16068: Translating The Meaning Of Multicultural Agency Of The Year.

 

Adweek named Translation the 2022 Multicultural Agency of the Year. Interestingly enough, in a recent interview with Advertising Age, Translation Founder-CEO Steve Stoute expressed unhappiness with being labeled a ‘multicultural’ shop. To sloppily paraphrase the man, Stoute contends that what Adland defines as the ‘General Market’ is multicultural. This, incidentally, echoes what nearly every ‘multicultural’ practitioner has insisted for generations. Yet they remain pigeonholed and fed crumbs. Unfortunately, ‘multicultural’ really means minority. And in Adland—the bastion of systemic racism—minority translates to marginalized.

14400: Celebrating The Diversity Of Hanukkah…?

M&C Saatchi in Israel and Roladin Bakery & Patisserie make Hanukkah a multicultural experience with multi-colored desserts.

12718: Barbie’s Multicultural Makeover.

Advertising Age reported Barbie is becoming more diverse with its Fashionistas line, prompting more diverse marketing too. The multimedia campaign is being handled in-house at Mattel, so it’s hard to know if there is diversity on the advertising team. The company website hypes a commitment to diversity, declaring the importance of “creating a workforce, at all levels, that reflects the diversity of our consumers and the population at large.” So it’s safe to presume Mattel ad executives resemble the Fashionistas.

Barbie Revamps Marketing Following Diverse Product Makeover

New Fashion-Focused Effort Encourages Self-Expression

By Ashley Rodriguez

Earlier this month, Mattel began rolling out the new Barbie Fashionistas line—a collection of 23 dolls that feature eight skin tones, 14 different facial sculpts, 18 eye colors, 22 hairstyles, and 23 hair colors and fashions. The toymaker aims to make Barbie more culturally diverse and reflective of the world in which we live. Now, her marketing is getting a similar shake-up. In its latest campaign, Mattel is refreshing its approach to TV, while exploring digital and social to build the doll’s role in pop culture.

The new push for the Fashionistas line, created in-house, is part of a broader 2015 initiative to empower girls. It included a superhero Barbie and campaign to highlight girls’ superhero-like qualities. The latest iteration, called “Super Style,” uses fashion to drive self-expression.

“Barbie has always been a reflection of the style of the decade but also of the culture and fashion that’s happening in the world,” said Evelyn Mazzocco, SVP-global brand general manager at Barbie. “[“Super Style”] is really about who you are. And fashion is the vehicle for expressing who you are.”

The effort comes as Barbie fights to reclaim its spot at the top of the girls category after being dethroned by Frozen during the holiday season last year.

In this latest campaign, Mattel is swapping out Barbie’s straight-forward, feature-focused TV spots with energizing ads that have a robust soundtrack.

“We wanted to disrupt the norm of what girls were watching,” said Ms. Mazzocco, adding that TV is still the best way to reach girls. “We call it a mini-music video… If you’re sitting there watching TV, it jumps out as being very different.”

Mattel also created a lookbook—available in store and online—that showcases the full Fashionistas line. And the Barbie website features a new game called My Style Book where kids can create their own fashions for Barbie. The brand is also working with YouTube influencers to talk to girls in a new way and spread the Barbie brand further.

“There’s an aspirational aspect to the Barbie brand,” said Ms. Mazzocco. “Using Youtube influencers to get girls to connect in the space of fashion and style was a great addition to how we’re talking to girls.”

Barbie is also building a fashion following on social. The doll’s Barbie Style profile, managed by KCD, has 815,000 Instagram fans and features the doll doing yoga, cruising by the beach and out on the town with a coffee and shades.

The brand has historically relied on traditional media like TV and direct-to-consumer messaging such as emails and mailers to promote its brand. This year, Mattel is spending more on the Barbie brand and using a mix of TV, digital, social and direct-to-consumer elements, said Ms. Mazzocco.

Mattel spent $13.4 million on U.S. measured-media for the Barbie brand in 2013, according to the Ad Age Datacenter.

Barbie is cast in a new light in an online stop-motion music video unveiled last week. Called “Who is Barbie?,” it showcases the doll’s new street style, diversity and versatility. Barbie, no longer bound by permanently pointed feet, wears flats in the ad created by Brand New School and rocks a partially shaved hairdo.

“It was kind of a risk and very different creatively than anything we’ve done in the past,” said Ms. Mazzocco, referring to the stop-motion video. “There’s something really amazing that happens when you bring Barbie to life in stop motion.”

Moms will be another big focus for the Barbie brand as it moves into the second half of the year, added Ms. Mazzocco. “We’re going to have some meaningful conversations with moms,” she said. “Moms have wanted us to listen. We’re listening now. And we’ll continue to do that.”

For 2016, Mattel will explore new avenues to take the brand. The next effort to empower girls will center on music, Ms. Mazzocco said. “We are looking under every rock. We are challenging our own rules,” she said. “As we go into ‘16 and beyond, this is only the beginning.”

StarCom handled the media for the “Super Style” campaign, and Golin and HL worked on PR.

12668: Multicultural Talent Surging…?

Adweek published a piece titled, “Multicultural Talent Is Surging on TV and Winning Mainstream Audiences.” Wonder how long it will take before the trade journal can present a report titled, “Multicultural Talent Is Surging on Madison Avenue and Winning Mainstream Accounts.” Probably not for another 66 years at least.

12212: Growing Pains Of Diversity.

USA TODAY published “Growing Pains: Multicultural explosion rattles residents”—a lengthy, thoughtful examination of the rapid growth in racial and ethnic diversity in Northern Virginia.

12148: Changing America Specialists…?

The New York Times reported on Commonground/MGS, a new holding group comprised of eight independent, minority-owned agencies. The Times headine reads, “Specialists in a Changing America.” Too bad the advertising industry has not been changing with America. For now, the principals admit not knowing if their offerings should be labeled as cross-cultural, total market, multicultural, general market or whatever. Well, as they cannot call themselves a White agency, their initial adventures will likely involve vying over crumbs.

Specialists in a Changing America

EIGHT independent agencies and companies that create and produce ads aimed at minority, multicultural, urban and youth markets are coming together under the umbrella of a holding group named Commonground/MGS, which will have its headquarters in New York and offices in Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles and Miami.

The five principals of Commonground/MGS, all senior executives with decades of experience in those markets, are describing the new agency holding company as the first in the advertising industry to be wholly owned by members of minority groups. Commonground/MGS will have about 300 employees offering clients services that include, in addition to advertising, public relations, event marketing, social media, content development, production and animation.

Three agencies being brought together under the Commonground/MGS banner — Commonground, based in Chicago; MGSComm, based in Miami; and the Vidal Partnership, based in New York — will be combined to form an agency also named Commonground/MGS. The other five agencies and companies — CG Works, the Cunningham Group, Post Master, Run Wild Productions and Sway Public Relations and Marketing — will continue operating under their own names as autonomous units of the holding group.

The formation of Commonground/MGS comes not long after an article in the trade publication Advertising Age described “a surge of small mid-sized agency holding companies,” among them the CHR Group, the Engine Group and Project WorldWide. They, however, work primarily with marketers seeking to reach consumers in the mainstream.

The new agency holding group also arrives as Madison Avenue pays more attention to the changing face of America, studying demographic trends that suggest ads may be more effective if they are crafted with a “total market” approach, also known as cross-cultural or transcultural marketing: directing pitches at a general audience whose demographic makeup is becoming more diverse rather than aiming ads in traditional fashion at specific ethnic audiences like Hispanics or African-Americans.

“We’re ultimately working toward a total market,” said Andrew J. England, executive vice president and chief marketing officer of MillerCoors, which has worked with Commonground on ads intended for African-American beer drinkers, because “a company like ours has to be open to where cultural influences are coming from.”

For instance, ads meant for African-American consumers that Commonground created for Coors Light beer, featuring the rapper Ice Cube, “became a core part of our total-market approach for a while,” Mr. England said.

“I’m very intrigued” by the formation of Commonground/MGS, he added. “A minority-owned holding company fills an important hole in the landscape.”

MillerCoors is among two dozen clients of the agencies uniting to form Commonground/MGS that will also be clients of the new holding group. Others include blue-chip brands like Bacardi, Coca-Cola, Hyundai, NBCUniversal, Outback Steakhouse, Tiffany and Verizon Wireless.

“We bring clients a solution that’s more relevant than ever: how to target the new U.S.” and how to understand “the multicultural consumer’s influence on the new America,” said Manny Vidal, the president and chief executive of the Vidal Partnership who becomes one of the five managing partners of Commonground/MGS.

“Where there’s change,” he added, “there’s an opportunity.”

“It didn’t take much to convince me that this was the right group to join,” Mr. Vidal said of the principals of Commonground and MGSComm, who had been discussing for some time the possibility of a combination. He was introduced to them by a mutual friend, Jorge Moya, chief creative officer of MGSComm. Top executives of MGSComm — Al Garcia-Serra, chairman, and Manuel E. Machado, chief executive, both of whom become managing partners of Commonground/MGS — met the principals of Commonground when “we pitched a pharmaceutical account together and were able to get to know each other,” Mr. Machado recalled.

“When Al and I started this agency in 2003, part of our long-term plan was to grow not just organically but, through the right people, reaching critical mass,” Mr. Machado said. “But it’s tough to do.” “We’ve all had opportunities” for deals that foundered because there was “a lot of personality in the room,” he added. “Here, we put it all together and the chemistry works.”

Mr. Machado acknowledged that “there is this confusion” over how to describe or refer to the kind of campaign that is now increasingly in vogue: “Is it multicultural? Is it total market? Is it general market? Is it all market?

“At the end of the day, the solution we’re bringing to the table is that we’re able to do the whole thing,” he said. “To do it together makes it a lot more powerful.”

Ahmad Islam, who founded Commonground with Sherman Wright, echoed Mr. Machado. “When Sherman and I started Commonground 10 years ago, clients were looking for a new model to reach multiple consumer segments,” Mr. Islam said. “Those once the minority are now a majority.”

Commonground/MGS will be “a brother-and-sister group of companies” developing campaigns with “a human truth based on a universal insight that applies to everyone,” he added, as well as campaigns aimed at demographic groups like African-Americans and Hispanics that do not “ignore the culture that is still relevant” when approaching those consumers.

“It’s being a bit of a Swiss Army knife,” Mr. Islam said, “not defined by one tactic.”

Mr. Islam and Mr. Wright, who are managing partners of Commonground, will become managing partners of Commonground/MGS. The new holding group will seek growth in three areas, Mr. Islam said: “from existing clients, new clients and acquiring entities that fit the culture, the spirit of what we’re doing.”

Correction: October 16, 2014

The Advertising column on Tuesday, about several agencies that are coming together under the umbrella of a holding group named Commonground/MGS, misstated the name of one agency involved. It is Sway Public Relations and Marketing, not the Sway Group. And a picture caption with the article misspelled the surname of one the partners shown in the group. As the article correctly noted, he is Al Garcia-Serra, not Al Garcia-Sierra.

12093: McCann Is Truly Mono-Cultural.

McCann boasts delivering “Truth Well Told since 1912.” Of course, the ad above makes zero references to multicultural or cross-cultural. Hey, at least they’re telling the truth.

11576: Is Total Market Total Bullshit?

The Big Tent featured columns by Chiqui Cartagena and Rochelle Newman-Carrasco on the latest Total Market mumbo-jumbo spewed at the annual ANA Multicultural Marketing and Diversity Conference. Um, given that Total Market has been fuzzily defined by cross-cultural cheerleaders as being distinct from multicultural marketing—with strong implications that Total Market is better than multicultural marketing—it seems a little silly for Total Market to be a major topic at the ANA Multicultural Marketing and Diversity Conference.

Based on the comments left at Cartagena’s column, not all minority marketers embrace the Total Market concept—or even understand it, for that matter. Multicultural marketing enthusiasts have already pooh-poohed cross-cultural marketing. The civil wars erupting among non-White adpeople appear to be growing daily.

Cartagena claimed that a majority of marketers are adopting Total Market strategies. According to Santiago Solutions Group CEO Carlos Santiago, about 54% of advertisers are executing Total Market theories on some level, with roughly 66% of the 54% insisting Total Market efforts were already showing positive market share results and return on investment. With all due respect, Cartagena and Santiago are probably wrong. In 2008-2009, ANA surveys showed the majority of advertisers were not engaged with minority marketing firms and multicultural marketing initiatives were underfunded, under-supported and unappreciated. Sorry, but adland has not dramatically evolved in the last five years—or the past 50 years.

Until Total Market translates to total slices of the marketing pie versus random crumbs, it’s just a new smokescreen designed to divert attention from the continued separate-yet-unequal conditions that minority professionals face and minority audiences receive. In short, it’s Total Bullshit.

10888: Holiday Cheer—With Blackface.

The New York Daily News reported German Chancellor Angela Merkel appeared at a holiday event with children in blackface. A few years ago, Merkel declared her country’s attempts to create a multicultural society had utterly failed. It looks like she’s right.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel poses with children in blackface for Three King’s Day celebration

The kids arrived Berlin’s Chancellery building from all over Germany to sing holiday carols for Three King’s Day, but, embarrassingly, some of the young Magi showed up with traditional darkened faces.

By Michael Walsh / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Photos of German Chancellor Angela Merkel with children in blackface have many viewers scratching their heads.

The children arrived on the steps of the Chancellery in Berlin to sing holiday carols for Three King’s Day. The young carolers arrived from all over Germany on Friday, reported The Associated Press.

But when the pictures hit the Internet shortly after, one aspect of the reception stood out — and it had nothing to do with what the children sang.

Multiple children had painted their faces for the occasion and Merkel simply stood there smiling for the photo op. In at least one photo, Merkel can be seen eyeing a young girl suspiciously.

According to The Telegraph, it is customary for one person in a group of carolers to darken his or her face to represent one of Three Wise Men — also called the Magi — who, Christians believe, visited Jesus after his birth bearing gifts: gold, frankincense and myrrh.

The celebration is intended to commemorate what Christians refer to as the Epiphany. But the only epiphany Merkel may have gleaned after the incident is that many people consider those images highly offensive.

So far, it does not appear that the New Year is shaping up well for the German leader. On top of the Three King’s Day troubles, her coalition partners in the Free Democratic Party have been falling behind in the polls, reported The Telegraph.

10861: Mickey Mouse’s Multicultural Move.

From USA TODAY…

Disney celebrates Hispanic heritage on Three Kings Day

By Beth J. Harpaz, Associated Press

NEW YORK—Disneyland is marking Three Kings Day in a big way this season, another milestone in the mainstreaming of a holiday that is beloved in Latin America and other cultures around the world.

The Christian holiday - also known as Twelfth Night or Feast of the Epiphany - takes place Jan. 6, ending the 12 days of Christmas. Many Hispanic communities in the U.S. celebrate Three Kings Day with parades and performances depicting the Biblical story of three kings following a star to find the baby Jesus, bringing gifts of frankincense, gold and myrrh.

Disneyland spokeswoman Michele Himmelberg said the theme park in Anaheim, Calif., “launched the Three Kings Day celebration last year as a test. It was a big success, particularly with the Hispanic community, and we’re expanding it this year to a larger area.”

The park will host Three Kings Day on Jan. 4 to 6 at the Big Thunder Ranch Jamboree in Disneyland’s Frontierland. There will be Mexican folklorico dancing, mariachi musicians, photo ops with Disney characters and bilingual hosts offering face painting, crown making and other children’s activities. Food carts will serve sweet corn tamales, chimichangas, Mexican hot chocolate and king cake, which is a round, sweet, doughy cake called rosca de reyes (king’s ring).

“I love the fact that Disney is doing this,” said Evette Rios, a correspondent with ABC’s “The Chew,” who grew up celebrating Three Kings Day with her Puerto Rican parents in Brooklyn, N.Y. “It means a lot. This is the changing face of America. We are becoming more open to different holidays and traditions. I don’t have a homogenous view of what America is and I’m glad Disney doesn’t either.”

As a child, Rios said, she’d leave a dish of water under her bed for the three kings’ camels — “actually for the horses because there were no camels in Puerto Rico” — along with grass to represent hay. The next morning, she’d find small toys hidden in her shoes, gifts left by the kings.

Rios still celebrates the holiday by attending a parade in East Harlem in Manhattan organized by El Museo del Barrio, a museum devoted to Latin American and Caribbean culture. The colorful parade, in its 36th year, includes costumed actors, floats, bands and real camels. It’s always held on a weekday - this year Jan. 4 - so schools can participate.

In Miami, three kings of basketball — Heat superstars LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh — are grand marshals of the 43rd annual Three Kings parade in the Cuban-American neighborhood of Little Havana. The parade is scheduled for Jan. 20 along Southwest Eighth Street.

The holiday has a French accent in New Orleans, where Twelfth Night kicks off carnival season, culminating in Mardi Gras. Each Jan. 6, the mayor and leaders of top Mardi Gras krewes — organizations that host carnival parades and balls — meet at historic Gallier Hall to serve king cake, which in New Orleans is called galette des rois and is iced in purple, green and gold, the colors of Mardi Gras.

Both the French and Mexican cakes have a toy baby representing the Christ child baked inside, but Mexican king cakes are usually topped in Christmas colors of red and green, colors also found in the Mexican flag.

Ricardo Cervantes, co-owner of La Monarca bakeries in Southern California, says they sell thousands of king cakes from their stores in East Los Angeles and the largely Hispanic city of Huntington Park. But surprisingly, sales are also strong at a Santa Monica location “in more of an Anglo neighborhood. People who are not Mexican, they are intrigued,” he said. “We also get a lot of people now bringing a cake into the office.” A new La Monarca opening this month in Pasadena will also carry king cake.

Huntington Park hosts a large Three Kings celebration, as does Olvera Street in downtown Los Angeles, a block-long historic attraction showcasing Mexican culture where a candlelight procession takes place each year.

Other Three Kings Day celebrations around the country include a parade in the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Chicago; a bilingual performance of the Biblical story that’s been staged for more than three decades at the GALA Theatre in Washington D.C., and festivities at the Latino Cultural Center in Dallas and The Children’s Museum of Houston. Schools in Hartford, Conn., which has a large Hispanic population, close when the holiday falls on a weekday.

New Mexico’s tribal communities, called pueblos, host ceremonial dances on Three Kings Day in a tradition that dates back centuries to the influence of Catholic missionaries in the Spanish colonial era. Jan. 6 is also when new tribal officials are installed in a ceremony called the blessing of canes or transfer of canes. In Santa Fe, N.M., a play about the three kings has been performed annually for more than 50 years by the Caballeros de Vargas, a Catholic service organization.

In Tarpon Springs, Fla., home to a large Greek-American population, the Feast of the Epiphany is marked with a Jan. 6 event called the Cross Dive, where teenage boys dive into a bayou to retrieve a wooden cross. At Disney World near Orlando, Fla., actors portray the three kings at Epcot Center’s Mexico Pavilion as part of the theme park’s “Holidays Around the World” event through Dec. 30.

Cervantes, the bakery owner, says that traditionally, the person who gets the cake slice with the toy baby must throw a party — “tamales and hot chocolate” for all. La Monarca puts two babies in a medium size cake, three in a large, so the cost of the party isn’t borne by one person.

In New Orleans, the burden is a little lighter: Get the slice with the baby, you buy the next king cake.

9512: Multicultural Versus Cross-Cultural.

From Market Watch…

Cross-Cultural Marketing Fails to Engage African Americans, According to New Study From Burrell Communications

Unprecedented, In-Depth Research Examines Attitudes of Everyday African American Consumers

CHICAGO, IL — Cross-culturalism, the current trend in multicultural marketing that stresses the blurring color lines in America, fails to engage African Americans, according to an unprecedented and comprehensive exploration of African American consumers by Burrell Communications (www.burrell.com).

The study, conducted in conjunction with Burrell’s 40th anniversary and named Burrell: Project 40, delves deep into the lives of African Americans, identifying themes in lifestyles, interests, cultural beliefs and perceptions of African Americans in the media. With more than 500 in-person interviews across 11 major markets, Burrell: Project 40 gives a true portrait of the average African American consumer. Over 80 percent of Burrell’s respondents had never participated in a market research project before, so the study gives voice to the unheard and untapped majority of black consumers in a way that’s never been done before.

“Most of the research conducted in the African American community is done with upper and middle-class consumers—who don’t necessarily reflect the attitudes, behaviors and opinions of the majority,” said Fay Ferguson, co-CEO of Burrell Communications. “Burrell: Project 40 gives a more accurate picture of a population that is often taken for granted.”

“Burrell: Project 40 continues Burrell’s 40-year legacy of commitment to deeply understanding African American consumers,” added McGhee Williams Osse, co-CEO of Burrell Communications. “The clients we work with have made it a priority to speak to African American audiences in a way that’s relevant and authentic, and we hope our research will show the greater marketing community why that’s important.”

Over the course of a year, executives from Burrell Communications and its research partners—The Recruit, The Futures Company and Breakthrough Marketing Technology—conducted interviews with 500 African American men and women, identifying key trends prevalent in the community:

1. African Americans interact with many cultures, but remain culturally distinct at the deepest, most important levels.

As many as 63 percent of African Americans are open to other cultures, and enjoy experiencing foreign customs as they relate to food, fashion and music, but those experiences do not change who they are when they are at home. 87 percent of those surveyed are actively attached to African American culture, and make an effort to balance their cultural interests with their own cultural identity.

2. The “game face” is still a part of the African American experience.

African Americans still openly and freely share accounts of occasions in which they needed to act differently among people of other cultures due to fear of judgment, the lessons of history and their desire to succeed, with 36 percent admitting that they experience this cultural suppression often. This includes situations at work and school, as well as in social settings.

3. African Americans continue to seek more positive representations of their culture in the media.

Every respondent could more easily identify negative, inauthentic portrayals of African Americans in the media than positive ones, with 88 percent agreeing that discrimination is still part of their day-to-day lives. This spans across movies and TV, as well as within the advertising and marketing industries. In particular, many expressed the belief that African American characters on TV tend to be one-dimensional, and 75 percent agreed that there should be more TV programs directed toward African Americans.

9027: Getting Cross Over Cross-Cultural.

Random rants regarding the New York Times piece on OgilvyCulture:

• Don’t recall NY Times advertising columnist Stuart Elliott ever giving much space to minority agencies. But when a White agency unveils its segregated silo, Elliott churns out over 850 words on the event. Okey-doke.

• Why do White agencies launch “cross-cultural” units? If these old school firms are indeed covering “mass market” or “general market” audiences—and everyone recognizes that the U.S. is multicultural—shouldn’t the work already be “cross-cultural” communications? Doesn’t the launching of a “cross-cultural” unit only underscore that “mass-market”/“general-market” shops are actually White agencies?

• Ogilvy & Mather reportedly held a daylong conference titled, “Preparing for the New General Market.” Um, adman Tom Burrell has been saying, “Mass marketing is dead,” for at least 15 years. Ditto Harry Webber. Guy Garcia published “The New Mainstream” in 2005. And White agencies are just now readying for the brave new world?

• O&M Chairman and CEO John Seifert said, “This starts from the kind of firm we want to be in the future. … Instead of thinking of discrete segments in a multicultural world, we’re saying the new reality is that it’s more of a cross-cultural world, a mash-up of cultures. …if there has been a weakness in the marketing communications industry generally, it’s that the makeup of agencies is not reflective [of the consumers to whom they advertise].” Let’s dissect these mumblings. Is the statement, “…the kind of firm we want to be in the future,” an admission that there’s no desire to be diverse in the present? “[W]e’re saying the new reality…” sounds like White men want to dictate reality. “If there has been a weakness in the marketing communications industry…” If? Yo, Johnny, who’s responsible for the fact that “the makeup of agencies is not reflective” of the consumer culture?

• Seifert also blubbered, “We’re feeling our way; I’ve said to everyone this is going to be messy for a while.” When White advertising agencies, for example, buy digital agencies and inevitably bungle the mergers, the top brass still introduce the new ventures with great fanfare. When White agencies recruit and promote and fire executives ultimately deemed to be “not a good fit,” the company honchos still introduce the new hires as The Second Coming. Yet when a White agency launches a non-White unit, the leaders lower expectations and predict messiness.

• In addition to OgilvyCulture, O&M will continue to run multicultural agencies like OgilvyRojo and OgilvyNoor. Only in America.

8445: Diversity Rings False With Kay.

This Kay Jewelers commercial utilizes heavy-handed diversity. But where are the Black and Native American couples?

8267: Prospect—Part Five.

From the October 2010 issue of Prospect.

8263: Prospect—Part Four.

From the October 2010 issue of Prospect.

8255: Prospect—Part Two.

From the October 2010 issue of Prospect.

8253: Prospect—Part One.

From the October 2010 issue of Prospect.

8076: Germany Mimics Madison Avenue…?

From MSNBC.com…

Merkel: German multiculturalism ‘utterly failed’
Remark fuels conservative camp’s debate over immigration and Islam

By Sabine Siebold

POTSDAM, Germany — Germany’s attempt to create a multicultural society has “utterly failed,” Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Saturday, adding fuel to a debate over immigration and Islam polarizing her conservative camp.

Speaking to a meeting of young members of her Christian Democrats (CDU), Merkel said allowing people of different cultural backgrounds to live side by side without integrating had not worked in a country that is home to some four million Muslims.

“This (multicultural) approach has failed, utterly failed,” Merkel told the meeting in Potsdam, south of Berlin.

Merkel faces pressure from within her CDU to take a tougher line on immigrants who don’t show a willingness to adapt to German society and her comments appeared intended to pacify her critics.

She said too little had been required of immigrants in the past and repeated her usual line that they should learn German in order to get by in school and have opportunities on the labor market.

The debate over foreigners in Germany has shifted since former central banker Thilo Sarrazin published a book accusing Muslim immigrants of lowering the intelligence of German society.

Sarrazin was censured for his views and dismissed from the Bundesbank, but his book proved highly popular and polls showed a majority of Germans agreed with the thrust of his arguments.

Merkel has tried to accommodate both sides of the debate, talking tough on integration but also telling Germans that they must accept that mosques have become part of their landscape.

She said on Saturday that the education of unemployed Germans should take priority over recruiting workers from abroad, while noting Germany could not get by without skilled foreign workers.

In a weekend newspaper interview, her Labor Minister Ursula von der Leyen (CDU) raised the possibility of lowering barriers to entry for some foreign workers in order to fight the lack of skilled workers in Europe’s largest economy.

“For a few years, more people have been leaving our country than entering it,” she told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. “Wherever it is possible, we must lower the entry hurdles for those who bring the country forward.”

The German Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DIHK) says Germany lacks about 400,000 skilled workers.

Yet Horst Seehofer, chairman of the Christian Social Union (CSU), the CDU’s sister party, has rejected any relaxation of immigration laws and said last week there was no room in Germany for more people from “alien cultures.”

7965: Rewriting History.

From USA TODAY…

More historic sites take a multicultural approach

By Zinie Chen Sampson, Associated Press Writer

Charlottesville, Va. — Thomas Jefferson’s clothes and linens didn’t get pressed on their own, and the meals for his lavish parties didn’t cook themselves.

Now, Jefferson’s estate, Monticello, is expanding efforts to depict the lives and activities of the people who worked behind the scenes, allowing visitors to see that Jefferson had a lot of support for his achievements. Other sites have been undertaking similar updates — and in doing so, they’re providing a more complete depiction of history.

Curators at the third president’s mountaintop home have been using Jefferson’s detailed journals, archaeological finds and other research to expand Monticello’s stories beyond the great man and his achievements. They are also speaking to a wider audience that includes a growing number of black visitors and other minorities, said Leni Sorensen, African American research historian at Monticello.

“It isn’t that (visitors) aren’t interested in Jefferson. They are, and they want to see how was he allowed to live the way he lived — who was behind that work,” Sorensen said. “They’ll see that competent, skilled enslaved people did the work and helped make it happen.”

A new permanent exhibit that opened in June in Monticello’s cellar depicts a place where slaves who worked as cooks, housemaids and others worked together and crossed paths with Jefferson family members, visitors’ servants and others. Called “Crossroads,” the exhibit includes life-sized figures of Jefferson’s enslaved butler Burwell Colbert, Jefferson’s daughter Martha, teenage house servant Israel Gillette and others next to artifacts found during archaeological research — such as thimbles, clothing irons and shoe buckles.

Ford Bell, president of the American Association of Museums, said that historic sites and museums are now reflecting a more multicultural approach, turning away from the “great man theory” that spotlighted only the achievements of Jefferson and other historic figures.

“The true story is the telling of millions of individual stories of all Americans,” Bell said. “It’s truly about diverse cultural and ethnic groups that came together to create our country, and many of them were reviled or subjugated.”

Updating history could also help attendance. The nation’s demographics are changing, but core museum visitors are still largely white, Bell said. To draw more diverse visitors, museums are offering stories that resonate with visitors of many backgrounds, including people from ethnic or religious minorities, he said.

In Richmond, the American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar was among the first to tell the story of the war from Union, Confederate, and African-American perspectives. Opened in 2006 at the site of the Tredegar gun foundry, the center allows visitors to see the war’s legacy, and to examine similar contemporary issues — including opposition to immigration and the increase in states’-rights rhetoric, said center President Christy Coleman.

The Hermitage, the Tennessee plantation home of President Andrew Jackson, has updated its introduction film and opened a gallery exhibit that includes the Indian Removal Act that Jackson pushed for and signed into law in 1830. The measure led to the forced westward migration of thousands of Native Americans from five Southeast tribes to make way for white settlers and slavery.

Some visitors have thought the presentation portrays Jackson as evil, or that Indian removal shouldn’t be discussed because it’s a black mark on the seventh president’s legacy. But Marsha Mullin, The Hermitage’s vice president for museum services, says it’s important to present a fuller look at Jacksonian America.

“It’s an era people don’t know much about, between the Revolutionary War and the Civil War,” Mullin said. “We need to paint the picture in between so they know why the Civil War came along.”

The National Park Service also is in the process of enhancing Civil War battlefield sites, said David Ruth, superintendent of the Richmond National Battlefield Park.

One project has been to create new exhibits at Chimborazo, site of the Confederacy’s largest wartime hospital. Highlighted is the role of Southern women and slaves who tended to wounded soldiers, marking the introduction of women to the male-dominated nursing profession.

History and military buffs, of course, will still be able to immerse themselves in the battles and wartime strategy, Ruth said, but the war’s bigger picture becomes clearer when it includes more depictions of real people’s lives during that time.

“My sense is that by including a more complete context, we’re going to be more relevant to a larger audience,” he said. “With a larger audience coming to our site, there’s no question there’s an economic impact in local areas by having more reasons for people to come.”

7413: It’s All Greek…

From The Miami Herald…

South Florida fraternities, sororities become more multicultural

By Laura Figueroa

Over at Florida International University, the South Asian and Caribbean brothers of Sigma Beta Rho raise money for tsunami and hurricane ravaged countries.

At Nova Southeastern University, the brothers of Alpha Nu Omega gather weekly to host Bible study sessions.

And online, the plus-size sisters of Chi Zeta Theta chat about self-esteem issues.

Whether it’s the fraternity for gay men at FIU or the multicultural sororities at the University of Miami, the options for brotherhood and sisterhood at South Florida’s schools have seen a growth in organizations catering to a wide array of beliefs and lifestyles.

“Miami is so diverse, it’s only natural that there are more multicultural-minded groups out there,” said Adrian Macatangay, chapter president of Sigma Beta Rho, a South Asian/Multicultural fraternity at FIU.

Macatangay, who is Filipino, heads a chapter of nine brothers hailing from India, Guyana, Bengal and Trinidad. To share their diverse cultural roots, they’ve done everything from organize fundraisers for tsunami victims in the Philippines to organizing brotherhood dinners focused on cultural cuisine.

Sigma Beta Rho is one of nine organizations that make up FIU’s Multicultural Greek Council—three of those groups, including two Latina sororities and a multicultural fraternity, were admitted in the past year.

Most of the culturally based sororities and fraternities say they offer an alternative to student clubs because their smaller size creates a tight-knit sense of family. That sense of family is cultivated over several weeks, as prospective members spend time getting to know the organization’s members before committing to pledge and pay membership dues.

“You’re joining a family, so you want to take your time making sure you feel at home,” Macatangay said.

FIU is also home to the state’s first fraternity for gay men—Delta Lambda Phi.

“We’re not that much different than the other fraternities,” said Christian Rodriguez, a 20-year old psychology major and brother of Delta Lambda Phi. “The only aspect that makes us different is we take pride in homosexuality.”

Rodriguez said he originally joined his fraternity because he did not feel the other fraternities at FIU were as “accepting” of his sexual orientation.

That has changed, Rodriguez said. Now his chapter of 25 brothers attends other fraternity parties and community services without feeling isolated.

Administrators at other South Florida college campuses are taking note of the demand for such diverse groups. Several say the smaller niche groups—which usually range in size from 5 to 20 members—help minority students adjust to life on a large urban campus.

“I think a lot of the growth with these groups has do with the students really owning who they are and what they’re looking for,” said Chini Camargo, director of student services for Nova Southeastern University in Davie.

Camargo said over the past two years, NSU’s fraternity and sorority options have grown to include two Latino groups and four historically black fraternities and sororities.

MORE PETITIONS
More growth could be on the way at NSU, as three other culturally based groups have petitioned the school for permission to establish a chapter. Countless others have also reached out for more information about recruiting members at the school, Camargo said.

“They’ve been pounding on our door trying to get in,” Camargo said.

While the smaller groups don’t have a house, they host their chapter meetings at the student union. Toga parties are replaced with dance lessons in everything from salsa to bhangra, and movie nights have become a venue to showcase foreign films, from African action flicks to Japanese animation.

“There are some things you can’t learn from books, only from people,” said Cushla Talbut, 18, president of Lambda Theta Alpha, a Latina-based sorority at UM. “These are lessons and relationships that will last a lifetime.”

A NEW ADDITION
UM’s campus is now home to five Latino and multicultural-based fraternities and sororities. This semester the campus welcomed its newest addition, Delta Epsilon Psi, a South Asian fraternity.

“There has never been a period of growth like this before,” said Walter Kimbrough, author of Black Greek 101 and president of Philander University in Arkansas. “I call it fraternalism on steroids. Especially now with the advent of the Internet, it’s easier to start a fraternal organization than ever.”

Starting up their own sorority from scratch is just what a group of Florida Atlantic University students did in 2005 when they formed Chi Zeta Theta—a sorority for “plus-size” women.

“Just because you can’t fit into a size 2 doesn’t make you a bad person,” said Rosemary Austin, president of Chi Zeta Theta. “I’ve met a lot of plus-size women who are insecure about themselves. Our goal is to motivate these women to see their true beauty.”

With a membership of 25 sisters spread throughout the United States, the group’s sorority experience relies heavily on the Internet and phone. Members are recruited from social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. Since there aren’t any chapters charted at college campuses, weekly chats on online forums and regional community service events help the sisters stay connected.

“We strive to be the best sorority for our members and our community,” Austin said. “We’re not concerned with being like any other sorority.”

While some look for a support network, others like Fermin Vasquez, 20, look for a more divine connection.

The search for an unconventional fraternity led Vasquez, a NSU biology major, to bring a chapter of the Christian fraternity Alpha Nu Omega to his campus.

Now Vasquez, 20, spends Tuesday nights hosting Bible study sessions for Nova students with his fraternity brothers.

The group also performs step-routines at local community centers and churches.

“I found a brotherhood that would allow me to get closer to my faith,” said Vasquez, who serves as chapter president. “My brothers motivate me to try and be a better Christian, a better person overall.”