MEDIA JUSTICE NOW!

THIRD WORLD MAJORITY (TWM) is currently working on the historic first MEDIA
JUSTICE curriculum and anthology. The anthology portion of this book will
feature case studies and interviews from organizers in the field talking
about the way their communities grapple with the joint struggle of fighting
for a just media and a just society. This includes organizers from present
campaigns as well as important, hidden his/herstories of strategies past
movements have created to incorporate media and cultural work into their
organizing. The curriculum portion of the book will include politicized
introductions to video, radio, Web, and graphic design production from
leading women of color artists, producers and organizers in the field.


We are currently looking for artists, organizers, poets and writers who are
interested in sharing their stories and strategies for MEDIA JUSTICE. If
you are tired of media abuse and want to be part of the movement, send in
your submission idea now!


WHAT IS MEDIA JUSTICE?
Media Justice is not new. It is an urgent struggle born by movements lead by
the most marginalized communities (i.e. indigenous, immigrant, communities
of color, LGBTQ, working-class) all over the country--in the streets, on
reservations, in barns and churches--wherever people were fighting for a
just world and needed to share that vision of justice with others. It is the
chants we sing in resistance that have kept the memory of our movements
alive. It is the streets we bomb with resistance graffiti. It is the
strategy sessions we have to keep media accountable. It is the radio, video,
Web, and theater pieces we create to validate our experiences and use our
culture as resistance.


Media Justice is our people fighting for and reclaiming our basic right to
communicate our stories with, by and for each other.


WHO IS MEDIA JUSTICE?
Here is a sample of some of the Media Justice profiles and campaigns we are
interested but not limited to. Add your community to this new his/herstory!


  • RUBEN SALAZAR reporting from the Chicano anti-Vietnam War Moratorium
    rally in East Los Angeles in 1970 before he was killed by a tear gas
    projectile.


  • The coalition of civil rights organizations in JACKSON, MI that
    succeeding in holding the NBC affiliate WLBT accountable for its racist
    stereotyping and censorship of public interest programming sympathetic to
    Black communities. Their organizing resulted in the Federal Communications
    Commission (FCC) revoking its license in 1969'dcthe only time in FCC history
    that it took a license because of racial bias in programming.


  • FANNIE LOU HAMER speaking out against the injustices of voting
    discrimination in Mississippi for the first time on national networks, using
    song and chants as part of the vision for the civil rights movement.


  • The NEW YORK HIP HOP LIVES HERE COALITION of artists and organizers
    currently working to create fair and equal representation of the diversity
    of Hip Hop Culture. Their vision including keeping HOT 97 accountable for
    their racist depiction of Tsunami victims, demanding more time for community
    driven public affairs on publicly owned airwaves, and looking at how the
    record industry is pimping a culture without any of the benefits going back
    to the artists or the community.


  • VIDEO MACHETE's community-based media justice organizing in Chicago
    schools.


  • RIGOBERTA MENCHU TUM connecting the violence against indigenous people
    and the media blackout of their struggles and the American role in support
    of Central American dictatorships


  • COALITION OF IMMOKALEE WORKERS effective use of micro-radio for outreach
    and organizing to their farmworker membership in Florida.


  • YOUTH ORGANIZERS from Youth Organizing Communities and Inner City
    Struggle in Los Angeles using effective video documentation and strategic
    messaging to put pressure on the school board in Los Angeles to improve
    conditions in schools and win Ethnic studies.


  • NORMAN JAYO broadcasting from inside the International Hotel in San
    Francisco while community members fought to keep it open for low-income
    elderly immigrants.


  • MEDIA TANK's grassroots cable and wireless access campaigns in
    Philadelphia.


  • DESI WOMEN of DRUM'S (Desis Rising Up and Moving) video program, Desi
    Reel Newz, telling the real stories of immigrant families and detainees in
    Jackson Heights, New York fighting the Immigration enforcement agents and
    the embedded media.


  • YOU self-publishing your zine, writing your songs and chants, throwing up
    your graf pieces, stickering and flyering your art, telling your stories and
    breaking through corporate media to tell it like it is.


  • WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR:

    Writers:
    If you are a writer, poet, organizer, or wordsmith who is
    interested in submitting a story about an individual or about a current or
    past media justice campaign/strategy in your community, please contact us
    below. INDIGENOUS, IMMIGRANT, PEOPLE OF COLOR, YOUTH, AND LGBTQ FOLKS ARE
    HIGHLY ENCOURAGED TO APPLY.

    Interviewees:
    If you would like to be interviewed to tell your story, or know of a media
    justice organizer who should be interviewed, please contact us below. A
    writing sample is not necessary for interviews.

    SUBMISSIONS: Please provide one (1) writing sample (maximum 1 page), one (1) bio/resume
    and/or one (1) one-page synopsis of a story idea about yourself or other
    media justice activist. Be sure your submission includes the information
    below. Print and electronic submissions in an attached rich-text format
    (.RTF) document are accepted. All submissions require a NAME, ADDRESS,
    TELEPHONE and/or EMAIL information. This application is also available for
    download from our Web site: www.cultureisaweapon.org.
    CLICK HERE to submit your form online.

    Please send all submissions by NO LATER THAN 31 May 2005 to:
    THIRD WORLD MAJORITY
    912 E. Third Street, Suite 101
    Los Angeles, CA 90013
    213.237.9944 tel
    mediajustice@cultureisaweapon.org
    www.cultureisaweapon.org