Soledad O’Brien at Women’s Media Center: Media Awards

Soledad O’Brien, who’s career spans nearly twenty years in broadcasting, was honored by the Women’s Media Center for her tireless efforts to promote women on television and in broadcasting. O’Brien, an award-winning and critically acclaimed documentarian, is the current anchor for CNN morning show Starting Point with Soledad O’Brien. A working mother and successful journalist in a fast-paced and demanding business, Soledad sheds new light on many of today’s most important issue including the media, diversity, women’s issues and education among others.
Hosted by comedian/actress Wanda Sykes, the event featured a cross-section of the most powerful and influential women in America, paying tribute to those who have brought a much-needed light to women in the media.

Gloria Steinem, who co-founded the organization in 2004 with Jane Fonda and Robin Morgan, has stated: “The media is where we get our ideas of what is normal, what is OK, what is possible for us, what we can become.” She goes on to compare the media to a “…current campfire. For all the time that human beings have been on Earth, we have been sitting around a campfire telling our stories. And if one person could not tell their story they were not part of the group, people didn’t learn from them, and the circle was incomplete.”

WMC promotes women as subjects and decision-makers within the media, training women and girls so they are media-ready and media-savvy. WMC founder Robin Morgan said, “we’re all constrained by two-dimensional information—at our peril. The greatest threat to democracy in the Information Age is the erasure, underrepresentation, and misrepresentation of women, who after all comprise 51 percent of the U.S. (and global) population.” The Women’s Media Center plays a pivotal role in ensuring a female presence in newsrooms, on air, in print and online.

Honorees were:

Soledad O’Brien (CNN)
Broadcast Journalism Award

Lara Logan (CBS correspondent)
Whole Truth Award

Maggie Wilderotter (Frontier Communications Chair & CEO)
Business Media Award

Yanique Richards (Howard University Student)
Carol Jenkins Young Journalist Award

Sady Doyle (Founder of tigerbeatdown.com)
WMC Social Media Award