About & Submissions
El Grito: “The Cry”, or “The Shout”
Many of us are familiar with gritos being cried out during our cultural celebrations and dances. Others associate the term with El Grito de Delores, the battle cry of th Mexican revolution for independence from Spain. For still others, it brings to mind days not too far past when El Grito del Norte, a community newspaper, chronicled the grassroots struggles of traditional New Mexico communities. Our use of El Grito today is meant to evoke the deep cultural traditions and the rich legacy of struggle found in our communities, in service to justice, equity, and opportunity.
In the digital era, we hope El Grito will flourish as the next iteration of a long tradition of community journalism that threads its way forward to the present.
El Grito del Norte, for instance, was founded to help spread the word about the land grant movement in northern New Mexico.Elizabeth “Betita” Martinez, a well known civil rights activist, was invited to move to Espanola, New Mexico to help establish and grow the publication as well as the movement it was centered around. The paper became well read for the way it surfaced viewpoints from grassroots communities broadly.
Eventually the committed group of folks who produced El Grito del Norte as well as others from around the state moved to Albuquerque, where they began the Chicano Communications Center in the Chicano barrio of Los Duranes, with the intention of spurring grassroots media throughout the state. A foundational product of the Center was the powerful publication that today is known as “500 Years of Chicano History.” Edited by Martinez, the SouthWest Organizing Project has kept this seminal book that is used in countless classrooms and homes today in print since the 1980s.
“Like Miguel Hidalgo of the Mexican revolution, we continue to cry out el grito de Dolores, which represents all those who struggle for justice and peace,” said Joaquin Lujan, who was the printer at the Chicano Communications Center and is now a community organizer with SWOP’s Project Feed the Hood.
“Back in the days of the Chicano Communications Center, we believed strongly in the power of grassroots media, and we still do today. These vehicles provide a space for our voices to be heard and to develop our understanding of the world in which we live.”
Who we are:
This site is maintained by the SouthWest Organizing Project. We pledge to offer a space here for the diversity of voices that exist in New Mexico, and to continually seek out and share the stories and views of New Mexicans who may not always have access to a medium that will let their cry be heard across the state. And we sincerely hope you’ll check in often and add your “grito” to the debate.
Submissions:
All submissions are encouraged and welcome. Our lens is critical analysis of our society, our focus is the landscape experienced by New Mexico’s traditional and low-income communities. We reserve the right to only publish those pieces that further the debate in a constructive and positive manner. We also accept calendar submissions. Please send submissions to elgritonm@gmail.com.
For those who’ve attended our media maker institute, or have published elsewhere, we may pay a small stipend for articles or videos agreed to in advance. If you would like to explore this option, or are interested in training to be a community journalist, please send an email to editor.elgritonm@gmail.com.
El Grito is strictly non-partisan, and will not publish any content referring to political elections or written by a candidate for office.
**The articles that appear on our site reflect the individuals who write for the site, and should not be considered official positions of El Grito or the SouthWest Organizing Project, unless designated as such within the article.