UST Research Center for Culture, Arts, and Humanities (RCCAH) Fellow Asst. Prof. Christian V. Esguerra has, once again, been recognized as one of the top journalists in the country.
Esguerra, an Assistant Professor at the Communication and Media Studies Department of the Faculty of Arts and Letters, was conferred the 2019 Titus Brandsma Award for Emergent Leadership in Journalism on October 28, 2019 during ceremonies held at the SM North EDSA Skydome in Quezon City.
Earlier this year, Esguerra also received the 2019 award of distinction from the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.
Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ (CBCP) online news outlet CBCP News reported Esguerra was “recognized for his abiding efforts to the pursuit of excellence in media reporting with his sharp analysis to interpret the meaning of events and explain the issues in the news that confront Filipinos in these difficult times,” as well as, “evangelizing his young students by his living witness in the field he teaches that is political journalism, media ethics, and social communication.”
“I am deeply honored and at the same time humbled by the recognition. But more importantly, may the memory of Titus Brandsma inspire all of us to stay true to journalism’s calling, at a time when press freedom — and truth — are under heavy attack,” Esguerra said in an interview with alternative media outfit Kodao Productions. Esguerra was the editor in chief of the Varsitarian while he was a student at the Faculty of Arts and Letters of the University of Santo Tomas, where he graduated cum Laude.
The ABS-CBN News Channel (ANC) correspondent Christian Esguerra received the award alongside Veteran journalist and activist Luis Teodoro, TV5 correspondent and journalist Ed Lingao, Philippine Information Agency’s (PIA) Belina San Buenaventura-Capul, the late American Jesuit Catholic priest Fr. James Reuter, S.J., and the late ABS-CBN Foundation co-founder and environmentalist Gina Lopez.
The Titus Brandsma Awards are given to outstanding individuals, predominantly journalists, for their exemplary leadership in the field of journalism and education. This award is inspired by the Blessed Titus Brandsma, a Dutch Carmelite friar who was imprisoned at the Dachau concentration camp for bravely opposing the Nazi ideology.
