black Voices) — In the two-plus weeks since Don Lemon announced he is gay in tandem with the release of his new memoir, ’Transparent,’ the CNN anchor has received both kudos and criticism. The praise is geared toward the courage it took to openly embrace his homosexuality as a public figure. The criticism lies mainly with the language Lemon used in his announcement. Lemon told the ‘New York Times’, where the news of his announcement first broke: “It’s quite different for an African-American male…It’s about the worst thing you can be in black culture. You’re taught you have to be a man; you have to be masculine. In the black community they think you can pray the gay away.” Lemon also mentioned black women specifically, expressing his concern “that black women will say the same things [about me being gay] as they do about how black men should be dating black women.” We spoke to Lemon recently about those comments and his perspective on homosexuality in the black community, how life has changed since becoming an openly gay public figure and the women who still have a crush on him.
Jozen Cummings: How long did you know you were gay before you came out so publicly?
DL: I say in the book, I’ve always known I was gay. I think the exact quote in the book is, “Since I was knee high to a duck I’ve always known I was gay.” I had crushes on boys – it wasn’t in a sexual way, because kids aren’t that way, they don’t really know, they just know they have a crush on someone. I don’t remember the first person I came out to, but I didn’t come out to my mom until I was 30 years old.
Black Journalists Trade White Newsrooms for Black
(Columbia Journalism Review) — It started as a trickle. Sylvester Monroe resigned in 2006 as Sunday national editor at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and, two months later, joined the staff of Ebonymagazine. In 2008 the renowned byline of Jack E. White, the first black columnist at Time magazine, began to regularly appear on The Root, where Lynette Clemetson, formerly ofThe New York Times and Newsweek, was managing editor. By March of this year when Constance C. R. White, once an influential New York Times fashion writer, was named editor in chief of Essence, the trickle had swelled into a river of prominent African-American journalists streaming to black-oriented media. The names of veterans like Lynette Holloway and E. R. Shipp, formerly of The New York Times; Teresa Wiltz, Natalie Hopkinson, and Michael Cottman, all of The Washington Post; Joel Dreyfuss, formerly of Fortune and PC Magazine, and Amy DuBois Barnett ofHarper’s Bazaar and Teen People, are turning up in places like Ebony, Jet, and Essence; at BlackAmericaWeb.com, a division of Reach Media, Inc.; and at The Root, the online site spearheaded by Harvard’s Henry Louis Gates Jr. and published by The Washington Post Company. Some of these moves were prompted by layoffs and buyouts; others by disillusionment with mainstream journalism or a desire to delve more deeply into African-American issues. Whatever the reasons, with increasing frequency, African-American journalists are reversing the once common trajectory from the black press to the mainstream. New ventures like HuffPost Global Black, a vertical for Arianna Huffington’s widely read website that will be launched in partnership with Sheila Johnson, cofounder of Black Entertainment Television, are likely to quicken the pace.
