David Beers is a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

journalist and founder of the news website, ''The Tyee''. He previously served as managing editor of the ''San Francisco Examiner'', senior editor at ''Mother Jones'' magazine, and features editor at the ''Vancouver Sun''. He is a faculty member in the Graduate School of Journalism at the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a Public university, public research university with campuses near University of British Columbia Vancouver, Vancouver and University of British Columbia Okanagan, Kelowna, in British Columbia, Canada ...

Early life

Beers was born in 1957 and grew up in

San Jose, California San Jose, officially the City of San José ( ; ), is a cultural, commercial, and political center within Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area. With a city population of 997,368 and a metropolitan area population of 1.95 million, it is ...

, where his father worked for Lockheed as a satellite test engineer. He attended Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, California.

Journalism career

Beers’s work has been published in magazines including the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

Magazine'' and ''

Harper's ''Harper's Magazine'' is a monthly magazine of literature, politics, culture, finance, and the arts. Launched in New York City in June 1850, it is the oldest continuously published monthly magazine in the United States. ''Harper's Magazine'' has ...

''. In 1994, "We’re No Angels" was a finalist for the Canadian

National Magazine Award The National Magazine Awards, also known as the Ellie Awards, honor print and digital publications that consistently demonstrate superior execution of editorial objectives, innovative techniques, noteworthy enterprise and imaginative design. Or ...

. He served as managing editor of the ''San Francisco Examiner'', senior editor at ''Mother Jones'' magazine, and features editor at the ''Vancouver Sun''. In October 2001, Beers wrote a ''Vancouver Sun'' editorial about freedom of speech in which he defended sociologist Sunera Thobani. A week later, the ''Vancouver Sun's'' publisher,

CanWest Canwest Global Communications Corporation, which operated under the corporate name Canwest, was a major Canadian media conglomerate based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, with its head offices at Canwest Place (now called 201 Portage). It held radio, ...

, fired Beers citing "budgetary restraints".Gill, A. (2003, Dec 06). Against opinion's tide. ''The Globe and Mail'' Retrieved from https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/against-opinions-tide/docview/383942041/se-2 Beers regarded CanWest's decision, which coincided with other firings of senior CanWest journalists, as political. In 2003, Beers started an online publication in

Vancouver, British Columbia Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...

called ''

The Tyee The Tyee is an independent daily news website based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was founded in November 2003 as an alternative to corporate media. Articles in The Tyee focus on politics, culture, and life. The Tyee was founded b ...

''. Funded in large part by non-profit groups, the British Columbia Federation of Labour and an advertising agency called Quest Advertising, the ''Tyee'''s goal is to publish news and opinion not adequately covered by the mainstream news media. His book, '' Blue Sky Dream: A Memoir of America's Fall from Grace'', is based on his essay, "The Crash of Blue Sky California", which won the American

National Magazine Awards The National Magazine Awards, also known as the Ellie Awards, honor print and digital publications that consistently demonstrate superior execution of editorial objectives, innovative techniques, noteworthy enterprise and imaginative design. Or ...

when it appeared in ''Harper's''.

Works

"The Public Sphere and Online, Independent Journalism"
''CSSE''
"It's all good: The appeal of Deepak Chopra", ''Salon'', May 10, 2001
* ''Blue Sky Dream: A Memoir of America's Fall from Grace (''1996) * ''Liberalized: The Tyee Report on British Columbia Under Gordon Campbell's Liberals'' (2005) * ''Points of'' ''Interest: In Search of the Places, People, and Stories of B.C'' (2024)

References

External links

The Tyee
{{DEFAULTSORT:Beers, David Writers from San Jose, California Journalists from Vancouver 1957 births Living people Vancouver Sun people Mother Jones (magazine) people Academic staff of the University of British Columbia Canadian newspaper editors +