Daniel
Hernandez

longdrivesouth@gmail.com

AUTOBiogrAFíA

My first professional gig in 2002 was on the metro desk of the L.A. Times. It was the last years before the dawn of the multimedia era. I covered police on the evening shift. Editors let me roam in Los Angeles. I dove into topics like graffiti and street art, the use of Spanish by Mexican American politicians, and early-era L.A. hipsters.

In 2006, I switched to the LA Weekly. I wanted to write with more voice. There, I covered the early days of the immigrants rights movement, the history of the arts collective Asco, and the rise of the “Mexican American Princes.” In 2006 I was named Emerging Journalist of the Year by the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.

I kept looking for ways to connect with my readers, so I launched the weblog Intersections in late 2006. Blogs gave us connectivity on the web before social apps and newsletters took over. Intersections gave me a space to contextualize my stories, and explore a range of topics — architecture, food, fashion, sex, indie books, music, anything. The blog led to a bunch of really cool panels and symposia, including the gathering of digital urbanists Postopolis by Storefront for Art & Architecture in 2010.

Mexico was always calling. Born and raised on the border, I knew I had a lot of Mexico in me, but I tangled with the sense that I had so much more to learn. I first lived there in 2002, a full summer directly after Berkeley and before joining The Times — and vowed to return one day. In 2007, I relocated to Mexico City with no set return. I moved with contract to write a book inspired by a cover story I did for the Weekly. I sort of submerged myself in chilango culture, and embedded with various ‘urban tribes’ among Mexican youth over time, living and traveling with mexicanos.

I like to think that I wrote the eventual book that emerged, Down & Delirious in Mexico City, for an 18-year-old me. It was a process rather than a goal. The book is translated to Spanish by author Elizabeth Flores as El bajón y el delirio, published by Editorial Oceano.

While living in Mexico, I rejoined the L.A. Times in their bureau, where I served as a lead writer of the World Now and La Plaza blogs. I reported in the field on art, music, and politics and became richly acquainted with Latin America at large. I covered the aftermath of the devastating 2010 earthquake in Chile and filed stories from all over Mexico.

In 2013, I began a stint with VICE Media, an unforgettable ride. I started as editor of VICE Mexico, overseeing the monthly print edition of the magazine in Spanish and a digital platform serving LatAm at large. With VICE, producers one day tapped me to appear on-camera as a host for the food platform Munchies. This led to a string of videos, and opened a new chapter for me as an on-camera journalist.

In 2014, I became Latin America bureau chief, launching the editorial operation in the region for the global VICE News network, with amazing colleagues in Mexico City.

At the height of the U.S.-backed drug war in Mexico, our teams reported from inside El Chapo’s escape tunnel, from the poppy producing fields of Guerrero and Sinaloa, and from the ganglands of Buenos Aires. We covered the case of the missing 43 students in Ayotzinapa, the rise of femicides in central urban Mexico, and the case of a false-positive killing of a kidnapping victim by the Mexican armed forces.

I started reporting on food over time. In 2014, I visited Diana Kennedy for a Munchies feature, and wrote a street-food column in Spanish, called “Mal del Puerco.” Our office was invited to present at the live platform Mesámerica in Mexico City, where we premiered the video “El menú del día.”

Living and working in Mexico and traveling within several countries in South America changed my life and altered indelibly how I approach the world at large.

But it was time to go back to California. I returned to L.A. in 2016. I was assigned to the team that launched “Vice News Tonight on HBO.” For the HBO program, I reported from the Mexico-Guatemala border and from the Texas-Tamaulipas border. It was an honor to be a part of the first stage of the global ambitions of the VICE network; many of my peers delivered risky and groundbreaking work.

In 2017, with the near-shutdown of the LA Weekly, I was tapped again: This time by the publisher of LA Taco, who asked me to relaunch the local graffiti and tacos site in response to the dwindling presence of an alternative press in Los Angeles.

At LA Taco, our small team gradually took shape and started speaking to, in our mantra, “the real L.A.” Over time, LA Taco increasingly became a sounding board for the multiethnic, multiracial core of Los Angeles. We launched the LA Taco podcast, new videos, and new events. By 2020, the site earned industry accolades from the James Beard Foundation, as recipient of the Emerging Voice award.

In 2018, I got accepted as a fellow at the MacDowell Colony, another incredible growth experience for me creatively. I wrote fiction and essays.

In late 2019, I accepted a reporting fellowship with the West Coast bureau of the Styles section at The New York Times. In three months at the NYT, I strove to write investigative features: on the changing face of Venice Beach under Snap, on a firebombing of a homeless encampment in Eagle Rock, and with a reported essay on queer nightlife on L.A.’s Eastside.

In between all this, I wrote a magazine story for Epic, set in Mexico. The final piece, “The Haunting of Girlstown,” is optioned to be a forthcoming motion picture feature from Blumhouse.

Writingwise, I returned home, in 2020. I love working for Los Angeles, which for me is what the L.A. Times is supposed to do. There is no L.A. without this paper. Since back, I’ve tackled lowrider cruises, the Chicano Moratorium, and the crisis of Latino representation in U.S. films and television. My work in 2021 has been honored with the inaugural Nell Minnow Award in Cultural Criticism, from the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

In 2022, I was named Food editor for The Times — a true honor, and true challenge. I love exploring how food is a conduit for a host of questions, around access, environment, point-of-view, class, race, history, and geography. Please write me daniel.hernandez@latimes.com if you have a pitch.

In service, I am an at-large board member of the California Chicano News Media Association. I reside in South Los Angeles.