A report to all Canadians
For the nearly
forty percent of the Canadian population that his mother tongue is neither
English or French, the Ethnic Press of the Country performs a unique
function within the boundaries of the Canadian mass media.
Generally, its
purpose is to inform its readers in a language more readily understood
than the official languages of the Country.
There are four
hundred newspapers and magazines today published all over Canada, serving
more than twelve million Canadians from all over the world, which made
Canada their home.
This informative
publication is produced in order to celebrate the 26th anniversary of the founding of the Ethnic Press and Media Council Of
Canada, which eventually has been developed to NATIONAL PRESS AND MEDIA
COUNCIL OF CANADA, The only national Ethnic Press and Media organization
in the Country.
For many years now,
no other attempt for the
creation of a central force to represent and speak with “one voice” on
behalf of the multilingual media has been succeeded. This is the reason
that today we are celebrating an achievement and feel proud of ourselves.
This year’s
anniversary of the Ethnic Press is considered by the editors and
publishers as an occasion to acquaint those who are interested in the
present and future developments of our Canadian society in general, with
some basic facts and services of the Ethnic Press and Media to Canadian
life for the last decades.
Further, this
publication is not intended to be as a souvenir of the celebrations of the
ETHNOMEDIA WEEK, its aim is to record and to be a source of history of the
vitality and dynamism of the Canadian Press and Media in the non official
languages, and they own influence and contributions during a period of
enormous changes of the Canadian society.
We have included in
this publication all the known to us ethnic newspapers and publications,
regardless of the fact whether or not they are members of this
organization, in order to provide a more complete picture of the work of
the family of the members of the Ethnic Press and Media of Canada.
It focuses particularly on changes which affected the large
segment of the Canadian population of other descent than English or
French.
The role of THE
NATIONAL ETHNIC PRESS AND MEDIA COUNCIL OF CANADA is to represent
the members of the foreign languages publications of Canada, on the
Federal and Provincial levels and to
take a stand on fundamental questions such as the national unity, equality
among Canadians, the respect of human rights, social justice and social
acceptability for every citizen or Canadian resident, as well as the
preservation and respect of the cultural heritage of all Canadians and
finally an input in the development of the Canadian
Foreign policy.
For various reasons
this publication will not give a whole picture of the problems the
publishers of ethnic newspapers are facing, nor the pressing needs of the
multilingual communities are facing. It is a pilot publication about
pioneers and their efforts and struggle to honour and preserve a language
and culture alive in a linguistic ocean of the multilingual mosaic of our
Country.
For the last twenty
six years the ethnic press and its members organizations have shown
considerable development as well as linguistic and ideological diversity,
as educated immigrants from various parts of the world daily arrive to
Canada.
As Canada develops
more open daily able and willing to accept an inclusive for all of its
citizens policy, the ethnic press and its members will be pioneers in
consulting and guiding the government for the creation of the “ just
society”, by introducing laws that will bring changes to education, the
socioeconomic affairs of the new Canadians and the acceptance of the new
ideas by the Canadian society.
For all this
reasons the role of the ethnic press in many respects will remain of
primary importance.
We thank you for
your attention at the ETHNIC PRESS and MEDIA of CANADA.
The Board of
Directors.
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