Creating a Place in Middle America: How Spanish-Language Local News Serves the Hispanic Community

AbstractA fraction of Hispanic people in the U.S. uses Spanish-language news because a language barrier prevents them using English-language news. Functional theory suggests ethnic media serve ethnic community needs ignored by mainstream media. Research on how Spanish-language news serves U.S. Hispanic communities and differs from English-language news typically studies large, politically liberal cities with large Hispanic populations, neglecting Hispanic people living elsewhere. Content analysis of local newscasts to assess differences between network-affiliated, English-language television stations and the Telemundo affiliate serving a mid-sized, midwestern, politically conservative market addresses these limitations. An analytic framework derived from functional theory categorizes community needs as informational and representational. Results show significantly different agendas between Spanish- and English-language news. Spanish-language news airs more human interest and government stories and fewer crime stories. It addresses unique informational needs, helping orient newcomers and airing government stories that sustain ties to Spanish-speaking countries. Regarding representation, results show Hispanic people are invisible to a greater extent than they are negatively portrayed in English-language news. Thus, Spanish-language local television news serves the Hispanic community by making it visible to itself. However, Spanish-language news focuses on the Hispanic community rather than being a general news source, supplementing rather than substituting for English-language news.Keywords: Ethnic mediafunctional theorylocal newsminority representationSpanish-language newstelevision news AcknowledgementsThe authors would like to thank Joseph Trujillo Falcón and David Candy for their help with data collection and coding. They would like to thank Patrick C. Meirick for his help with data analysis.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Correction StatementThis article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.