Deuze, M. (2006). Ethnic media, community media and participatory culture. Journalism, 7(3), 262-280.

Mark Deuze is an assistant professor in the Department of Telecommunications at Indiana University, Bloomington and a professor in Journalism at Leiden University, the Netherlands. This article examines the growth and success of ethnic/minority media by analyzing recent social trends. Deuze contends that thriving ethnic media is tied to the worldwide emergence of all kinds of community (including alternative, oppositional, participatory and collaborative practices) media. This reasoning is in contrast to the generally accepted viewpoint that immigration flows and worldwide migration patterns exclusively lead to the growth of ethnic media. Instead, says Deuze, the rise in ethnic, or minority media, is reflective of the growth of participatory or "grass-roots" media. This overall trend indicates a rejection of the transnational corporations' monopoly on what constitutes media production. Current trends see a growth in media audiences producing their own content.

By propagating various research and analyzing current media practices, Deuze says that audience segmentation and fragmentation are on the rise as Western societies become more ethnically diverse. By reviewing studies such as those conducted byPew Research Center for the People and the Press, research into the media and ethnic composition of European countries, specifically the Netherlands (2003), along with a European Manifesto of Minority Community Media (2004), and the New California Media Survey (2005), the author demonstrates the position of ethnic media within a majority media. The majority mainstream media is found to lose credibility among its audience. Ethnic and minority consumers, as well as,interestingly, dominant class consumers experience a growing disconnect with the mega-media producers and the producer/consumer model in general . Yet, while community or ethnic media continue to grow, the mainstream media work to marginalize the discourse produced by the grass-roots media outlets. The gap between journalists of mainstream news media and the minority audience grows wider, the latter viewing the former as ‘corporate news.’ The rise of participatory and convergence media culture serves to fill that gap.

According to Deuze, convergence culture in societies, particularly among Western societies with characteristic technological growth, is found to break through the boundary that divides media production and consumption. No longer is media production exclusively driven by the dominant class and corporations, as the consumers’ role now includes participating in production. This new role of media content producers is not without the participation of the margins of society (the ethnic minority groups). Convergence culture is found to be useful in rethinking why the ethnic minority media is thriving. The members of a socially and ethnically diverse society, who are empowered through technology and the decline of the traditional ‘corporate news,’ are characterized to be individualized and globalized at the same time. Journalists and media corporations are found to no longer view such members as a mere consumer audience, but as fellow citizens, if they wish to regain their credibility. These ‘fellow citizens,’ as Dueze concludes, are now participating in the media instead of just receiving the media.

He states that journalism must re-engage with the audience as fellow citizens and not just potential customers the way in which ethnic media outlets have already done. The author seems to allude to the idea that ethnic media is successful because it has adopted the concept of involving the people. Because ethnic media is an integral part of a culture’s community, the involvement of the audience is extremely pertinent to a medium’s success. On the other hand, mainstream media continues to struggle with the concept of audience participation because of heavy reliance of advertising. Ethnic media has found ways to enact participation in the ways they use and make media and because of this they are ahead of the curve with mainstream media who has still not figured it out.

The reemergence of radical ethnic media has been dubbed “citizen’s media”. Citizen’s media is apart of the participatory media culture where media companies learn to accelerate the flow of media content in order to increase revenue and consumers learn to use the different types of media technologies to bring the flow of media more fully under their control. Audience takes a more active role and closes the gap between media producers and consumers.

Radical ethnic media outlets tend to give people a voice as active participants as opposed to being a represented voice amongst the audience. Jenkins’ “Convergence Culture” is a useful concept to catch a variety of social and cultural also political and economic trends at the same time; essentially the ways in which people interact with the products of mainstream popular media culture.

The concept of corrosion and cohesion simply states that ethnic media does not necessarily replace the other, it becomes a part of the media diet. As stated in Viswanth and Arora’s writing, ethnic media usually serves as a supplement to its mainstream counterpart. The multicultural convergence culture concept includes participation which is a key element. Alternative forms of media have successfully emerged next to its more traditional counterpart, for example pirate radio stations and small scale print magazines. Sometimes the merge takes place within the walls of the mainstream media organizations.

Deuze introduces a concept called“Glocalization” which is a combination of intense local and extensive global interaction. First and second generations use ethnic media as a source of information on the homeland, third generations use it to enable dialogue with parents and grandparents while fourth generations use ethnic media to search for their roots.

References from a variety of sources including mass communicational, cultural, social, and technological, are the strength in Dueze’s work. Consequently and along with the author’s analysis, this article provides a framework for determining; the emergence of ethnic media’s success, contemporary views on mainstream media, and the influence of technology on the media. The author’s findings may even suggest a taste of what the new media landscape will look like in the years to come. (Reviewed by Ari Apelian) (Edited by Judith Klapper and Wendy McNeal)