Articles Feature

Vibe Magazine Was Quincy Jones’ Print Legacy

by richard0387

Music Impresario Went to Time Warner With His Idea

How Harris Coverage Differs in Black Media:
Boston Globe Finds a Context Missing Elsewhere
Trump Attacked Media 100 Times in 8 Weeks
Star-Ledger, Other N.J. Papers Ending Print Editions

Haiti, Israel Worst on Justice for Journalists’ Killers
Survey Finds Racial Differences on Foreign Policy
AP Documents Sexual Abuse of Female Inmates
$3 Million to Boost Student Papers in Big Apple

$7.5 Million Pledged to Support Nonprofit News
Must Broadcasters Imagine the Audience is White?
Miami Radio Legend Jill Tracey Dies at 60

More to come

Homepage photo: Quincy Jones at home, in a promotional photograph for his 1989 album, “Back in the Block,” with Vibe magazine at right.

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In 2010, Quincy Jones reflects on the creation of Vibe. “When I open up this 10th anniversary issue and I open that thing up and I saw 100 covers on there I mean it really . . . lights you up, and again it gives you that courage to take a giant step the next time, so after a while you get to become fearless.” (Credit: YouTube)

Music Impresario Went to Time Warner With His Idea

Quincy Jones, described as “one of the most powerful forces in American popular music for more than half a century” and who died at 91 Sunday in California, also left a legacy in the journalism world: Jones’s marriage of music and publishing led to the creation of Vibe magazine.

Vibe was founded in 1992 by Jones and Time Warner, with a focus on hip-hop and R&B music and the culture surrounding it. It became one of the most influential publications of its kind, as the New York Times would report when the title was sold in 2013.

“Presenting a glossy and urbane view of urban culture, Vibe Magazine became a preeminent site for journalists and scholars chronicling contemporary black popular culture,” author, professor and cultural critic Mark Anthony Neal wrote in 2009, when the magazine folded, later to return as an online-only product.

“The lists of writers who can claim a Vibe Magazine by-line represent the cutting edge of a critical intelligentsia, many of them black writers who would have had few other legitimate options to hone their craft.”

In a 2018 oral history of the magazine for Billboard, Keith Clinkscales (pictured), chief operating officer in 1993, and chief executive officer from 1994 to 1999, said, “No conversation about Vibe can occur without talking about Quincy Jones. It was his career, and the way he did things, that set the stage for belief that Vibe could happen. Here’s one other thing: Nobody recognizes how hard it is for people of color to get an opportunity. The position I had at Vibe was a gift from God, and Quincy, and Bob Miller” of Time Inc. “It was one of the greatest opportunities that I’ve ever gotten.”

The late journalistic icon David Carr summarized Vibe’s influence in 2009 for The New York Times, when the magazine shut down:

“Founded with a test issue in 1992 by Time Warner and commencing regular issues in 1993, Vibe was a magazine about hip-hop, R&B and urban youth culture that brought luxe design values and major-league photography and writing to the music that dominated and shaped American pop culture in the late 1990s.

“In the current context — a black president, rap stars so ubiquitous even your mom knows who 50 Cent is, pop songs that feature drive-bys from the M.C.’s of the moment — Vibe would seem less necessary.

“But it’s worth remembering what an easy target rap was in the culture wars of the early ’90s; Vibe did not sanitize rap so much as give it its cultural due. If there were no Vibe, contemporary black music and culture would not be quite so writ into the mainstream.

“Sixteen years ago black pop musicians may have been moving records and booties, but few got the A-list treatment in major magazines, at least not until Vibe. Those artists usually had to be huge to earn the cover at other
publications, but Vibe took an interest in both the nascent and the known.

“Born from a friendship between Mr. Jones and Steven J. Ross, then chairman of Time Warner, Vibe showed up on a magazine rack where black faces rarely appeared unless they had been charged with a crime or it was a thin August issue and a fashion magazine wanted to demonstrate some token diversity. (Yes, Ebony and Jet got there first, but they were mostly Mom and Dad’s magazines; the Source was founded in the late 1980s but had little for readers who weren’t hard-core hip-hop heads.) (Photo: Jones makes the cover!)

“Every time I see a black entertainment figure on the cover of InStyle or Cigar Aficionado, I think of Vibe,” said Danyel Smith (pictured), Vibe’s editor in chief, who interned at the magazine and served two stints as its editor. “You have to remember that the kind of coverage you see now did not exist before Vibe. You had this music community that was
incredibly bold and vibrant, and it was getting, at best, a sometime look in most places.”

“Black people read it, and so did white people and, well, anybody who listened to hip-hop and R&B, a psychographic that came to include vast swaths of Americans. By the mid-’90s it became a showcase for hip-hop royals, and the writer Kevin Powell and others steadily chronicled the East Coast-West Coast rap feud and the rise and deaths of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G.

“ ‘I think that the magazine defined a cultural moment during the whole East Coast-West Coast beef,’ said Ta-Nehisi Coates, a blogger and writer for The Atlantic. ‘The writers and editors at Vibe were participants in the hip-hop community who went to the same shows and the same parties as the people they covered. . . .’ “

How Harris Coverage Differs in Black Media

Vice President Kamala Harris in July at the Essence Festival of Culture in New Orleans. Essence magazine CEO and president Caroline Wanga conducted a “chief-to-chief” interview with Harris. (Credit: Roland Martin/YouTube)

Boston Globe Finds a Context Missing Elsewhere

” ‘We know that this is monumental’: How Black-led newsrooms are bringing nuance, perspective to Kamala Harris coverage,” read the headline Thursday over a Boston Globe story by its media writer, Aidan Ryan (pictured below).

The story quoted editors at the nonprofit news website Capital B, the director of City University of New York’s Black Media Initiative, and leaders at Boston’s Bay State Banner, Essence magazine and the New York Amsterdam News.

It came a month after journalists of color observed that mainstream media were not “getting” Harris.

“News coverage of Vice President Kamala Harris and her bid for the presidency is hampered by the ‘cultural incompetence’ of journalists who don’t understand or acknowledge the political skill it took for a Black and South Asian woman to reach the level she has, according to reporters who discussed the Democratic presidential nominee last week at the Journal-isms Roundtable,” this column reported.

“Overall, the press has failed to pay sufficient attention to her background, her time as vice president and how the priorities she’s outlined reflect her own experience as a woman, a former prosecutor and a person of color, said the reporters, themselves of color and who have all covered Harris.”

Ryan said the idea for his story sprung from a conversation with Cristina Silva (pictured), the Globe’s managing editor for local news, who has been co-chair of the Diversity Committee of the recently disbanded News Leaders Association and, as a member of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, told that organization in 2021, “it’s long overdue for NAHJ to do more to fight anti-Black racism and stand with NABJ,” the National Association of Black Journalists. NAHJ formed a task force on Afro-Latinos.

Earlier, as national enterprise editor at USA Today, Silva launched “Hecho en USA,” a series intended to “tell stories about the lives of Spanish-speaking Americans,” published in English and Spanish.

“My editors and I have been discussing election coverage for several weeks,” Ryan messaged. Silva “had the idea to do a story about how Black-led news outlets were covering the election. After speaking with some editors of both local and national publications and reading their coverage, I decided to focus the piece largely on how various Black-led newsrooms were covering the Kamala Harris campaign, both in capturing the history she could make as the first Black woman to become president and the stakes of this election.

“What came through in my conversations and in several newsrooms’ coverage was a unique perspective on her identity, how she would govern if elected, and bringing nuance and context to threads that have been covered extensively by the mainstream press, such as Harris’s support among Black men. We hadn’t seen this story covered, so thought it was important to share with our readers and beyond.”

Ryan’s story began, “The day former president Donald Trump falsely claimed that Kamala Harris ‘happened to turn Black’ at a Black journalists’ convention in July, the nonprofit news website Capital B quickly published a story debunking the allegation.

“While the outlet called out the lie — its headline: ‘Donald Trump’s Pants on Fire Claim That Kamala Harris “Became” Black’ — Capital B didn’t dwell on the vice president’s race. Instead, executive editor Kelly Virella said the publication has focused on the issues most crucial to Black voters, such as Harris’s record on criminal justice reform, reproductive rights, and the economy, including how her policy proposals could boost Black communities.”

Later in the story, Ryan wrote, “Aaron Foley (pictured), news editor at the New York Amsterdam News — one of the country’s oldest Black newspapers — said Black news outlets have the imperative to avoid over-generalizations and frame statistics within proper context. That includes not running headlines that overstate the recent polling, he said, such as, hypothetically, ‘Black men are skeptical about having a Black woman in office.’

“ ‘That would be taken and run with this saying, “Oh, here’s a Black paper saying all Black men are doing it,” ‘ Foley said.

“Many Black outlets instead have run articles reframing the conversation, such as Capital B’s story: ‘What Headlines Miss About Black Men’s Support for Harris,’ which acknowledges the drop in polling, but emphasizes that Black men are poised to be the second-most-supportive voting bloc for Harris after Black women. . . .”

Silva told Journal-isms she had nothing to add to Ryan’s comments, but that “I am glad Aidan was able to write this important story on this historic coverage.”

CNN’s Kaitlan Collins (Chloe Fineman) checks in with Kamala Harris (Maya Rudolph) and Donald Trump’s (James Austin Johnson) campaigns on the eve of the 2024 election. Kamala Harris’s surprise appearance on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” over the weekend was “a ‘clear and blatant effor’t to evade the FCC’s Equal Time rule,” Republican commissioner Brendan Carr asserted in a social media post. However, Alex Weprin reported Sunday for the Hollywood Reporter, “NBC is giving former President Donald Trump’s campaign free commercial time in response to Vice President Kamala Harris’ appearance on Saturday Night Live, including an unusual ad during Sunday’s NASCAR coverage, a source familiar with the matter says.” (Credit: YouTube)

Trump Attacked Media 100 Times in 8 Weeks

“As the U.S. presidential campaign reaches its November 5 climax, Republican candidate and former president Donald Trump has escalated his war on the free press, verbally attacking the media more than 100 times over the past two months,” Clayton Weimers, executive director of Reporters Without Borders USA, reported Oct. 25. “Yet these attacks rarely make the news anymore. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is deeply concerned that American media – and in turn, the wider public – may be growing numb to the existential threat Trump’s attacks pose to American press freedom.

“In an eight-week long period analyzed by RSF, Trump insulted, attacked, or threatened the media at least 108 times in public speeches or remarks from September 1 to October 24. This figure does not include social media posts or remarks from others connected to the campaign. . . .”

On Sunday, Trump “delivered a profane and conspiracy-laden speech . . . talking about reporters being shot and suggesting he ‘shouldn’t have left’ the White House after his 2020 loss to Democrat Joe Biden,” Jill Colvin and Jonathan J. Cooper reported for the Associated Press.

In remarks “that bore little resemblance to the speech he’s been delivering at his recent rallies, the former president repeatedly cast doubt on the integrity of the vote and resurrected old grievances after trying to overturn his 2020 election defeat. Trump intensified his verbal attacks on what he cast as a ‘demonic’ Democratic Party and the American media, steering his rally in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at one point to the topic of violence against members of the press.

“He noted the ballistic glass that is used to protect him at outdoor events after a gunman’s assassination attempt in July and pointed to openings between the panels.

“ ‘I have this piece of glass here,’ he said. ‘But all we have really over here is the fake news. And to get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news. And I don’t mind that so much.’

“Facing criticism for suggesting violence against the media, Trump’s campaign later played down his comments.

“ ‘The President’s statement about protective glass placement has nothing to do with the Media being harmed, or anything else,’ Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement. Instead he claimed that Trump was suggesting that reporters were in ‘great danger themselves, and should have had a glass protective shield, also. There can be no other interpretation of what was said. He was actually looking out for their welfare, far more than his own!’ ”

Separately, Beth Reinhard and Sarah Ellison reported Friday for The Washington Post, “When President Donald Trump threatened in 2017 to pull licenses from television stations that scrutinized his administration, he met resistance from his own political appointee — the Republican chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, who cited the First Amendment in objecting to the idea.

“Seven years later, Trump’s latest broadsides against the media are getting a much different reception.

“As the former president and his allies demanded crackdowns on ABC over alleged bias in the presidential debate the network hosted and on CBS over its editing of an interview with his Democratic opponent, the agency’s two Republican commissioners, both originally nominated by Trump, appeared sympathetic.

“Not frivolous,” one of them, Brendan Carr, (pictured, above) said of the complaint about CBS during a Fox Business interview. ‘Big if true. Will look into it,’ said the other, Nathan Simington (pictured,}, in a social media post the former president shared with millions of followers.

“The shift suggests how a reelected Trump could install a more cooperative bureaucracy to weaponize the FCC as part of his broader assault against the media, including taking the extraordinary step of punishing broadcasters that air unfavorable coverage. . . .”

  • Gene Demby, B.A. Parker, Xavier Lopez, Courtney Stein, Alison MacAdam, Jess Kung, Christina Cala, Leah Donnella, Jasmine Romero, “Code Switch,” NPR: Diving into the Black Manosphere

The building at 30 Journal Square in Jersey City, N.J., was for decades the home base for the Jersey Journal. (Credit: Reena Rose Sibayan/Jersey Journal)

Star-Ledger, Other N.J. Papers Ending Print Editions

The Star-Ledger, New Jersey’s largest newspaper and the winner of several Pulitzer Prizes, will stop publishing its print edition early next year, ending a lengthy run as a dominant source of print news in the region, its owners announced on Wednesday,” Lola Fadulu and Tracey Tully reported for The New York Times.

“The shuttering of The Star-Ledger’s printing plant will cause its sister publication, The Jersey Journal, a Jersey City-based newspaper with a storied, 157-year history, to cease publication altogether. Its demise will leave Hudson County, N.J., a densely populated region that is as well known for political corruption as it is for being the birthplace of Frank Sinatra, without a daily newspaper.”

Almost all of the reporters and editors are based out of newsrooms for NJ.com or LehighValleyLive.com (Pa.), news sites run by NJ Advance Media, the largest producer of news in New Jersey. All the publications and news companies are affiliates of Advance Publication, the largest privately held media company in the nation. 

Most news stories are published online first, then published in the Advance newspapers, including The Star-Ledger, South Jersey Times, the Times of Trenton, the Jersey Journal, the Easton-Express Times (Pa.), and the Hunterdon County Democrat. The Star-Ledger will continue to have a separate online news site for subscribers after the print publication ends in February.

Only three journalists remain on The Star-Ledger’s staff — all members of the newspaper’s editorial board. David Blomquist, the Jersey Journal’s publisher and editor, said their eight full-time and nine part-time employees will be “let go” in February.

“Advance Local, which owns NJ Advance Media and NJ.com, home to the publications’ news sites, said they would remain available online,” the New York Times story continued.

“The Star-Ledger stopped publishing its Saturday newspaper in January, and its circulation has dropped 21 percent so far this year, its leaders said in a statement.

“Steve Alessi, the president of NJ Advance Media, said that people in New Jersey and across the country had ‘made clear their preference for news delivered in digital forms.’ He said leaders had tried to keep the print editions going but that declining demand and rising costs had made them ‘unsustainable.’

“All 17 employees of The Journal — including nine who work full time — will be let go and offered severance packages, David Blomquist, The Jersey Journal’s editor and publisher, told NJ.com.

Hired in 1975, John C. Watson (pictured), Ph.D., associate professor of communications and journalism ethics at American University, was the first Black reporter at the Jersey Journal.

Watson recalled some of those of color who worked with him before moving on:

“There’s Leonard Greene — columnist at NY Daily News, reporter at New York Post, reporter at Boston Herald and Newsday; Gilbert Martinez — senior lecturer in journalism at Texas State University; Monica Quintanilla Araya – editor at Newsday;

“The late Earl Morgan (former minister of Information for Black Panther Party unit in New Jersey, reporter at Hudson Dispatch, reporter and columnist at The Jersey Journal, public library was named in his honor after death; Peralte Paul – Communications director at Georgia Tech, reporter at Atlanta Journal Constitution;

“Nick Chiles — writer in residence at University of Georgia Grady College of Journalism and Communication, Dallas Morning News, the Star-Ledger of New Jersey and New York Newsday, where he won a Pulitzer Prize as part of a team of reporters covering a subway crash, wrote books with Bobby Brown, Al Sharpton, Kirk Franklin and NBA center Etan Thomas. I was there from 1975 until I left for graduate school in 1996. I was the first Black reporter, later first Black editor (news editor then city editor) and first Black president of the Newspaper Guild unit in Jersey City.””

Watson later added two Puerto Rican journalists, the first Agustin Torres. “He pre-dated me by about a year and was the first reporter of color at the paper and the first elevated to an editor’s desk. He remained there when I left and stepped down in 2018. There was also Raul Vicente Jr., who was a decorated Viet Nam veteran and who worked the police beat for a while. He is currently in the entertainment business. I don’t know if it matters, but Péralte Paul is of Haitian descent and Monica Quintanilla is of Chilean descent.

  ”A New York Times article in 1999 said it was the most diverse newsroom in the NYC market. The numbers closely mirrored the population in our circulation area:

 ” ‘In the New York area, the paper with the greatest diversity was The Jersey Journal in Jersey City; more than 30 percent of its newsroom staff are members of minorities. Newsday is next with 21.4 percent. The Wall Street Journal reported a minority staff percentage of 17.6; The New York Times, 15.6; The Daily News, 13.9 and The New York Post, 12.6.‘ ”  

UNESCO prepared this video on “How to stop impunity for crimes against journalists?” in 2021. This year, the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists fell on Nov. 2, with the global commemoration on Nov. 6 and 7 at the African Union Headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The theme is “Safety of Journalists in Crises and Emergencies.” (Credit: YouTube)

Haiti, Israel Worst on Justice for Journalists’ Killers

“Two small nations – Haiti and Israel – are now the world’s biggest offenders in letting journalists’ murderers go unpunished, according to CPJ’s 2024 Global Impunity Index, which measures unsolved murders in proportion to a country’s population. This year is the first time Israel has appeared in CPJ’s index since its inception in 2008,” the Committee to Protect Journalists reported Wednesday.

“In Haiti, ranked No. 1, a weak-to-nonexistent judiciary, gang violence, poverty, and political instability have contributed to the failure to hold killers to account. Haiti joined the index for the first time in 2023, in third place, as criminal gangs took over large parts of the country following the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, plunging the press into an ‘existential crisis’ that has forced many to cut staff or close altogether.

“Israel’s targeted killing of journalists in Gaza and Lebanon during a relentless war drove it up to the No. 2 spot on this year’s index, which covers the period from September 1, 2014, to August 31, 2024. CPJ has documented the murder of five journalists – four Palestinian and one Lebanese – since the war began, and is investigating the possible targeted murders of 10 more journalists. Given the challenges of documenting the war, the number may be far higher. Overall, Israel has killed a record number of Palestinian journalists since the war began on October 7, 2023. . . .”

Survey Finds Racial Differences on Foreign Policy

A survey from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace shows differences among registered Black, Hispanic and white voters on such critical foreign policy challenges as Israel and Palestine, immigration and reducing carbon emissions, the Center’s Christopher Shell reported.

“Here are some key findings:

  • “On immigration, a slim majority of Americans agreed that undocumented immigrants should be allowed to remain in the country if certain conditions are met, though specific criteria were not assessed in the survey. Among supporters of former president Donald Trump, Hispanic Americans were least supportive (37 percent) of measures aimed at removing undocumented immigrants compared to Black Trump supporters (51 percent) and White Trump supporters (77 percent).
  • “While a plurality of Americans (43 percent) strongly supported U.S. involvement in international efforts to reduce carbon emissions, few supported completely phasing out fossil fuels in favor of renewable energy sources — with the exception of White voters who support Vice President Kamala Harris (51 percent).
  • “A plurality of Americans (44 percent) supported the United States pushing Israel toward a ceasefire and hostage exchange in the Israel-Hamas conflict. However, the partisan divide was more pronounced among White voters than Black; White Harris supporters favored a ceasefire at 74 percent compared to White Trump supporters at 21 percent, while Black Harris supporters favored a ceasefire at 53 percent compared to Black Trump supporters at 41 percent.”

AP Documents Sexual Abuse of Female Inmates

“As part of a sweeping two-year investigation into prison labor, The Associated Press found that correctional staff nationwide have been accused of using inmate work assignments to sexually abuse incarcerated women, luring them to isolated spots, out of view of security cameras,” Margie Mason and Robin McDowell reported Oct. 31 for the AP. “Many cases follow a similar pattern: Accusers are retaliated against, while the accused face little or no punishment.

“Here are takeaways from the AP’s investigation:

  • “Women are fastest-growing population behind bars. Though they represent only 10% of the nation’s overall prison population, female incarceration rates have jumped from about 26,000 in 1980 to nearly 200,000 today. . . .
  • “Prison rape is illegal, but laws vary widely. The Prison Rape Elimination Act, passed more than two decades ago, created a channel for filing reports that resulted in a threefold increase in the number of allegations of staff sexual misconduct involving male, female and transgender inmates from 2010 to 2020 at jails and prisons nationwide. . . .
  • “Fear of retaliation. Most female victims were abused before being incarcerated, research shows. They rarely report assaults, fearing they won’t be believed or will be punished, ranging from losing their jobs to being placed in solitary confinement or denied contact with their children. . . .
  • “Investigating labor abuses. As part of the AP’s investigation — which has exposed everything from multinational companies benefiting from prison labor to incarcerated workers’ lack of rights and protections — reporters spoke to more than 100 current and former prisoners nationwide, including women who said they were sexually abused by correctional staff. . . .”

Dozens of young New Yorkers gathered at City Hall on April 18 calling for the city to expand support for journalism programs and student newspapers at its schools. (Credit: Jeanmarie Evelly/City Limits)

$3 Million to Boost Student Papers in Big Apple

Only 27 percent of public high schools in New York City have a student newspaper, down from roughly 50 percent in 2009, Claire Fahy reported in September for The New York Times.

“The problem is even more stark at schools with many low-income students: Just seven of the 100 public schools with the highest rates of student poverty have student-run publications, according to data from Baruch College. . . .

“The decline in school newspapers is not unique to New York. Across the country, rising costs, changing attitudes toward the news media, difficulties in finding faculty advisers and an emphasis on science, math and technology have led to a dearth of high school journalism programs — particularly at underprivileged schools.

“Seeking to address the problem, local news outlets and universities in states like California, Illinois and Texas have teamed up to prepare teachers to lead electives and workshops for aspiring young journalists.

“And now, New York City will have its own initiative, Journalism for All. The pilot program is a collaboration between the Youth Journalism Coalition, which is run by The Bell, a nonprofit; the City Council; and the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. . . .

“Journalism for All, a $3 million initiative funded by the City Council and private donors, is expected to quadruple the number of Black and Latino students in journalism classes at New York City schools, according to Taylor McGraw, the executive director of The Bell, which created the coalition. . . “

$7.5 Million Pledged to Support Nonprofit News

“NewsMatch, the annual fundraising campaign spearheaded by the Institute for Nonprofit News (INN), begins on Nov. 1 with a record amount of funds pledged to bolster local support for independent journalism,” the organization announced Thursday.

“Eighteen national and regional funders have pledged $7.5 million to NewsMatch, the largest grassroots fundraising campaign to support nonprofit news in the U.S. Since 2017, participating news organizations in the INN Network have leveraged $31 million in NewsMatch funding to help generate nearly $300 million in support from their communities. . . .

“This year, 391 news organizations plan to participate in NewsMatch — 14% more than in 2023. These outlets represent most U.S. states and territories and often cover historically marginalized communities; 23% (90 outlets) indicated that people of color comprise a majority of their audience or that their organizations spend a majority of their resources producing news reports for people of color; a quarter (98) indicated their organizations are led by people of color. . . .”

Decisions on applications are to be announced in mid-December.

Former NFL defensive back Nick Ferguson learns the rules on using one’s hands while talking on television. (Courtesy Ryan Watts.)

Must Broadcasters Imagine the Audience is White?

“Journalists often assume that their primary audience is white. Much has been written about how this assumption shapes marketing strategies and editorial decisions. Less attention has been paid to how the imagined audience influences journalists’ appearance and vocal delivery,” Elia Powers (pictured) of Towson University wrote Oct 24 for Nieman Lab. “This topic interests me as a professor who teaches podcasting and studies self-presentation norms. . . .”

“Research suggests that television news remains most popular among less-educated audiences,” continued Powers, author of “Performing the News: Identity, Authority, and the Myth of Neutrality.”

“Viewers are racially diverse, but the imagined viewer often isn’t. An Asian television journalist recalled that at her former station, a photo of the target audience member — a white, suburban, middle-aged mother — was pinned to a conference room wall. Wherever the journalist worked, she knew the target viewer profile, and it ‘never reflected someone who looked like me.’ She said in local television news, ‘you’re trained very early to know that your audience is probably white, probably in the suburbs, and probably middle class.’ . . . . .

“That’s less the case for public radio-affiliated podcasts and podcasting in general, which tends to attract younger, more diverse listeners. When a journalist left public radio to start her own podcast studio, the listener she and her colleagues imagined was a 26-year-old Afro-Latina daughter of immigrant parents who is the first in her family to graduate college — the kind of listener that audience research showed ‘wasn’t being served well by traditional radio.’ . . .

“Conclusion: Research shows that exposure to different types of voices and appearance attributes can help reduce bias and stigma. News outlets can help normalize diverse forms of self-presentation and attract audiences who have previously felt unrepresented. Many are vowing to do so, though as one journalist noted, even when public radio stations promise to target diverse communities, “there’s always a sentence in there about ‘and maintain our current audience’

“Progress is slow, but the imagined audience may finally be expanding.”

Miami Radio Legend Jill Tracey Dies at 60

“Known for her catchphrase, ‘Love ya! Mean it!’, Jill Tracey (pictured, by Collette Fournier) was an institution in South Florida radio who gave listeners all the juiciest celebrity gossip as well as a platform to discuss the issues of the day,” Raisa Habersham reported Friday for the Miami Herald. She was found unresponsive in her home that day, WTVJ-TV reported. Tracey was 60.

The South Florida chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists said, “Jill’s remarkable career included serving as News Director at HOT 105, where she not only showcased her exceptional talent but also inspired countless others in the industry. As past president of the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) South Florida chapter, she championed diversity and excellence in journalism, leaving a lasting impact on the community she loved.

“Her commitment to public service was evident in her recent candidacy, where she sought to make a difference in the lives of her fellow residents. Despite facing health challenges in recent times, Jill’s resilience and determination never wavered.” Tracey was running for Hollywood’s District 2 commissioner, hoping to replace the city’s first Black commissioner Linda Anderson.

The Herald story also said, “Jill Tracey was with WHQT HOT 105 FM on and off for more than 30 years in various roles but was laid off in June along with veteran radio personality, James T. Most recently she hosted a community engagement show on the weekend called Hot Talk with Jill Tracey and the daily morning show from 6-10 a.m. . . .

“Tracey started her career as a South Beach gossip columnist, which led to radio and TV jobs that took her to Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta and back to Miami. During the late ‘90s Tracey’s life as a radio star began to rise on WEDR 99 Jamz. There wasn’t a club opening she didn’t attend, a celebrity who could sneak into town without her finding out or some dirt she couldn’t dig up.

“A 1997 Herald profile described Tracey, who for years hosted a celebrity gossip segment on air called ‘The 4-1-1,’ as a “gossip guru, entertainment reporter and social butterfly. Tracey’s business is other folks’ business.”

More to come

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