Meet the Ethnic Press : An Increasing Number of Specialized Publications That Reflect the Diversity of the Region Bring News of Home and Help Newcomers Learn About the U.S.

The editor of the Nguoi Viet Daily News stood in front of his office on Moran Street and pointed to a nearby business where newspapers in Vietnamese, Spanish, Cambodian, Laotian and Farsi are printed. Down the street are the headquarters of the Vietnam Economic News, the Little Saigon News, and a software firm specializing in Vietnamese.

“This is like Fleet Street,” Yen Do said, referring to the former newspaper row in London.

But unlike London in the 1980s, where one language was dominant, people in Southern California today speak many languages. Ethnic newspapers reflect that diversity.

A reader can find publications of almost any tongue, from Spanish to Cambodian to Swahili, said Holmes Stoner of Artesa Marketing Services, an advertising company specializing in the ethnic market.

“Our biggest clients back in ’83 were primarily Spanish and black,” Stoner said. “Today, we are heavily into Asian languages. We are also in Farsi, Armenian, Russian, German, Italian. . . .”

Demographics tell the story: Latinos in 1990 made up 23% of Orange County population, up from 14.8% in 1980, according to U.S. census figures. Asian-Americans went from 4.5% in 1980 to 10% in 1990. The census in 1990 shows that close to 24% of Orange County residents are foreign born.

Ethnic media are not new.

Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer reached his first American audience in the Jewish Daily Forward, a New York Yiddish paper.

Immigrant Hermann Ridder’s 19th-Century German-language newspaper, the Staats-Zeitung, was the foundation of a publication empire that later became Knight-Ridder Inc., one of the nation’s largest media chains.

And the Rafu Shimpo, which caters to Japanese-Americans and Japanese temporary workers, is celebrating its 90th anniversary, making it the oldest Asian-American daily in the United States.

“This is a subterranean world,” K.W. Lee, an editor at the Los Angeles-based Korean Times, said of ethnic newspapers. “But this is a subterranean world that has been in existence for 200 years.”

What is new, however, is the number of papers catering to minorities, whether in English or in the language of the home country.

Because no one tracks them, the number of ethnic publications is hard to pin down. It is estimated that 25 ethnic publications circulated in Southern California in 1986. Today, the Vietnamese community alone accounts for about 30 Vietnamese-language papers.

At least eight Spanish weeklies are published in Orange County. And although the two Korean dailies are based in Los Angeles, they have bureaus in Garden Grove and home-delivery service to Orange County’s burgeoning Korean-American population.

In whatever language, one common goal of ethnic publications is to bring news from back home.

“The Korean-Americans, after 12, 13 hours of hard work, you know what they do?” Lee asked. “They grab the Korean-language paper and they devour it. . . . I know Korean merchants; they come home at 11, 12 at night, while eating, they read the newspaper, and then put their head on the table and fall asleep. . . . They are excited about what’s going on 8,000 miles away.”

Yet while helping their readers look homeward, these papers also introduce the United States to newcomers, helping to explain everything from the legal system to National Football League rules.

“Ethnic newspapers are very important. . . . (They) are the lifeblood of commercial and social activities,” Lee said. “It’s a necessary part of our new life in America.”

“The goal of these newspapers is to bring information to these communities that no one else brings to them,” said Jonathan Sanchez, president of the California Assn. of Hispanic Publishers.

Along with the diversity in language comes diversity in size. The publications range from tiny mom-and-pop operations to outfits owned by huge conglomerates. And each affords a peek into its readership’s subculture.

Most of the Vietnamese-language newspapers, for example, adopt a bellicose stand against communism. Some seem to exist solely to rid Vietnam of communism. Editors routinely refuse to refer to Ho Chi Minh City; the preferred name is still Saigon.

One Latino weekly, the Azteca News, devotes seven pages in each issue to amateur soccer. At least 20,000 amateur players participate in the sport in the county, Editor and Publisher Fernando Velo said, and some of the country’s best players are here.

A unique feature of an Asian Indian newspaper, India West, is its matrimonial classifieds, where readers carry on a tradition of advertising for potential spouses.

In many cases, the ads are placed by family members: “Alliance invited from professional girls for handsome, well-established Gujarati (region) engineer, 5 ft. 8 in., 34, green card holder, divorced. Caste no bar. Call sister at . . . “

Classifieds are important in other ways, providing a community marketplace.

Many minority businesses rely on them to advertise for workers. The rates are cheaper, and it makes sense because often businesses prefer to hire someone who speaks that community’s language.

“Many Koreans read newspapers to find jobs,” said Kyeyoung Park, a UCLA professor of anthropology and Asian-American studies. “Unless you find a job through personal connections, (a) newspaper is an important way of finding a job.”

The two Korean-language dailies, the Korea Times and the Central Daily News, are the big daddies of ethnic papers. Each averages about 100 pages a day, complete with color photos. They cover everything from the Garden Grove Planning Commission to the latest minutiae about the new South Korean president to Hollywood gossips. Each includes an English section one day a week.

The Central Daily News is owned by Samsung Inc., a corporation better known for its television sets and VCRs.

An Anaheim Cambodian paper, the Angkor Borei News, has bilingual editions, but the “other” language is not English, it is French, because 40% of its 10,000 circulation goes to Paris, said editor Diep Ly. Also, given the country’s colonial history, many Cambodians are fluent in French.

These newspapers share a symbiotic relationship with their communities, staying close to the pulse of their readers in many ways.

The two Korean newspapers, for example, knew the names of three Korean-American suspects in the Stuart Tay murder case minutes after the arrests. The mainstream media didn’t get the identities of the youth accused in the Fullerton honor student’s murder until a day later. But unlike mainstream newspapers, which ran the juvenile suspects’ names, the Korean papers did not, citing a Seoul tradition of protecting underage youths. Printing the names would also shame the suspects’ families.

One reporter noted that the Korean Times was among the biggest victims of last spring’s riots, having seen many of its Koreatown ad accounts destroyed in the unrest.

Some papers grow with their community.

Take Nguoi Viet Daily News.

Editor Do started publishing his weekly newspaper out of his home with a few friends in Santa Ana in December, 1978, a time when Orange County had only 12 Vietnamese-run businesses, he recalled.

Today, Little Saigon has become the largest enclave of Vietnamese outside of Vietnam. And Nguoi Viet Daily News has grown to six issues a week, with daily circulation of 12,000, six times its first-year circulation. There are 30 staffers, and the paper has spawned a monthly literary magazine. Its wire service ships news to papers from Toronto to Sydney, Australia.

The Latino counterparts to Do’s paper have grown as well.

In addition to Azteca News, there are Rumores, Miniondas and Union Hispana, each averaging about 30,000 copies a week. They provide news about their community, as well as news tidbits from Latin America.

Despite the proliferation of ethnic newspapers, publishers said, newspapers are profitable.

The business records of these private companies are secret, but Stoner’s advertising company provides a hint of their success. When he started in 1983, Stoner was alone in the ethnic market but now has “approximately four or five major competitors,” he said.

The future for ethnic media looks good, publishers said, and they are branching out. Take Tom Kagy, who calls his Transpacific magazine the second generation of ethnic media.

Tired of what he calls the stereotypical mainstream media portrayal of Asian men as a “humble, skinny guy with buckteeth and glasses,” the Korean-born Kagy launched his magazine in 1986.

It is an Asian blend of Vogue, Vanity Fair, People and Fortune magazines, often running Asian success stories and profiles. But with its most controversial feature, the fashion pages of Asian men surrounded by beautiful models, Transpacific aims to dispel the stereotype that Asian men are sexless characters, Kagy said.

Critics, including some in the Asian-American community, charge that the English-language magazine is sexist and gauche. But Transpacific, with 35% of its 47,500 circulation in Southern California, appears to be making it in the Darwinian world of publishing. Targeting affluent Asian readers, the magazine has been able to lure upscale ads from Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Bally’s shoes.

The 37-year-old Kagy recently launched a magazine for Asian women and is about to start another for Asian men.

Most ethnic editors and publishers are like Kagy. They see opportunity for themselves and their communities in Southern California. This polyglot version of Fleet Street of old will likely expand as the area draws more immigrants from Latin America and the Pacific Rim.

As Azteca News’ Velo said: “We have very great confidence in our future.”