Editor Christian Williams Year founded 1984 Country United States | Frequency quarterly Company Ogden Publications | |
Categories U.S. politics and public policy | ||
Utne Reader (a.k.a. Utne) is a quarterly American magazine that collects and reprints articles on politics, culture, and the environment, generally from alternative media sources including journals, newsletters, weeklies, zines, music, and DVDs.
Contents
The magazine's writers and editors contribute books, film, and music reviews and original articles which tend to focus on emerging cultural trends. The magazine's website produces ten blogs covering politics, environment, media, spirituality, science and technology, great writing, and the arts. The publication takes its name from founder, Eric Utne.
History
The magazine was founded in 1984 by Eric Utne as the Utne Reader. Eric Utne chaired the magazine until the late 1990s when his then wife Nina Rothschild Utne took over. The magazine was headquartered in Minneapolis.
The cover logo was changed to simply Utne in 2003, continuing until 2006, with the subtitle, A Different Read on Life.
In 2006 the magazine was purchased by Ogden Publications, publishers of Grit, Mother Earth News, Natural Home, and other magazines. The earlier title Utne Reader was brought back, and the magazine refocused on its original mission to reprint "the best of the alternative press".
According to the New York Times, Utne Reader was a leader of the salon movement of the 1980s, devoted to debate on the issues of the day. Utne Reader was an early source of coverage of the mythopoetic men's movement when it first surfaced in the early 1990s.
Utne Independent Press Awards
Every year, the magazine gives out its Utne Independent Press Awards, which honor alternative and independent magazines from around the world. Past winners include the Wilson Quarterly, In These Times, Virginia Quarterly Review, Mother Jones, Orion, High Country News, Gnosis and New Internationalist.
In popular culture
In The Simpsons episode "King-Size Homer", Lisa Simpson receives a letter for a subscription to the Utne Reader. A later episode, "Dad Behavior", again references Lisa's collection of the magazines.