Common Language Project Mission

The mission of the Common Language Project is to develop innovative approaches to international journalism by focusing on positive, inclusive and humane reporting of stories ignored by the mainstream media?

Focus Areas

Independent media, supporting nonprofit work and grassroots organizing through progressive journalism, facilitating international networking, and providing an in-depth, alternative, multimedia, international news source for independent press in the United States

Intro to the Common Language Project

The Common Language Project reports news from around the world about groups and individuals working outside of the mainstream, with a specific focus on stigmatized regions and peoples underrepresented in the traditional media. Our coverage is focused on issues of human rights, gender equality, social and economic justice, education, labor, and health.

We believe that the best stories are told from the bottom up, not the top down, and seek out people working on the ground and those directly affected by the issues, not bureaucrats and politicians, as our primary sources. Staff are currently travelling in South Asia, the Middle East and Central Asia recording the stories of individuals and groups who epitomize this purpose for Volume 1 of our online multimedia magazine and alternative newswire.

Our goal is to facilitate communication amongst the global citizenry to spread evidence that “marginalized” individuals and communities can and do exercise their own inherent power to realize a better vision of their lives, apart from that handed down by governments and the mass media, and to champion the causes of those whose voices are not being heard.

More About the CLP

As politics, economies and media globalize, so must information about grassroots approaches to social and political change. While American media is fixated on issues such as the Iraq war, terrorism, and expanding global markets when it covers foreign affairs, little attention is given to issues affecting the day to day lives of common people or their struggles against injustice and inequality. Even less is given to stories that might foster cultural awareness and international communication.

The CLP believes that stories on a human scale can reveal the most about the relevant political and social issues of our times. The digital age has created new opportunities to connect people around the globe. The CLP believes that this has opened up exciting possibilities for independent media, especially in the realm of international reporting.