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We have a big announcement this month, updates on the next Censored yearbook and The Project Censored Radio Show, and some selected reading recommendations.
Project Censored Launches The Censored Press
Project Censored proudly launches The Censored Press, the publishing imprint of Project Censored and its non-profit sponsor, the Media Freedom Foundation. Building on the Project’s yearbook series, website, weekly radio show, and other programs, The Censored Press advances the Project’s promotion of independent investigative journalism, media literacy, and critical thinking.
Out of the gates, The Censored Press will publish four books: the next Project Censored yearbook, State of the Free Press 2022 (December 2021); The Media and Me, a guide to critical media literacy for young readers, coauthored by Ben Boyington, Allison T. Butler, Nolan Higdon, Mickey Huff, Andy Lee Roth, and illustrated by Peter Glanting (Fall 2022); State of the Free Press 2023 (December 2022); and Going Remote: An Educator’s Journey through the Digital Exodus by Adam Bessie and Peter Glanting, a book of graphic-journalism based on a chapter previously published in State of the Free Press 2021 (late 2022/early 2023).
The Censored Press benefits from a robust partnership with Seven Stories Press, the Project’s long-time publisher and stalwart ally, which will print and distribute Censored Press titles in an arrangement similar to its cooperation with Human Rights Watch to publish HRW’s Annual Report. As publisher Dan Simon recently observed, “At Seven Stories we work with the truest, bravest voices. Project Censored has met that high standard year after year. The team at Project Censored and The Censored Press is among our most important partners.”
The support of several generous founding donors ensures that The Censored Press will be a sustainable publishing imprint. Its development is guided by a distinguished founding editorial board: Mischa Geracoulis, Veronica Liu, Nora Barrows-Friedman, T.M. Scruggs, and Dan Simon.
Stay tuned for details over the summer; please consider supporting this new, exciting, and important endeavor.
State of the Free Press 2022 Assesses “The New Normal”
Meanwhile, the next Censored yearbook is now complete and in the able hands of our extraordinary editor, Michael Tencer. State of the Free Press 2022 questions what a “return to normalcy” will look like as American society and US journalism continue to come to grips with the pandemic, deep-rooted structural inequalities, and the aftermath of the January 6th attempted insurrection. With US journalists increasingly vulnerable to physical attacks and other chilling threats, the “new normal” for the Fourth Estate is up for grabs.
State of the Free Press 2022 kicks off with a foreword by Danielle McLean, chair of the Society of Professional Journalists’s Ethics Committee. Noting that “too many of the media’s scarce resources are devoted to amplifying the voices of the country’s most powerful government officials and corporate executives,” McLean writes that “our industry needs to change.”
State of the Free Press 2022 provides sober analysis of where we’ve been and a clear, compelling vision to make a robust free press and a well-informed and actively-engaged public cornerstones of the “new normal.”
The Project’s newest yearbook will be published on December 7, 2021, but stay tuned for news about pre-publication specials.
Town Hall Seattle Hosts Project Censored
On May 27, 2021, Town Hall Seattle featured Mickey Huff and Andy Lee Roth discussing State of the Free Press 2021 as part of its Civics Series. The Project was honored to be included in the long-running THS series, whose past speakers include Robert Reich, Ijeoma Oluo, and Thomas Frank. In case you missed the event, you can catch up by finding the video on the Town Hall Seattle website.
What’s New on “The Project Censored Show”?
Recent broadcasts include highlights from a talk given by Aviva Chomsky on her new book, Central America’s Forgotten History; an interview with Abby Martin of The Empire Fires on the foreign policy of the new Biden administration; a discussion with Michelle Rodini-Colocino and Brian Dolber about activism in the “gig economy”; and radio adaptations of “The Long Sili-CON: Power and Censorship in the Digital Era,” the three-part series (linked here I, II, III) that Project Censored and The Real News Network coproduced in May and June.
What are We Reading Online? Three Recommended Reads
We recommend the following recent articles from independent news outlets and press freedom groups. Each is informative and well worth reading.
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Victor Pickard and Timothy Neff, Strengthen Our Democracy by Funding Public Media, Columbia Journalism Review, June 2, 2021.
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Emma Pattee, The Fallacy of Our Carbon Footprint YES! Magazine, May 10, 2021.
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US Press Freedom Tracker, Between the Bookends: 1 Year of Press Freedom Violations, May 24, 2021