METHODOLOGY
HOW WE DEFINED A LATINO NEWS MEDIA OUTLET
The definition of Latino news media outlet for the purposes of this report is a U.S.-based media outlet that serves a Latino community or population offering information and/or commentary about U.S. current events or nonfiction storytelling in Spanish or English.
For this first phase of our project, we have not included outlets that produce content exclusively in Portuguese. Although we have identified a small number of such outlets, at this time our fact checking resources do not allow for the necessary content analysis to include them. We expect to do so in a subsequent phase of the project.
We understand news in the broadest sense, as information that helps people make sense of the world around them.
We started by carrying out an expansive search. Our only stipulation was that the outlets provided news and current affairs content– the latter in the form of either original reporting or presented as commentary or nonfiction storytelling. So for example, a small local weekly newspaper produced by one individual would qualify as a news media outlet, but a large Spanish-language radio station in a major city which programming is mainly music and entertainment, would not.
Further, we did not include platforms within larger media outlets that only translate English content into Spanish. An example would be ProPublica en Español. We also did not include outlets like The New York Times en Español, produced mainly outside of the U.S.
HOW WE IDENTIFIED NEWS OUTLETS AND COLLECTED DATA
The first stage of our research was carried out by a group of bilingual journalists in the 2017 class at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.
The students were first tasked with identifying Latino news media outlets for their assigned states where we knew some already existed —general news media directories and databases. Some of these were accessed through the New York Public Library system: Gale Directory of Publications and Broadcast Media, 154th ed (Online), SRDS database, Advertising Red Books Online, and Editor & Publisher. Others were aggregator news and business databases the students were already familiar with and had access to through CUNY: ReferenceUSA, Access World News, Factiva and LexisNexis.
Next, our students carried out extensive online searches for aggregated lists of Latino news media outlets, state open data portals, Facebook groups, Twitter lists, Latino journalists and media associations, Latino community organizations, Latino nonprofit and/or advocacy groups, universities, local journalists, other local media outlets, chambers of commerce –organizations and people who would be more familiar with media outlets at a state and local level.
Following that first phase of research we put together a list of what we considered to be our “slim” states —those states that had fewer than 10 Latino media outlets. Two research assistants did additional outreach and online research to identify outlets we might have missed in those states, in addition to data collection for all outlets identified, which included the following data: address, media type, language of publication/broadcast, content type, website, year founded, type of ownership or name of owner, audience/circulation, sources of income, number of employees, frequency of publication, social media accounts. Data collected in this phase came primarily from information available on the outlets’ websites.
Our third phase of research involved a complete review of outlets; additional online search and outreach (as defined above) including multiple phone calls and emails to the outlets; data collection through a survey emailed to all identified outlets and a final verification process of all information collected.
Our survey served as a way to introduce and explain the project to those outlets we identified and collect missing data for each of them. Outlets that did not respond remain in our directory so long as we could verify that they are currently producing and distributing content.
We hope the public launch of this interactive map ahead of the report’s release this summer will prompt all remaining outlets to fill out our survey to correct or add information.
Our goal was to include all 50 states and Puerto Rico on the map and final report but we were unable to find any Latino media outlets in the following: Hawaii, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
If you’re a media organization serving the Latino community and you’re not featured here, please fill out and submit our survey. We want to include you! Likewise, if you are featured here and we are missing data for your organization and/or have incorrect information for your outlet, please let us know by filling out the same survey.
If you’re a news consumer and know of a Latino news media outlet in your area not listed here, please let us know by emailing us at latinomediareport@journalism.cuny.edu
We also welcome any feedback and suggestions.