Rooted in the past, growing for the future: Generational solidarity through ethnic media

Across the U.S., local and ethnic media have long served as cultural lifelines for immigrant communities. However, many such outlets now face a critical challenge: the generational gap. As the first-generation immigrant readership ages, younger audiences — often born or raised in the U.S. — consume media through radically different platforms, formats and cultural lenses.

This shift is especially stark in diaspora communities. According to a 2023 Pew Research Center study, 85% of U.S.-born Asian Americans aged 18–29 get their news from social media, compared to just 21% of foreign-born Asian Americans over age 50. The implications are profound: Without transformation, legacy ethnic media risk becoming irrelevant to the very communities they once helped define.

At India Currents, we’ve confronted this dilemma head-on. Founded in 1987 to document the stories of Indian immigrants, we spent over three decades cultivating deep trust with our first-gen audience. Today, we’re undergoing a bold transformation — reimagining ourselves as a platform that fosters generational solidarity and serves bicultural audiences from Gen Z to Boomers.

Why this work matters

Generational solidarity is not simply about passing down culture. It is about forging connections that drive civic participation, mental health and cultural continuity. Local media can play a pivotal role in fostering these connections — yet few have the strategy or tools to bridge the divide.

In 1987, India Currents was launched to tell the untold stories of Indian immigrants in the United States. As a new immigrant myself, I was part of the generation that needed a publication to reflect our cultural anxieties, triumphs and lived realities. For over three decades, we built trust as a reliable platform for immigrant storytelling. But something shifted in recent years. The children of those early readers — the so-called “1.5 generation” and second-gen Indian Americans — aren’t flipping through print magazines or even browsing static websites. They’re on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, forming their identities through fast, visual and deeply personal media.

That gap — between a legacy publication and a rising generation — is where generational solidarity is both most needed and most possible.

Our challenge was clear: India Currents could not thrive unless it bridged a 30-plus year-old magazine to 30-plus year-old next-gens in the diaspora. So we began a transformation that wasn’t just about digital transition; it was about fostering a vibrant, cross-generational community that speaks in many voices, formats and languages — literal and cultural.

In January 2025, I was selected for the Media Transformation Challenge at the Poynter Institute. And I learned of several tools and frameworks that we are using to make this transformation.

Getting started: Building the bridge

To design meaningful intergenerational collaboration, we had to evolve across three major domains:

1. Mindset shift

We let go of being platform-first and recommitted to being people-first. This meant understanding not just where next-gen readers consume content, but why they do it. We asked: What kinds of stories do they seek out? What language, tone, and format resonates with them? What are their values and fears — and how can we be of service?

2. Tools and experiments

Using the From-To Framework:

Using a framework we call RAOOI (Resources → Activities → Outputs → Outcomes → Impact), we tested:

• AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, Notebook LM and Claude for content generation
• Social-first storytelling formats like carousels, reels and cultural explainers
• Automation tools for content calendars and metrics tracking

These experiments allowed us to design and do — to move quickly from theory to practice without waiting for a perfect strategy.

3. Action

To guide content creation, we held two listening sessions and also gathered data through a survey. We then developed new audience personas using AI — such as The Cultural Synthesizer and The Identity Seeker.

For example, Identity Seekers want quick, trend-reactive posts that help them understand their roots in a digestible format. Cultural Synthesizers thrive on curated deep dives and thoughtful carousels.

These personas helped us better align content with user needs while avoiding the trap of one-size-fits-all storytelling.

What’s possible: A scalable model for solidarity

We’ve seen early wins: Our next-gen audience (ages 18–44) grew from 3900 to 32,500 – a 733% growthin six months.

If a small BIPOC-led newsroom like ours can reimagine itself as a dynamic cross-generational platform, others can too.

We think this model is highly replicable across community and diaspora media:

• Focus on people, not platforms
• Start with one content property, tailored to a well-researched audience persona
• Use low-cost AI tools to test, iterate and refine content
• Track metrics that align with community-building — not just vanity stats
• Partner with universities and youth organizations to co-create programming

Lessons and actionable takeaways

1. Don’t wait for perfect. Start small, start now. We launched Rooted with just one part-time social media lead and a basic AI-assisted content calendar. The key wasn’t scale — it was starting.

2. Use AI, but stay human. AI helped us with repetitive tasks like summarizing interviews or generating post drafts. But the voice, values and cultural nuance? That still comes from people who care deeply about the community.

3. Don’t assume new means new content. Next-gen engagement didn’t always require new reporting. Repurposing legacy stories through new formats (e.g., archival photos + Gen Z commentary) can drive high engagement with minimal resource lift.

4. Track what matters. Instead of focusing only on impressions and likes, we also tracked who is engaging repeatedly and what content generates comments or shares.

5. Collaborate offline. Nothing builds trust across generations like face-to-face engagement. Our events with SJSU and AAJA have the potential to create lasting connections and give young creators a platform.

6. Rethink your measures of success. Legacy newsrooms often chase traditional KPIs. We shifted our internal focus:

• From operational excellence → to product innovation
• From static web traffic → to engaged next-gen audiences
• From longform excellence → to shortform experimentation
• Publish a series of youth-driven pieces on cultural bridging

Why this matters beyond us

Generational solidarity in local journalism is more than a survival strategy — it’s a civic imperative. In a 2023 Knight-Gallup study, 74% of Americans under 35 said they distrust national news but are more likely to trust local or identity-based outlets. If younger generations disengage from local or ethnic media, we lose vital pathways for heritage transmission, political voice and community cohesion.

At India Currents, we believe storytelling can build bridges — not just between people, but across time.

Because when we tell our stories across generations, we don’t just preserve the past — we shape the future.

 

Vandana Kumar is the Publisher and CEO of India Currents, the leading digital platform for Indian Americans, which she co-founded in 1987. She has received multiple honors for her leadership in ethnic media, including the Asian American Hero Award and the AAJA Community Impact Award. Vandana also serves on the Board of the California News Publishers Association and is a Knight Fellow focused on innovation in journalism.