Former NPR journalist Michele Norris is scheduled to speak at the RiverCenter March 11.

Tonight, WVIK Quad Cities NPR will host the latest of its series of “Hidden Conversations” – How the black community is portrayed in marketing and media, on Facebook Live at 6 p.m.

Davenport-based leadership and diversity expert Dr. LaDrina Wilson will speak with Quad-Citizens Mikhayla Hughes-Shaw, reporter for WHBF and KLJB news and host of LOVE Girls: The Podcast; Skubie Mageza, sports anchor and reporter with KWQC, TV6; and Dr. Joseph Miller, professor of sales and marketing for St. Ambrose University about how the Black community is portrayed in marketing and media — all from a local perspective.

Last month, Wilson spoke with Command Sergeant Major Tisa Scott of the U.S. Army Garrison – Rock Island Arsenal, Darryl Howlett, Chief of Media Relations and Community Relations for First Army, and Dr. Burl Randolph with Reboot Combat Recovery of the Quad Cities about the black military experience.

Launched last fall, the “Hidden Conversations” programs are a

WVIK’s “Hidden Conversations” will be on Facebook Live tonight, Jan. 14, at 6 p.m.

new series of online conversations that will culminate with a 2021 Power of Words event featuring Michele Norris on March 11. These online conversations are themed around Michele Norris’ book The Grace of Silence, a personal memoir discussing the stories hidden within her own family that she only began to discover as an adult.

On March 11 at the RiverCenter, 136 E. 3rd St., Davenport, doors open at 5 p.m., with appetizers, desserts, coffee, and cash bar available. At 6 p.m. will be the keynote address with Michele Norris, Peabody Award-winning journalist, founder of The Race Card Project and Executive Director of The Bridge, The Aspen Institute’s new program on race, identity, connectivity and inclusion. At 7 p.m., Norris will answer questions from the audience, moderated by LaDrina Wilson.

For more than a decade, Norris served as a host of NPR’s All Things Considered, where she interviewed world leaders, American presidents, Nobel laureates, leading thinkers, and groundbreaking artists. She has also produced in-depth profiles, interviews, and series for NPR News programs, as well as special reports for National Geographic, Time Magazine, ABC News, and Lifetime Television.

Norris created The Race Card Project, an initiative to foster a wider conversation about race in America, after the publication of her family memoir, The Grace of Silence.

Tickets for the March 11 event are $20 to $40, available at Eventbrite.com.

Please leave this field empty

Free Breaking News
Alerts & Daily Digest
In Your Inbox!

Check your inbox to confirm your subscription.

Jonathan Turner

Jonathan Turner -- who has called the Quad Cities home since 1995 -- has decades of experience as a professional journalist and pianist. His experience writing for daily newspapers, public radio and local TV encompasses a wide range of subjects, including the arts, politics, education, economic development, historic preservation, business, and tourism.

Jonathan most loves writing about music and the arts (which he now does as a freelancer for the River Cities Reader and Visit Quad Cities). He has a passion for accompanying musicals, singers, choirs and instrumentalists, including playing for QC Music Guild's 2023 productions of RENT and SWEENEY TODD. He is assistant music director and accompanist for the spring 2025 Music Guild show, ESCAPE TO MARGARITAVILLE. He wrote an original musical based on The Book of Job, which premiered at Playcrafters in 2010. Jonathan penned a 175-page history book about downtown Davenport, that was published by The History Press in 2016, and a travel guide about the QC published by Reedy Press in 2022.