Name: Craig Allen
University Affiliation and Position: Arizona State University, Associate Professor & Associate Dean of the Barrett Honors College
Book Title: Univision, Telemundo, and the Rise of Spanish Language Television in the United States
1. Describe the focus of your book.
The book is the first comprehensive history of U.S. Spanish-language television. Drawing from ten years of archival research, original interviews, and exploration, it reveals the inside story behind the Spanish-language networks Univision and Telemundo, how they fought enormous odds, and finally rose as giants of mass communication in the English-speaking United States. The book argues that scholars’ study and understanding only of English-language television has hidden a key dimension of U.S. mass media, that they are extensively and endemically internationalized. Much of the book traces the rise of Mexican broadcast pioneer Emilio Azcárraga Vidaurreta, who founded Univision as the U.S.’s fourth television network only a few years after the beginning of TV on ABC, CBS, and NBC. Chapters go on to recount events that demonstrate that, despite attracting virtually no attention or pursuit among U.S. media scholars, Mexico’s powerful Azcárraga dynasty fundamentally influenced and shaped the development of television in the U.S. The history further unfolds with exploration of numerous American figures who directed the emergences of Univision and Telemundo. Although unknown in media literature, here identified and delved for first time, they are among the U.S. mass media’s foremost pioneers. The account reiterates the endurance, innovation, and popularity of Spanish-language television, and that its story is essential to understanding not merely the Latinx but overall history of modern America.
2. How did you come across this subject? Why did it interest you?
Spanish-language television always has been out there. Univision has been the No. 1 single source of media many times. I don’t think media scholars ever had heard of it. (Media scholarship is a not a domain that’s good at grasping mass communication beyond white, Anglo, English-language media.) My professional career in television began as a volunteer rookie producer of a weekly Spanish-language TV show on an English-language station. This was in the 1970s, when Spanish-language broadcasting was known only in a dozen cities and virtually all television was three English-language channels, ABC, CBS, and NBC. The Spanish experience was my “break” that got me inside TV first as a news reporter, eventually as an anchor and news director. Although I worked in English-language TV, I never stopped following the Spanish-language counterpart to which I owed my career. Later as a media historian, I think I was the only one who knew that Spanish-language television existed.
3. What archives or research materials did you use?
A pivotal part of the book (on a landmark court case in which the FCC eliminated Univision’s foreign owners) was drawn from research at the National Archives. However, as an internal study of the Univision and Telemundo corporations, key documents either were not kept or subject to proprietary restrictions. Through dealings with the companies and parties, I was able to accumulate (and cite from) materials I located in numerous private collections. Much travel was involved.
4. How does your book relate to journalism history? How is it relevant to the present?
I’m not sure it’s really relevant to the present. It’s a story of history. I tend to believe that journalism and mass communication if they exist at all are on their last legs. A hundred years from now, people will look back at a bygone period when something known as journalism that massed a lot of people and was influential existed. I tend to see Spanish-language television as a piece of what those in the future will look back upon toward helping them understand what once was America’s “mass media era.” 5. What advice you have for other historians working/starting on book projects
Spend time researching a marketable topic before you begin. Writing published history seems easy—until you have to write a treatment that sells the topic you’ve plunged into. If you want to publish a book but your topic doesn’t brim with selling points, you will be trapped when you have to approach publishers. In the case of Univision, I had at least 50 rejections, each time with the stock comment “The topic doesn’t fit our market,” code for “we can’t sell it.” If the goal is a book, ask yourself “What will attract an audience?” and “What will get people to pay for what I’ve written?” These are publishers’ first questions. Do the analysis before, not after, you commit.