Platform with Third Media Sector expertise in 16 countries strengthened
At its General Assembly in Madrid Community Media Forum Europe (CMFE) the Board of Directors got three new members. Judith Purkarthofer (Austria) takes over as President after Ciáran Murray (Ireland) . Vice presidents are Larry Fergeson (Cyprus) and Gabriella Velics (Hungary). Treasurer is Helmut Peissl (Austria). Together with former board members new in the Experts Group is Lina Chawaf MD of the Syrian expat radio station Radio Rozana in Paris.
Judith Purkarthofer works as a post-doctoral research fellow at the Center for Multilingualism across the Lifespan at the University of Oslo, and has a strong focus on multilingual settings. Her interest is in participatory practices, media as multilingual practice for plurilingual speakers, etc. Master thesis on language choice in community radio, research on Community Radio and multilingual producers in 2008 and in 2010 on multilingual programming in Austrian community radio. Participatory projects on women’s radio history in Europe and language learning and experience incommunity media. Member of different research groups and organiser of regular meetings around community radio, participation in diverse conferences on community media.
The “Third Media Sector” is made up of non profit-making media serving a local community and has as such a clearly distinct identity alongside the national public service sector and private commercial media. The CMFE is a common platform for networks, national federations and projects active within this sector.
CMFE’s network is growing steadily and, to date has a total of 102 members: 42 Individual Members and 60 Organizational Members, of which 28 are (National) Federations or networks. CMFE has 94 members from 23 European countries, and among its affiliate members it counts also individuals and organisations from Africa, Asia and North America.
The work of CMFE is also advised by members with in-depth expertise on European community media with the input of the CMFE Experts Group that consists of the Board of Directors plus 20 other members.
