I reviewed the content in the newspapers, The Washington Post, The Irish Echo, and El Diario La Prensa. The Washington Post is a mainstream newspaper catering to the American public, while the The Irish Echo and El Diario La Prensa are ethnic newspapers catering to the Irish and Hispanic populations in the United States. Despite their apparent differences, all three of the newspapers report some similar content while remaining true to their intended audiences. The newspapers can learn to report information through different lenses other than the one of the intended audience in order to give their audience a full understanding of the topics discussed. The newspapers can also learn to represent the views of the other newspapers’ catered audiences (The Washington Post, The Irish Echo & El Diario La Prensa).
The Washington Post puts greater emphasis on national news relating to US politics, unlike the other two newspapers. However, the newspaper (Post) does have a significant amount of articles about international and local politics too. The newspaper (Post) puts an equal emphasis on sports and entertainment; with each topic having their own section. Since The Washington Post is published in Washington DC, the newspaper has a particular bias towards Washington DC sports teams, unlike the other newspapers. For example, in the National Football Leagues’ section, there is a particular focus on The Washington Redskins. The entertainment section is different from El Diario La Prensas’ in that it has a focus on academic forms of artistic expression, such a museums section and a literary section. However, the main difference that is evident between The Washington Post and El Diario La Prensa’s entertainment sections is that El Diario La Prensa focuses more on entertainers, whereas The Washington Post focuses more on the actual forms of entertainment, such as Television or Music. The Washington Post’s entertainment section is interesting because it has some unique sections, such as a horoscope section, and a comics’ section. The Washington Post focuses equally on opinion and news articles, however, The Washington Post stands out over the other two newspapers because of its success with investigative reporting. The Washington Post has won many Pulitzer Prizes for its investigative reporting (The Pulitzer Prizes). A reader may choose to read The Washington Post over the other two newspapers because of the newspaper’s success with investigative reporting. A reader may also choose to read The Washington Post over the other two newspapers because the newspaper focuses extensively on international news in a variety of countries, whereas the other two papers focus mostly on international news in Spanish speaking countries or Ireland (The Washington Post, El Diario La Prensa & The Irish Echo).
El Diario La Prensa puts the most emphasis on local news in New York City. Many of local news articles relate to the Hispanic population in some way. Although the paper emphasizes local news, it also has many articles on national and international news. The newspaper is different from the other two newspapers in that many of the international news articles are about Spanish speaking countries. El Diario La Prensa is also different in that it has whole section on immigration. Through viewing the articles in the immigration section, it is clear that the newspaper has a pro-immigration bias. The newspaper also seems to cater more towards new immigrants, than the other two papers. Similarly to The Washington Post, El Diario La Prensa focuses equally on sports and entertainment, with each genre having their own section. However, El Diario La Prensa is interesting in that the paper relates many of the articles in their entertainment section to the Latino population in America. The paper does this by highlighting Latino artists and entertainers in articles about mainstream and Latin American entertainment. The article, “NYFW: Talento latino emergente (NYFW: emerging Latino Talent)” exemplifies how the paper highlights Latino artists, while discussing a mainstream entertainment. The paper covered New York Fashion Week, a mainstream artistic event, in the article. Even though New York Fashion Week was a mainstream event, the paper still related New York Fashion Week to the Hispanic population by highlighting Hispanic fashion designers whose work was presented in the show (Fouilloux, 2014). Even though El Diario La Prensa highlights many Latino entertainers and designers, they also have many articles on American mainstream entertainers and artists too. Since the paper caters to the Hispanic population, many of the articles in the sports section are about sports teams from Spanish speaking countries. El Diario La Prensa is similar to The Irish Echo, in that the paper focuses on the sports teams of the countries that the intended audience’s families originate from. El Diario La Prensa is more interested in news than opinion articles. This is evident through seeing that the paper has a significant amount more news than opinion articles. El Diario La Prensa stands out because the paper is able to report news and relate it to the Hispanic population even if the content doesn’t directly relate to the Hispanic population. The article “Pasan los años pero nunca el dolor por la pérdida el 9/11 (fotos)(Years pass but never the pain of losing the 9/11 (photos)” shows how the paper does just this. The article covered the 13th anniversary of 9/11, and related the anniversary to the Hispanic population by highlighting the stories of Hispanics who were deeply affected by the tragedy (Peralta, 2014). A reader may choose to read El Diario La Prensa over the other two newspapers in order to stay connected to their heritage, either through reading international news about Spanish speaking countries or by reading about news relating to the Hispanic population locally (El Diario La Prensa, The Washington Post & The Irish Echo).
The Irish Echo emphasizes local news in New York City that relates to the Irish population in the United States. An example of a local news article that relates to the Irish population is “Irish gay group vows to continue campaign.” The article covered how the New York St. Patrick’s Day Parade committee gave permission for a group of homosexuals who work for The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) to march in the parade in 2015 (O’Hanlon, 2014). The Washington Post covered this topic as well with the article, “Gay groups in St. Patrick’s parade all right with N.Y. Cardinal Dolan.” The Washington Post article made it seem that the homosexual group’s ability to march in the parade was a great triumph for the gay community (Gibson, 2014). However, The Irish Echo’s article had a more negative view on the topic. The article explained that the homosexual group feels that their ability to march in the parade was only a minuscule triumph, considering that other Irish homosexual marching groups were not given permission to march in the parade (O’Hanlon, 2014). Similarly to El Diario La Prensa, the international news is about the country that the intended audience originates from, Ireland. The Irish Echo is more interested in sports than entertainment, unlike the other two papers. This is evident through viewing their sections titled “Sport” and “Arts and Leisure.” The “Arts and Leisure” section does not contain any current articles about mainstream or Irish entertainment, the only articles presented are about history. However, in the section titled “Sport” there are more current articles highlighting Irish teams and professional athletes. Similarly to El Diario La Prensa, The Irish Echo is more interested in news articles rather than opinion articles. This is evident through viewing the home page of the paper. The home page emphasizes news articles, while it doesn’t highlight opinion pieces. The Irish Echo is different in the way that it covers culture. The paper tries to connect Irish Americans with Irish cultural events and programs going on in their area. The paper does this by listing Irish cultural events and programs in the “National and Tri-state Events” section. The Irish Echo stands out over the other two papers because of this, and this may cause a reader to read The Irish Echo over the other two papers (The Irish Echo, The Washington Post & El Diario La Prensa).
The newspapers can learn to report information through different lenses. The Washington Post can learn from The Irish Echo that they should represent the views of all of the parties involved. This is evident through reading The Washington Post article “Gay groups in St. Patrick’s parade all right with N.Y. Cardinal Dolan” and The Irish Echo’s article “Irish gay group vows to continue campaign.” In The Irish Echo’s article, the homosexual Irish group’s views on their newfound ability to march in parade were mentioned, whereas in The Washington Post article their views were not mentioned. By mentioning the views of the Irish homosexual marching group, the article would give the reader a clearer understanding on the topic. The Washington Post and The Irish Echo can learn from El Diario La Prensa to show how topics affect different ethnic groups, even if the story doesn’t directly relate to the ethnic group, just like El Diario La Prensa did with the article “Pasan los años pero nunca el dolor por la pérdida el 9/11 (fotos)(Years pass but never the pain of losing the 9/11 (photos)” El Diario and The Irish Echo can learn from The Washington Post that they should include the views of other ethnic groups besides their own in their articles. (The Washington Post, The Irish Echo & El Diario La Prensa). The Washington Post can also learn from El Diario La Prensa to be less biased concerning certain topics. For example, The Washington Post covered the Ebola Virus in the article, “It’s highly unlikely that you’ll become infected with Ebola. So what are you so afraid of?” The article mentioned that there is one person in Dallas, Texas, has the Ebola Virus and that he contracted the virus while he was in Liberia. In the article the author, Ohlheiser stated, that Americans shouldn’t be afraid that they are going to contract the virus from the diseased man because Ebola is only transferred through coming into contact with fluids from the bodies of diseased people and as a result there is no need for hysteria of an outbreak of the virus in America. Ohlheiser then when on to say that it is illogical for Americans to give so much attention and be so concerned about Ebola while they don’t do so for other deadly diseases (Ohlheiser, 2014). El Diario La Prensa covered this topic too with the article, “CDC: caso de ébola en EEUU no es razón para pánico (CDC: Ebola case in USA is no reason to panic).” The article discussed that the that the CDC believes that the man with the Ebola Virus in Dallas, Texas doesn’t pose a threat to the health of Americans because Ebola is only transferred through bodily fluids and because the man was kept in isolation (Peña, 2014). In relation to this topic, The Washington Post should have mimicked El Diario La Prensa’s objectivity, in order to get the true facts across while not minimizing the horror of Ebola (Ohlheiser, 2014 & Peña, 2014).
Bibliography
Fouilloux, P. (2014, Sep 11). NYFW: Talento latino emergente (NYFW: emerging Latino
Talent). El Diario La Prensa. Retrieved from http://translate.google.com/translate?
hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=%20http%3A%2F%2Fwww.eldiariony.com%2Fnyfw-talento-
latino-emergente
Gibson, D. (2014, September 3). Gay groups in St. Patrick’s parade all right with N.Y. Cardinal
Dolan. The Washington Post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/national
religion/gay-groups-in-st-patricks-parade-all-right-with-ny-cardinal-dolan/2014/09/03/
84d07944-339c-11e4-9f4d-24103cb8b742_story.html
O’Hanlon, R. (2014, Sep 13). Irish gay group vows to continue campaign. The Irish Echo.
Retrieved from http://irishecho.com/2014/09/irish-gay-group-vows-to-continue-
campaign/
Ohlheiser, A. (2014, Oct 5). It’s highly unlikely that you’ll become infected with Ebola. So what
are you so afraid of? The Washington Post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.
com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/10/05/nothing-to-fear-but-ebola-itself/
Peña, M. (2014, Sep 30). CDC: caso de ébola en EEUU no es razón para pánico (CDC: Ebola
case in USA is no reason to panic). El Diario La Prensa. Retrieved from http://translate.
google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=%20http%3A%2F%2Fwww.eldiariony
.com%2Fsalud-cdc-caso-ebola-no-debe-causar-panico
Peralta, M. (2014, Sep 11). Pasan los años pero nunca el dolor por la pérdida el 9/11 (fotos)
(Years pass but never the pain of losing the 9/11 (photos). El Diario La Prensa.
Retrieved from http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=%20http
%3A%2F%2Fwww.eldiariony.com%2Ffamiliares-victimas-9%2F11-conmemoran-
aniversario
The Pulitzer Prizes. (n.d.). Investigative Reporting. Retrieved from http://www.pulitzer.org/by
cat/Investigative-Reporting http://www.pulitzer.org/bycat/Investigative-Reporting
Recent Comments