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The media in a changing world Adewale Kupoluyi
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he mass media is prominent in nearly every facet of our daily lives while technology is constantly shaping our future. The technological advancement has changed communication significantly such that the media has become a veritable vehicle for social transformation. This reality was the fulcrum of discourse at the 4th Annual International Conference on Journalism and Mass Communications, which was put together by the Global Science and Technology Forum (GSTF), a partner of 38 universities around the globe with 63 other universities and partner organisations that gathered in Singapore for the annual conferences that was attended by over 1,000 academics, scholars, professionals and researchers. Presenting the first keynote address titled, “The Merlion in Winter”, Professor Lin Allen of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Northern Colorado, United States of America, “explores the ‘complicated intrigue’, when the heir to a story must be chosen”. She reviewed the critical role of “journalists in the development of the mythos of concealment and revelation surrounding this intrigue, proposing a creative way to manage the mystery so that a fuller historical plotline may become manifest”. Professor Allen, in a satiric style, mentioned the impact made on the global information history by the likes of the William Shakespeare, the celebrated English poet. Dr. Wu Wei, Director, China Affairs Office and an Associate Professor, School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, observed in his second keynote address titled, “Political Communication in the Digital Era: Hopes and Hypes”, observed that governments worldwide more than ever now embrace digital democracy hoping that it would significantly improve public communication. Dr. Wei made case for a paradigm shift in political communication, transparency to reduce cynicism and the four process levels connect, consult, explain and describe. In the paper titled, “Indian Traditional Media for Development Communication: Reference to Protection of Children’s Rights”, Professor Ravi Chaturvedi, Municipal University, Jaipur and Dr. Junali Deka, Central University of Rajasthan, revealed that arts and crafts remain part of traditional media with universal appeal that could effectively be used for persuasion. Characteristics of the Indian traditional media they noted; include flexibility, cost effectiveness, immediacy in giving of feedbacks and intelligibility, among others, as Iwan Yusuf, Faculty of Psychology and Socio-Cultural Sciences, Universitas Islam Indonesia, talked about “Sensationalism of Yellow Journalism: A Question About Ethics of Journalism”, where he reviewed the country’s
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popular print media tradition and the role which Yellow Journalism played in the freedom of the press era. Yusuf, however, challenged journalists still practicing Yellow Journalism to turn a new leaf by maintain professionalism and integrity at all times. “A Socially-Responsible Educational Response to Routine-Biased Technological Change in Journalism: Fostering Employability among Journalists in the United Kingdom”, was the topic of Professor Michael Bromley’s paper, where he disclosed that journalism in the UK had straddled the divide between high and middle-skilled jobs and that since 1970s, young people had been vulnerable to increasing difficulty in finding employment, deepening insecurity of employment and limited advancement avenues. He submitted that journalism is short-term career that can be upskilled. Dr. Bradley Freeman, American University in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, revealed that UAE is a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural country and this is reflected in the diversity of the media as local newspapers and radio stations cater for the needs of the various language groups. Using the example of the Dubai’s Tag FM, Dr. Freeman stated that the commercial station operates in a community-public service way because it was providing entertainment and information in a language that is not native to the region even though it is not the official language of the country. In finding answers to the question; how do online media professionals educate members of the public about environmental impacts of energy issues? Dr. Keith Zukas, Department of Communication and Sociology, Carroll Univer-
sity, Waukesha, Wisconsin, USA, in the presentation titled, “New Media, New Structures: How Digital Journalists Frame Renewable Energy Stories”, affirmed that previous research suggested that media utilise concise episodic frames to succinctly transmit the news for environmental energy matters and the like. Dr. Yudi Perbawaningsih, Department of Communication, Atma Jaya Yogyakarta University, Indonesia, stated that in Indonesia, it was cultural for women to be married as unmarried women were considered a disgrace to their parents and family. By the time a woman reaches the age of 25 and is not showing any sign of her getting married, she becomes the topic of gossip, she said. In finding a soft-landing, parents often organise mates - also known as match or forced marriages - for their daughters whether they like it or not. Similarly, young women, who patronize dating agencies, are also not respected thus putting them in a fix. As a way out, the presence of the social media readily becomes a companion in filling this gap. Titilayo Osuagwu, Department of Linguistics and Communication Studies, University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria, disclosed that research in social media had pointed to the fact that the female gender has taken the lead over the menfolk in the use of the social media platforms even though not much attention is paid to why females are ardent users of the social media even to the level of assumption that they “are idling away”. Though, her research study area was limited to her institution, which I find very interesting, she stated that females mostly use the platform mainly for making new friends, keeping in touch with product brands and making comments on their friends’ posts. “Social Media and the Management of Multi-subjects Integration in Chinese Public Crisis”, was the topic of the presentation by the duo of Tang Jing-tai and Sun Li, School of Journalism and Communication, Jinan University, China, where they observed that with the upsurge in the New Media, the “agenda set-up process in emergent events shows fierce game trend among multiple subjects”, calling for a need to integrate multi-subjects and forge coalition, ensure the integration of the distribution channel, advance the multi-issues fusion by media convergence and conduct the integration of fact-guidance and value-guidance. Reacting to the presentations, I raised two points that elicited reactions from participants. The first issue has to do with how the owners of social media sites can exercise more controls over the nature of postings on the web, going by the increased volume of obscene posts going into the social media, and secondly, why is very little recognition given to Internet sources, often cited in academic papers. While many contribu-
tors felt that doctoring postings could lead to an infringement on people’s right to freedom of expression while many web sources remain largely unverifiable but hoping that with time, improvements were bound to be recorded such that the Internet would add more to academic research. Dr. Dan Eller, Department of Journalism, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, USA, spoke on “Expanding Public Sector Communications: Moving Beyond Public Affairs to facilitate Collaborative Public Relations”, where he noted that traditionally, public sector agencies pass on information to their target audience mainly to communicate and resolve conflicts. Dr. Eller prescribed the broadening of the role of public sector communications, by moving beyond the traditional approach, to a more collaborative public relations model that is based on the twoway symmetrical communications. Interestingly, in “Calling a Foul: An Examination of American Sports Journalists’ Interactions with Whistleblowers”, Sada Reed, Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, Phoenix, USA, reviewed newstories that exposed American athletes’ scandals that often start with a ‘whistleblower’, who usually contacts the sports journalist. Results from Reed’s study, binary logistics regression, show that sports journalists’ length of time working with a newspaper media largely determines whether or not they interacted with whistleblowers.
Solution to puzzle 19
•Kupoluyi writes from Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB), adewalekupoluyi@yahoo.co.uk, @AdewaleKupoluyi
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