Culture

MSNBC “. . . enjoyed significant (around 20%) ratings increases across the board” in 2012, “but made astonishing gains with their already-large African American audience, growing that audience by 60.5% for the Mon-Sun 8pm-11pm period,” Tommy Christopher reported Monday for Mediaite. “MSNBC President Phil Griffin told me, in a phone interview, that he is ‘thrilled’…

Some Editors Failed to See No-Brainer Story The controversy over Quentin Tarantino’s “Django Unchained,” in which slavery is the backdrop for a spaghetti Western, ratcheted up a notch over the weekend when freelance entertainment journalist Karu F. Daniels, writing in the Daily Beast, reported that the movie characters — slaves and slavemaster — are being…

Pulitzer Winner to Devote More Time to Grantland Website Wesley Morris, the African-American film critic for the Boston Globe who won a Pulitzer Prize last year, is leaving for Grantland, the ESPN-affiliated sports/pop culture website that specializes in longform journalism, his Globe editor told staffers Thursday night. “I just didn’t have a reason to say…

“Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Django Unchained’ has become embroiled in the second major controversy of awards season,” Steve Pond wrote Wednesday for the Wrap. “The director’s liberal use of the N-word, and his temerity in tackling the issue of slavery, has drawn fire from some prominent African-Americans and impassioned defenses from others. “Like the turmoil stirred up…

Diversity’s Greatest Hits, 2012 1. Neither GOP Nor News Media Looked Like America 2. Social Media Can Mean Trouble: Ask Martin, Whitlock, Lee or Williams 3. Trayvon Martin Case 4. Unity Coalition Changes Course 5. New NAHJ Leadership After Brutal Campaign 6. The Numbers 7. Fellowship Breakthrough at Stanford 8. NBC News to Pay Its…

The National Rifle Association was inspired by the Black Panthers? Yes, according to Adam Winkler, a professor of 
constitutional law at UCLA School of Law and author of “Gunfight: The 
Battle Over  the Right to Bear Arms in America.” Winkler said over the weekend on NPR’s “On the Media”: “One of the surprising things I…

Others Disciplined, “Oversight” of “First Take” Pledged ESPN announced Thursday that it is suspending commentator Rob Parker for 30 days over his on-air remarks about Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III, tightening editorial oversight of the “First Take” show and taking “appropriate disciplinary measures” against employees who played a role in allowing Parker’s remarks on…