Black Media

Associated Press (AP) Changes Guidelines To Capitalize "B" In Black; "I" In Indiginous

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As coverage of racial issues has spiked since the death of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer on May 25, 2020, journalists and even regular people in their social media posts or emails are paying attention to when to capitalize words that identify people such as “Black", “Indigenous” and “white.”

On June 19, 2020, the Associated Press announced via blog post from John Daniszewski, the AP’s Vice President of Standards, that its style would be to capitalize the “B” in Black, as well the “I” in Indigenous. Conversations about these terms, and all language, are always being considered, and Daniszewski confirmed: “We continue to discuss other terms, including minorities and people of color, as well as the term ‘Black, Indigenous and people of color.’”

To make the distinction clear, Daniszewski emphasized: “AP’s style is now to capitalize Black in a racial, ethnic or cultural sense, conveying an essential and shared sense of history, identity and community among people who identify as Black, including those in the African diaspora and within Africa. The lowercase black is a color, not a person.”

Journalism Professionals And National Association of Black Journalists Have Long Asked For This Change

Former president of National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ), Sarah Glover, said in a second open letter to the AP published June 11, 2020 (her first was published in August, 2019) that she is aware of others before her who have asked for this change: “I’m not the first to propose this change. I’ve read multiple published opinions on the topic over the past decade in particular. I first asked AP editors to consider the change last August.”

In an interview with PublicIntegrity.org, Glover expanded upon why the change contributes to racism: “George Floyd’s tragic and untimely death by a Minneapolis police officer brought to the surface of the American psyche the horrors of institutionalized racism. The case made to capitalize the “B” in Black is about dismantling assigned identity in language by those in power in the media (often white people) and affirming a particular community and how it defines itself. Use of the capital “B” in news reporting style in some ways mirrors the systemic inequality so many everyday citizens are working to eradicate.

”Ironically, journalists will find themselves covering these protests. Yet the media industry must do more than simply cover the protest, it must reckon with and change itself, too. The media industry must dismantle its own biases. The complex history of race in society shows up in how journalism publications assign meaning with words and coverage. Unpacking this is as relevant as the coverage of the pandemic.”

In the AP’s elaborated announcement on its blog, they explored the capitalization of the “N” in Negro: “Nearly a century ago, sociologist W.E.B. DuBois (wow, please read this) waged a letter-writing campaign to get newspapers to capitalize Negro, saying a lowercase “n” was a sign of disrespect and racism. The New York Times took his advice in 1930, calling it an act of recognition and respect for those who’d spent generations in ‘the lower case.’ Negro fell out of fashion with the Black Power movement of the 1960s, coming to symbolize subservience. African American was often used, but is not always accurate — some Black people don’t trace their lineage to Africa.”

News Outlets Who Already Made The Change

Glover pointed out that prior to the AP’s official change, some news outlets had already made the decision to capitalize the “B” in Black when referring to a person, including NBC Owned Television Stations (Glover is currently an executive with NBC), The Seattle Times in 2019, and The Daily Orange, a student-run newspaper at Syracuse University. Glover pointed out that some Black run media had already been capitalizing the “B” in Black, and the Washington Post identified a few as Essence, Ebony and the Chicago Defender.

Since the AP’s announcement, more news media groups adopted the policy, including the USA Today and its affiliated network of more than 260 local papers, The Los Angeles Times, NBC News, MSNBC, BuzzFeed and the McClatchy newspaper chain. The Washington Post itself was still considering as of the time of that article.

The “w” In White

Meanwhile, the AP has declared that for now, the “w” in white will remain lowercase, even when referring to a type of person, not a color of paint. Says the AP: “AP style will continue to lowercase the term white in racial, ethnic and cultural senses.”

The AP went on to explain their thought process, which they concluded, is ever evolving: “After a review and period of consultation, we found, at this time, less support for capitalizing white. White people generally do not share the same history and culture, or the experience of being discriminated against because of skin color. In addition, AP is a global news organization and there is considerable disagreement, ambiguity and confusion about whom the term includes in much of the world.

”We agree that white people’s skin color plays into systemic inequalities and injustices, and we want our journalism to robustly explore those problems. But capitalizing the term white, as is done by white supremacists, risks subtly conveying legitimacy to such beliefs.”

Glover feels that this decision to capitalize the “B” in Black is separate from the treatment of “w” in white. She told Publicintegrity.org: “The case for capitalizing the “B” in Black is a separate discussion from capitalizing the “w” in white. The mistake some news organizations or arbiters of this issue made was connecting the two and suggesting that the decisions for the “B” and “w” were binary, meaning they were directly related to each other. There are two separate discussions to be had.

”The case for the capital “B” is focused on affirming a group of citizens of the world. African descendants living in America often have no defined ethnic lineage to a specific country or countries. Like the many African Americans who may have no known genetic link to a particular country due to the history of slavery, the capital “B” serves as an inclusive identity that notes a shared experience, race and ethnicity. Conversely, a known heritage is a more common reality for many white people, Asians, Hispanics and Latinos. As they may be more likely to know their country of origin, if relevant to a story, the media would likely publish that cultural or ethnic background. It is for those reasons, albeit not limited to, that the case for capitalizing the “B” in Black was made.”

What To Do With This Information

Aside from writing it correctly - and knowing why - in your social media posts, pitches to the media, emails to friends and colleagues, you might also be wondering how to handle yourself or your business in this racial revolution.

If you are unsure about how to talk about racial issues or the treatment of Black people right now, Tin Shingle can be a soundboard for your needs. Tin Shingle is an idea center for business owners, artists, makers and community organizers who are trying to get the word out. Consider membership so that we can begin discussing your needs in our Community Forum.

New Editorial Calendars, Featuring African American Publications

In this update to Tin Shingle’s exclusive Editorial Calendar Collection, we have added new publications (new to our collection, but established in the publishing world!) catering to the African American audience.

Keep in mind, these are only Editorial Calendars. There are more media ideas for you to pitch to in Tin Shingle’s Media Contact Library. We have devoted a research project to #blackmedia to make sure we have the publications (digital and print) that people have been loving and have made big impacts on their lives. In our Media Contact Library, you can search by “Black Media” or “African American” for instance, and get search results of people who work for publications who identify with that niche.

About Our Editorial Calendar Collection

For all of our Editorial Calendars, we either get them from the magazine for the upcoming year, or if it hasn’t been released yet (but they still know the themes), we do our scientific study of researching the past 2 years of what that magazine published. If we see consistency in the broad theme, then we make a prediction. For example, if Essence Magazine did “Women In Business” in October for the past 2 years, then we predict that to be the broad theme again for 2020.

However, the utmost important tool you have access to is the publication and submission date through 2020. You are able to determine where a magazine is in their production cycle so you can pitch them a timely story angle. There are SO MANY ideas you can pitch. Knowing the broad theme is helpful, but not the most important aspect to your pitching. Think big! Think broadly!

African-American Career World Magazine

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African-American Career World Magazine is the career link between African American students, graduate students, and professionals and the employers seeking to hire them.  Featuring career strategies, industry trends and role model profiles that aim to inspire the African American community.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR PLANNING FOR NOW: Black History Month, Healthcare, Government, Military

Black Enterprise

Since 1970, Black Enterprise has been the premiere source of business information and advice to African American professionals and entrepreneurs. They seek to empower their audience to take control of their wealth and success.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR PLANNING FOR NOW: You’ll have the publication dates, which is key because this magazine works on articles months in advance. Knowing these dates is how you will pitch really timely story ideas that can work for most any broad theme.

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The African American Golfer’s Digest

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The African American Golfer’s Digest, launched in 2003, is the nation’s leading publication for avid Black American golfers. It is unique in that it is a 100% minority and woman owned and operated business, and the only golf magazine specifically for the African American demographic. Available by subscription only and independently published, it is an integral guide that features activities enjoyed by golfers including tournaments, book reviews, celebrity news, fundraisers, traveling, competition and healthy living.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR PLANNING FOR NOW:  Finance

These Are Only A Small Sampling Of Editorial Calendar Themes!

Many more editorial calendar ideas are in Tin Shingle’s Editorial Calendar Collection. These are a small sampling, highlighted for you to see what you need to dive into.

Members of Tin Shingle at the All Access Level of Membership have instant access to ALL of our editorial calendars. We currently have the editorial calendars from over 100 publications for 2019! All searchable by Title and Area of Interest! Browse through and let your inspiration take hold!

All editorial themes are from editors themselves and are subject to change.

Send in media contact or editorial calendar requests to member@tinshingle.com

Updating Media Contacts Library: CRWN Magazine

We first learned about CRWN Magazine through a feature that appeared in Alley’s newsletter, that featured one of its members of the co-work workspace. That member is Lindsey Day, co-founder of CRWN Magazine.

The magazine launched as a zine, and grew to a publication with 20 contributors and advertiser support, according to this 2016 article in Yahoo Beauty. At the time of that article, the magazine’s Instagram had 15K followers. Today it has 44.6K and growing.

Co-founder of CRWN, Nkrumah Farrar, pointed out in that article that there were not many publications catering to women who have chosen to live a natural-hair lifestyle. Farrar pointed out, that publications available like Sophisticates, Hype Hair and Black Hair tend to not be owned by or operated by black women, and lack a focus on beautiful imagery.

CRWN Magazine covers more than just hair, said Lindsey in that article. “We probably have more thought pieces and essays in the issue than we do things that are specifically pertaining to hair. We use natural hair as a pivot point to connect with an audience of African- American women who share similar psychographics that led them to eventually becoming natural.”

Read this amazing interview with Lindsey in Byrdie to learn how and why she and Nkrumah created the brand, how important it is to them to have African- American women in printed pages, how they thought of the name, and much more.

We’'ll sum up with the mission statement as stated on CRWN’s website:

CRWN Magazine exists to create a progressive dialogue around natural hair and the women who wear it. We're reaching beyond trendy clickbait and #BlackGirlMagic to address the whole Black woman; a woman who is more educated, well-traveled and sophisticated than ever before — largely because generations before her have fought to ensure her seat at the table.

Through beautiful content, thoughtful commentary, hair inspiration and resources; we’re telling the world the truth about Black women by showcasing a new standard of beauty — and documenting our story in tangible, print form.