NAHJ releases updated Cultural Competence Handbook with comprehensive guidance on immigration reporting

The National Association of Hispanic Journalists (NAHJ) has released its updated Cultural Competence Handbook, a practical, in-depth resource to help journalists improve accuracy, fairness and inclusivity in coverage of Latino communities and other diverse populations.

The 2025 edition stands out as the most extensive journalistic guide on covering immigration and migration issues available today, providing not only terminology guidance but also strategies to avoid bias, contextualize complex policies and center the voices of impacted communities.

“Immigration coverage shapes public perception and policy debates in profound ways,” said Yaneth Guillén-Díaz, NAHJ executive director. “This handbook equips journalists with the tools to report these stories with depth, nuance and humanity.”

The handbook is available on NAHJ’s website as a searchable PDF and can also be queried on ChatGPT.

Key features include:

• Extensive, practical guidance on covering immigration, from framing stories beyond politics and border control to understanding migrants’ legal statuses and lived experiences.
  
  
• A detailed migration glossary with clear definitions of terms such as asylum seeker, refugee, irregular migration, climate migration and non-refoulement, empowering journalists to write with precision.
  
  
• Updated demographic insights on Latino communities in the U.S., reflecting the latest Pew Research Center data.
  
  
• Expanded recommendations for covering multiracial identities, the LGBTQIA+ community, health disparities, sexism and victims of violence with cultural competence and journalistic rigor.
  
  
• Guidance on evolving language and terminology, including “Latino,” “Hispanic,” “Latine” and “Latinx,” stressing that journalists should ask people how they identify and use their preferred terminology.

Why this guide matters now

While stylebooks like AP’s provide essential language standards, NAHJ’s Cultural Competence Handbook goes further by addressing narrative framing, sourcing and ethics — equipping journalists to avoid stereotypes, challenge misinformation and produce reporting that builds trust with diverse communities.

NAHJ urges newsrooms, journalism educators and reporters across the country to integrate the guide into their daily work, strengthening coverage of immigration, race, gender and culture at a time when these issues are central to the national conversation.

The 2025 NAHJ Cultural Competence Handbook is available for free download at NAHJ.org. A Spanish-language version will be published later this year.

About NAHJ:

 The National Association of Hispanic Journalists (NAHJ) is the largest organization of Latino journalists in the United States, dedicated to the recognition and professional advancement of Hispanics in the news industry. Established in April 1984, NAHJ works to increase the number of Latinos in newsrooms and to promote fair, accurate and inclusive coverage of Latino communities.

For more information, visit NAHJ.org or follow us on X @NAHJ.

Press contact: Andrew Sherry, press@nahj.org, 315-954-7571