Originally called Voices That Must Be Heard, the site was the first online publication in the country to focus exclusively on ethnic media. It was launched after the 9/11 attacks as a way to give a voice and an outlet to Muslims living in New York, but later expanded to include other ethnic groups.
Early last year, the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism assumed ownership of the site from the New York Community Media Alliance and redesigned and relaunched the website as Voices of NY (voicesofny.org). It was a natural fit for the school, which is also establishing a Center for Community and Ethnic Media. The center will be a resource, not only for the school, but for the city’s ethnic journalists, by exploring new digital tools, offering professional training, and promoting activities to strengthen the bonds between different ethnic communities.
So far, more than 200 journalists from about 30 news outlets, such as KoreaDaily, Bangla Batrika, and Caribbean People, have participated in free digital media workshops offered by the school.
Voices of NY gathers journalistic work produced by community and ethnic publications and translates it and Haitian Times publisher Garry Pierre-Pierre said students follow certain websites for stories and then pitch the articles at editorial meetings. Once they are approved, stories are translated, edited, and uploaded to the Voices of NY site. A direct link to the original source is also posted. The result is more website traffic to the publications, Pierre-Pierre said.
About 80 news organizations have partnered with Voices of NY in this endeavor.
“For students, it offers them a chance to explore these kinds of stories and issues being reported,” said Voices of NY assistant editor and Pakistani journalist Jehangir Khattak. “It’s an exciting opportunity to understand the media here and build relationships with community leaders.”
Carmel Delshad was one of those students. She graduated this past winter with a master’s degree in international reporting and helped edit Voices of NY. As an Arab-American, Delshad said it was a necessity to cover the ethnic communities.
“(Voices of NY) is doing something different,” she said. “You don’t see anyone translating these publications. It’s uncharted territory.”
Daily newspapers are also learning from ethnic media. “While some papers are closing, ethnic papers are growing,” Khattak said. “They have strong roots and the support of a community … their spirit is up to the mark.”
According to Pierre-Pierre, Voices of NY has several goals in mind for 2012. Among them are increasing traffic to the website, becoming a resource across the country, adding multimedia such as videos and photos, finding more students to assist with the publication, and commissioning journalists to write original content.
The school is also preparing to host the Ippies awards in April, which will honor excellence in ethnic and community journalism.
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