Malkia A. Cyril
President
Youth Media Council
Oakland, CA
http://www.youthmediacouncil.org
info@youthmediacouncil.org
1611 Telegraph Ave., Suite 510
Oakland, CA 94612
Work: 510-444-0640 x313

Summary:
Seeks to influence media dominated by negative images of youth of color

"Building youth power through media advocacy and media accountability"

Excerpts from the YMC WEBSITE:

"The YMC was launched to address the limited ability of youth leaders and organizers to influence a media dominated by images of young people of color portrayed as violent, criminal, and apathetic. The YMC is the innovative effort of young leaders dedicated to building the power of progressive movements by strengthening strategic media coordination, increasing media accountability and community control over media content, infrastructure, and policy, and amplifying the public voice of marginalized communities to bring about systemic and institutional change.

" We believe that communication is a human right, and a fundamental characteristic of democratic process that should not be for sale. We aim to build the media capacity and power of the youth movement because we see that media representations of youth issues have played a central role in replacing racism as a root cause of inequity in public discourse.

"To this end, our three primary strategies are:
"* Media Skills-Building for youth organizers and members through trainings, applied media work on youth-led campaigns, and practice for youth as spokespeople, media planners, and trainers
"* Organization-based Media Capacity-Building through intensive media campaigns, organization-based trainings, media monitoring and evaluation, consolidated media tools, and evaluation
"* Overall Movement Building by increasing Strategic Media Coordination, deepening movement-wide media strategy, building relationships with news outlets, and coordinated Media Accountability campaigns.

"The Youth Media Council is made up of YMC Representatives from 17 Bay Area youth organizations in the forefront of youth organizing around community and economic development, immigrant rights, juvenile justice and public education. The YMC also leads a Community Coalition for Media Accountability with six member groups representing some of the Bay Area's leading youth arts, advocacy and media organizations.

"Malkia A. Cyril, Director
"Malkia Amala Cyril is a 30-year-old queer black writer, organizer and media strategist. A working-class Brooklyn native, Malkia has worked with racial and economic justice youth, community, and activist groups in the SF Bay Area for the past nine years. As Director of the Youth Media Council and co-founder of the Media Justice Network, Malkia's goals are to build the strategic communications capacity of the progressive movement to move a racial/economic justice agenda, and to build the power of youth and other marginalized communities to hold corporate media accountable for biased content and policy. S/he believes that communications is a human right and should not be for sale. Malkia was recently featured in the documentary Outfoxed, and is primary author of numerous articles and studies including Speaking for Ourselves and Is KMEL The People's Station? (YMC, 2001 and 2002).

"The Youth Media Council is supported by: Community Technology Foundation of California, Evelyn and Water Haas Jr Fund, Frances Fund of the Solidago Foundation, Funding Exchange, Libra Foundation, The Youth Initiatives Program of the Open Society Institute, Overbrook Foundation, San Francisco Foundation, Themis Fund of the Tides Foundation, Youth Justice Funding Collaborative-a project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, Unitarian Universalist Veatch Program at Shelter Rock, and Vanguard Foundation."

END EXCERPTS FROM YMC WEBSITE

More below on Cyril from: The Outfox movie website:

Malkia A. Cyril is a 30-year-old African-American organizer and Brooklyn native. She has worked with low-income youth and communities of color as an organizer for the past eight years with organizations such as the Applied Research Center, the Alameda County Homeless Youth Collaborative, Youth Together, the Community Organizing Team of BOSS, Youth Force Coalition, Uniting Communities Against War & Racism, and We Interrupt This Message. Malkia has directed numerous youth organizing projects, focusing specifically on poverty and race, and has worked closely with young people on media accountability for balanced news coverage of youth and youth policy. Malkia has facilitated media and organizing training for youth and adults, coordinated and written several publications including, Soundbites & Cellblocks.

LINKS TO TALKS BY MALKIA CYRIL:
http://www.youthmediacouncil.org/news.html

INCLUDING:
A PDF of a prepared text of her remarks to the Free Press Media Reform conference in St. Louis, May 13, 2005.