Page 288 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

M nor ty Med a Ownersh p |

BEyonD BroaDCasT
Beyond the FCC deliberations in 2007, the battle of media ownership deregu-
lation and its impact on minority media ownership were certain to continue at
other public meetings, in news periodicals, on Web sites, in federal courts, in
Congress, and in the court of public opinion. For example, African Americans
have been the most vocal in voicing their concerns about the consolidation of
media outlets targeting minorities in the hands of white ownership. In a story
about Time Warner’s purchase of Essence in 2005, the black-owned Chicago De-
fender likened the reaction in some black circles to Robert L. Johnson’s sale of
BET to Viacom in 2001 as a “firestorm.” In that news report, Linda Jefferson,
senior vice president and director of media services for black-owned Burrell
Communications, said she was troubled by the sale of Essence because “a grow-
ing issue is the lack of African Americans ‘controlling our own stories’. ” Earl
Graves, the founder and owner of Black Enterprise magazine, lamented that
“there wasn’t an open bidding process in which black entrepreneurs could have
made an offer for the company and possibly preserve Essence as a black-owned
business and institution.”
But Ed Lewis, the founder of Essence Communications, and the African
American who sold Essence to Time Warner, reasoned that even under white
ownership Essence would remain a black women–centric publication: “[Time
Warner] has no desire to change what has been a rock solid mega-brand, which
we have done for over 35 years. And from the standpoint of the editorial tone
of the magazine, it’s always going to be the same because that’s what’s most im-
portant with regard to how we disseminate the kind of information that African
American women want.”

see also Alternative Media in the United States; Conglomeration and Media
Monopolies; Digital Divide; Global Community Media; Hypercommercialism;
Media and Electoral Campaigns; Media Reform; Media Watch Groups; Regu-
lating the Airwaves; Representations of Race; Shock Jocks.

Further reading: Bendixen and Associates. “Ethnic Media in America: The Giant Hidden
in Plain Sight.” http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=
0443821787ac0210cbecebe8b1f576a3; Consumers Union. “Media Ownership: Minor-
ity Ownership.” http://www.hearusnow.org/mediaownership/20/; Dines, Gail, and
Jean M., Humez, eds. Gender, Race, and Class in Media. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
Publications, 2003; Einstein, Mara. Media Diversity: Economics, Ownership, and the
FCC. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2004; Honig, David. “How the FCC
Helped Exclude Minorities from Ownership of the Airwaves.” http://www.fordham.
edu/images/undergraduate/communications/dh%20mcgannon%20lecture%20100506.
pdf; Honig, David. “History of FCC Diversity Initiatives.” Minority Media and Telecom-
munications Council. http://ww.awrt.org/advocacy/Diversity/History_FCC-Diversity_
Initiatives.pdf; Meiss, Guy, and Alice Tait, eds. Ethnic Media in America: Building a
System of Their Own. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing, 2006; Miller, Sally M.
The Ethnic Press in the United States: A Historical Analysis and Handbook. Westport,
CT: Greenwood Press, 1987; Napoli, Philip M., ed. Media Diversity and Localism:
Meaning and Metrics, Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2007; Rodriguez,