La Voz de Galicia
Encyclopedia
La Voz de Galicia is a Spanish daily newspaper owned by the Corporación Voz de Galicia. La Voz is the most sold newspaper in Galicia and the sixth of Spain. It is written primarily in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...

 with Galician
Galician language
Galician is a language of the Western Ibero-Romance branch, spoken in Galicia, an autonomous community located in northwestern Spain, where it is co-official with Castilian Spanish, as well as in border zones of the neighbouring territories of Asturias and Castile and León.Modern Galician and...

 used in the cultural and opinion sections.

The newspaper was founded in 1882 by Juan Fernández Latorre and is published in A Coruña
A Coruña
A Coruña or La Coruña is a city and municipality of Galicia, Spain. It is the second-largest city in the autonomous community and seventeenth overall in the country...

, Galicia.

The paper has a digital version available in both Spanish and Galician.

Political allegiance

Like the majority of Galician newspapers La Voz de Galicia relies on regional government subsidies for its survival, heavily compromising its editorial independence. Following the 2009 Galician parliamentary elections
Galician parliamentary election, 2009
The Galician parliamentary election of 2009 was held on Sunday, 1 March 2009 to elect members to the Galician Parliament.The election saw the People's Party of Galicia retake control of the parliament from the coalition of the Socialists and the Galician Nationalist Bloc, with a majority of 1 seat...

 in which the center-right People's Party of Galicia
People's Party of Galicia
The People's Party of Galicia is a centre-right political party in Galicia, Spain. It is the Galician affiliate of the Spanish People's Party....

 defeated the center-left Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in...

-Bloque Nacionalista Galego
Bloque Nacionalista Galego
The Galician Nationalist Bloc is a Galician nationalist coalition of political parties. It is self-defined as a "patriotic front".Formed in 1982, under the guidance of historical leader Xosé Manuel Beiras, the BNG advocates for further devolution of powers to the Parliament of Galicia and the...

 coalition, the newspaper was awarded more than 4 million euros in subsidies. Other Galician media claimed that this was reward for its political bias towards the ruling People's Party . This kept the paper alive, while other media disappeared because they lacked the economical support that they were entitled to as Galician language papers (the Spanish government provides extra funding to regions with several official languages in order to support their promotion).

History

Juan Fernández Latorre founded La Voz de Galicia in 1882 as a republican, progressive and open-minded newspaper. Consolidated in the republican era with a circulation of more than 20.000 daily copies, it is not until the decade of the ’60, when Santiago Rey Fernandez-Latorre, the founder’s grandson takes over as manager, that La Voz begins its expansion. Under the management of who today is the newspaper’s Editor and President of the Corporación Voz de Galicia, the Galician head conquers its greatest challenges: it undergoes a complete technical updating renovation, it surpasses the 100.000 copy circulation barrier, it becomes the 6th leading Spanish newspaper in circulation ranking, it creates a system of editions that covers all of Galicia and inaugurates in 1992 an intelligent building which houses the printing plant in Sabon which today is the group’s main headquarters.


In line with this, in the mid ‘80s the company goes multimedia and acquires eight radio stations, the editorial Biblioteca Gallega (contemporary with the foundation of newspaper), the Galician Yearbook , Voz Noticias, a graphic arts division (Galicia Editoral, S.A.) and a production studio called Voz Audiovisual, one of the first production companies in the country. In the early ‘90s, the Instituto Sociolóxico Galegos (Sondaxe) starts its activities and Radio Voz begins to broadcast. In 1997 the Fundacion Santiago Rey Fernández-Latorre is established as a means of ensuring the continuity of the ownership and the editorial line of La Voz de Galicia and its corporation. One year later, Juan Carlos I, King of Spain, inaugurates the Museum of the press and graphic arts built in the headquarters of La Voz , whose list of titles gathers close to 5.000 copies of different newspapers and magazines and 38 types of printing machines.


La Voz starts the new Century with the opening of its digital edition (www.lavozdegalicia.es), which is presently the most visited Web in Galicia and one of the most referenced digital editions in Spain. In May of 2010, it also launches its Digital Terrestrial Television project: V Televisión.


The Fundación Santiago Rey Fernández-Latorre manages, besides the Museum, the programs of Voz Natura and Prensa-Escuela which, on one side tries to involve the education community in the recovery and defense of natural environment, and on the other, encourages the use of the newspaper as an educational tool which contributes to build critical awareness among schoolchildren ; Master in Journal Edition (MEP), Master in Audiovisual Production and Management (MPXA) and the Post grad course on International Commerce of Audiovisual Contents (CICA).

Editions

The newspaper publishes 14 editions every day, carried out by journalists from 26 different areas and resources (branch offices, sub-branches and correspondents) which allows the reader to obtain the closest information on everyday reality.


Each edition is singled out by an insert within the newspaper which gathers all local information, a specific first page for each area and targeted information within the main body of the newspaper, specially in the sports section. This personalization implies the production of nearly 400 daily pages processed by the editorial staff and the printing department, of these the reader gets to see an average of 96 pages in his local edition.


With the opening of the Ferrol branch office in 1953, La Voz de Galicia was the first newspaper to undertake this editorial system which served as model to other newspapers outside Galicia. From that moment on, the expansion was carried out in various phases. In 1959 the Santiago branch was opened, in 1964 the one in Carballo and so on up to 1978, when the seven Galician cities had their own local editorial office. By 1990 the other main regions were also covered and short after the editorial staff office in Madrid was inaugurated, city that has a numerous Galician population.


This territorial organization allows La Voz de Galicia to have representatives in these areas in order to meet the necessities and interests of each city and region: the delegates are who manage the manpower appointed to each branch office and who defend the interests of the Corporación Voz and its readers.

Digital edition

On May 17, 2000, coinciding with the celebration of the Día das Letras Galegas
Día das Letras Galegas
Galician Literature Day is a public holiday observed in Galicia, Spain. Introduced by the Royal Galician Academy in 1963 it is a celebration of the Galician language and its literature. This celebration has taken place on May 17 since 1963...

(Galician Literature Day), honouring the figure of the Galician writer, Manuel Murguía, La Voz de Galicia launched its web page. During these past years, lavozdegalicia.es has been consolidated as Galicia’s most visited web and one of Spain’s best reference sources in digital newspapers, with 25 million visits monthly and 2 million exclusive users. Part of its success lies in the fact that the constant updating of information complies with the users needs for an accurate and speedy news development. From the early morning hours till way past midnight, navigators can keep up with last minute information. And the visitors can not only keep themselves informed on what’s occurring in the world, but can also go beyond the news. The team of professionals in charge of the web, add on to the most relevant news events of the day, photographs, text analysis, computer graphics, photo galleries, videos or links to other websites.


The desire to adapt to the society’s needs for complete up-to-date news has caused a sustained growth of audience during these last years, where significant increases in visits are registered in those days of intensive information, as occurred, for example, during the Galician Elections in 2009, which caused a record of 245.000 visits the day following election day.


Besides news articles, La Voz’s web makes use of interactive and multimedia formats normally applied in the Internet, to elaborate special reports that give visitors a follow-up of the top stories, such as the celebration of elections, war conflicts o notorious sports events.


The web also offers its users different services, such as weather forecasts which are updated four times a day, stock quotes in real time, the newspaper’s library or the Buscavoz, which is the web’s search engine to locate a specific event or article. It also counts with a specific version for mobile devices and it hosts a community blog, where you can participate with your opinions.

Commentators and columnists

Manuel Murguía and Emilia Pardo Bazán gave start to La Voz’s first stage as commentators, along with Casares Quiroga, Martínez Salazar, Manuel Aznar (grandfather of Spain’s ex-President, José María Aznar), Ramón Otero Pedraio and Castelao. The Second Republic (from 1831-1936) is considered to have been the paper’s golden age as far as its columnists are concerned, counting with articles written by some of the period’s most relevant personalities, such as Josep Pla, Julio Camba, Gregorio Marañón, Azorín or Pérez de Ayala.


During the 1950’s, the readers were able to enjoy the comments written by Alvaro Cunqueiro, as well as those provided by international commentators such as Walter Lippman and Augusto Assia. Afterwards, during the transition, they were able to appreciate the works of Francisco Umbral, well-known Spanish writer.


The over one hundred columnists and commentators with which La Voz presently counts with follow the same pluralism line. Among others, we can find names such as Xavier Alcalá, Xaquín Alvarez Corbacho, José Ramón Amor Pan, Manel Antelo, Xosé Carlos Arias, Xosé Luis Barreiro Rivas, Ignacio Bermúdez, Roberto Blanco Valdés, Xosé Carlos Caneiro, María Canosa, Manuel Luis Casalderrey, Jorge del Corral, Isaac Díaz Pardo, Federico Fernández de Buján, Lourenzo Fernández Prieto, X.L. Franco Grande, Victor F. Freixanes, Juan Gómez-Jurado, Uxío Labarta, Inma López Silva, Marina Mayoral, José Luis Meilán, Juan J. Moralejo, Pablo Mosquera, Miguel Anxo Murado, Gonzalo Ocampo, Fernando Onega, José Manuel Otero Lastres, Gonzalo Parente, Ventura Pérez Mariño, Ramón Pernas, Albino Prada, Andrés Precedo Ledo, Carlos Reigosa, Ernesto Sánchez Pombo, Yashmina Shawki, Inocencio F. Arias, Domingo Bello Janeiro, José C. Bermejo Barrera, Manuel Blanco Desar, Jaime Concheiro, Celso Currás, Manuel Fernández Blanco, Esperanza Guisán, Javier Guitián, Pedro González-Trevijano, Ramón Irigoyen, Antonio Iaquiero, Arturo Maneiro, Manuel Menor Currás, Victor Moro, Carlos Nárdiz y José Antonio Vázquez Taín.
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