Media Experts Meet in Morrison

Starting in 1985, the Whiteside Forum has brought speakers to Morrison to hold talks and moderate discussion between experts in the field and the public. This group has been meeting every year, for the past 30 years, to discuss and help educate the public about various worldly subjects. Subjects from the past include nuclear weapons, examining health care in the United States, the Arab Spring, and human rights. Last week the group met again to talk about “Mass Media in Modern Society: National and International New and Issues”.

The latest conference and dialogue was held on Friday April 24, 2015 in the Community Room at Odell Public Library. This event was open and free to all members of the public. Doors opened at 7:00 p.m., with the program starting at 7:30 p.m.. Welcoming Remarks were presented by Rosemary W. Coplan, a member of the Whiteside Forum. She introduced the Moderator of the evening Mark Ridolfi, Editorial Page Editor of the Quad Cities Times of Davenport, IA.

There were two speakers at the evening’s event, Nancy Benson, Associate Professor of Journalism at University of Illinois (Urbana – Champaign) was the first speaker. Mrs. Benson was covering the viewpoint of “The United States of America: How do We See the World?” As part of her opening, she discussed about how the United States has changed their coverage of international news over the past century, from World War I to when the fall of the Berlin Wall in the 1980’s to expanding news coverage with new cable stations and online newspapers. The second speaker was Elio Leturia, Associate Professor of Columbia College Chicago School of Media Arts Journalism. Elio discussed “The United States of America: How does the World see Us?” Mr. Leturia talked about growing up under a dictatorship in Peru and how the national government censored the national media. He also covered the differences of how news is covered in countries outside the United States versus inside the United States borders.

Mark Ridolfi, then opened the talk between Benson and Leturia with questions. Each side gave vieBensonandpublicwpoints on how d

o readers view the media coverage in the United States or in foreign countries. With questions from the public, topics of social media, investigative journalism, finding good sources of international media, news satire websites, and journalism ethics were also covered. The public were allowed to also discuss openly with the speakers about personal opinions of media coverage in the local area. Both the moderator and speakers talked one-on-one with members of the public during the refreshment break and after the conference was closed for the evening.

The Whiteside Forum would like to invite members of the public in Whiteside County to future events. For more information about the Forum and their future events, you can write to the Forum at: The Whiteside Forum, P.O. Box 51, Morrison, IL, 61270. Article written and pictures provided by Jacklyn Hanson.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply