As UCLA’s identity-based newsmagazines have moved from
origins of charged advocacy toward demonstrating personal culture,
they find themselves working harder to retain their influence and
sway on campus.
One of the consensus purposes for starting the newsmagazines was
to take control of how underrepresented populations were portrayed
in mainstream media and to provide an alternative perspective.
Founded in 1969, black advocacy newsmagazine Nommo is the
nation’s oldest student magazine geared toward the black
community.
Nommo Editor Nkemdilim Nwosu said the beginnings of the magazine
““ born out of the Civil Rights Movement ““ were focused
on blacks in jail, prompting the pioneer editors to create the
“Soul of Captivity” section.
“It’s there and it’s meaningful, but
it’s not as big as when it was first created,” Nwosu
said, referring to the waning presence of the section.
She also said racial politics were more prominent in Nommo in
the late 1960s.
“Not to say (racial issues) are not present today,”
she added.
FEM, a newsmagazine covering women’s rights issues since
the 1970s, spawned from the need for a magazine in which feminists
could freely express themselves, said Peijean Tsai, FEM editor and
former Daily Bruin News contributor.
Today, many of the magazine’s core issues ““ like
abortion rights ““ have surfaced and are not so foreign, Tsai
said.
“It’s become more news with a focus instead of a
reaction magazine,” Tsai said.
There have been exceptions to this wane in campus presence
““ Muslim newsmagazine al-Talib, which formed during the
Persian Gulf War, finds its community heavily scrutinized after
Sept. 11, 2001.
“After Sept. 11 Muslims saw a need to come out of their
shell more, and al-Talib is included,” said Bilal Khan,
editor of al-Talib. “We saw a lot more importance in sharing
our culture.”
Al-Talib now has the largest circulation of the UCLA
newsmagazines.
Some of the newsmagazines that were founded on the platform of
seeking social justice have had to refocus their energies.
Ha’Am, a Web-based Jewish newsmagazine, was established in
1972, intent on covering the persecution of imprisoned Jews in the
Soviet Union, said Editor Miriam Segura.
But Ha’Am today focuses more on Judaism as a web of
different cultures, Segura said. She attributed it to a shift in
attitude of today’s students.
“Today’s (Jewish) students are more interested in
the well-rounded picture, what Judaism means to them,” Segura
said.
Segura, who has edited Ha’Am for the last two years, added
that she tried experimenting with the magazine’s content by
making it more politically-charged ““ but decided it made the
magazine too one-sided.
In addition to a shift in mission, the respective editors have
now had to deal with lower participation numbers than previous
years.
This contrasts with the Nommo-affiliated alumni Nwosu has
contacted, who she said all had large staffs.
“You look at old Nommo, and the list goes down,”
Nwosu. “Now it’s hard to find people.”
Candice Kortkamp, editor for the Asian-identity newsmagazine
Pacific Ties, has felt the staff hit immediately upon taking over
the publication. Graduation resulted in a large turnover in her
staff, and she said staying consistent with past content has become
more of a challenge.
Other editors believe that their community has enough acceptance
to allow them to focus on more aesthetic aspects of the
culture.
Ten Percent, a newsmagazine addressing the campus’ queer
community, was spearheaded by a group of people who were fighting
for acceptance, said co-editor Josh Sassoon.
But he added that though the magazine might focus more on
aesthetics than politics, queer issues are not being ignored.
“Now that we have that voice, we can focus on the beauty
of our culture,” Sassoon said.
But a change in philosophy is not the only thing eliciting
concern from the newsmagazines, as some are wary of becoming
completely Web-based.
“There’s an important part of being in print,”
Sassoon said. “There’s a lot of students who
can’t log on to a gay Web site in front of their
roommate.”
For Ha’Am, which transitioned from print to the Web in
1999, the last good issues were in print, Segura said.
Media Director Arvli Ward said Student Media is working with
Ha’Am to get it back in print, granted they show the ability
to bring in steady ad revenue, which he said was a determining
factor in the original switch.
Ward added that there is no desire by the Associated Students of
UCLA’s Communications Board ““ which oversees all
student media ““Â to put any current print magazines
solely on the Web.
Yet for a new crop of newsmagazine editors, the Web is a
sought-after opportunity. This year, the board approved four new
Web magazines for online publication.
LiLi Tan, editor of the Web magazine Karisma, said there have
been advantages to being online.
“Definitely, being online, you have more room to make
changes, update more often, and do more polls,” Tan said.