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GLOCAL CONDITIONS
Get PDFAre you old enough to remember “the postmodern condition”? French philosopher Jean-François Lyotard coined the expression to describe the state of the world in the late 1970s. It evoked a heated discussion in arts and academia between “modernists” and “postmodernists”, culminating in the mid ‘80s. Postmodernists not only declared modernity and modernism dead; they danced on their graves, metaphorically speaking, in a spirit which at the time was characterized as “happy nihilism”.But the end of the ‘80s saw the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War, and “the postmodern condition” gave way to the transformational processes more accurately described as globalization. The solemn declaration of modernity’s death was obviously premature. Like the preceding alleged death of ideologies in the 50s and impending fall of capitalism in the 60s. Or the subsequent proclamation of “the end of history”. Lyotard actually rejected the term postmodernism, and lucidly but somewhat obscurely talked about the postmodern as the modern at its beginning: the deconstructive impulse of modernity itself. The prefix “post”, however, was confusing and misleading. Rather than in postmodernity, we are living in hyper- or global modernity, the latter implying that we should start thinking of the modern condition in plural, as modernities. Nevertheless, the post-modern debate marked a significant change. Modernity and modernism came of age and suddenly achieved awareness of their own historicity. It is possible to remember modernity although we are still in the midst of it –and by looking back and reviewing our recent modern past, we may be able to foresee and shape a different future.Memories of Modernity is a project of cultural, artistic and academic cooperation between institutions in Malmö, Sweden, and Durban, South Africa, involving four Swedish and four South African artists and a group of Master students in Communication for Development and Cultural production from Malmö University. The participants will soon meet for the first time during the coming ComDev seminar at Malmö University, 5- 7 June. The launching of the Memories of Modernity project, which will result in two exhibitions in 2007, in Durban (March) and Malmö (September), happens to coincide with a new stage in the development of this webmag, closely linked to the Master program in Communication for Development. Launched in 2002, before the program went international, it was initially an archive for graduates’ Project Works. In June 2005, it was re-launched as a webmag. At the time we decided to keep its Swedish name, Globala Tider, as a vestige of its Scandinavian origin. However, we have now succumbed to the realization that a name in the global lingua franca makes the webmag more readily accessible to an international audience – and we have chosen the marker glocal as a substitute to global. “Glocalization” was originally a concept used in Japanese business jargon, then adapted by American sociologist Roland Robertson to describe the dual character of globalization as being global and local at the same time. While globalization has come to be largely identified with corporate globalization from above, glocalization rather connotes globalization from below, which is more in line with a participatory ComDev perspective. Therefore Glocal Times. This first issue of Glocal Times -the fourth issue of the webmag- is dedicated to one of the biggest challenges ever to communication for development and social change: the HIV and AIDS pandemic. With a few significant exceptions, HIV/AIDS communication has largely failed –a failure which calls for radical revision and rethinking of the still dominant communication strategies. This special issue, co-edited by my colleague Thomas Tufte from Roskilde University, is the outcome of a seminar held in November 2005 in Copenhagen, organized by a health communication research program coordinated by Thomas and funded by DANIDA. It is also an example of the fruitful glocal cooperation we have established across the Öresund strait and which we intend to develop further in the coming years.We are living in glocal times, and we are experiencing a promising momentum for the field of communication for development, with several events to take place in the coming months: in June, a workshop in Uppsala on Media, Communication and Popular Culture in Africa, which will be the constitutive meeting of a new Nordic research network; in July, a conference on communication for development and social change [1] will be held at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia; and in October, the World Congress on Communication for Development, organized by The Communication Initiative, FAO and The World Bank’s Development Communication division, will be held in Rome [2]. In November, the Memories of Modernity project will move to Durban, most probably combined with a regional roundtable on communication for social change. You will see all of these events reflected in coming issues of Glocal Times. But start with this one. Take and read! [1] See http://www.sjc.uq.edu.au:9999/ for more information. [2] See http://www.devcomm-congress.org/worldbank/public.asp for more information
UNSPEAKABLE WORDS REMAIN UNSPOKEN
Get PDFCensorship is a violation of the human right to free expression and a serious offence to democracy. For obvious reasons, governmental bodies that suffocate opinion by controlling editorial content are internationally condemned. A much less debated but frequently practiced way of confining freedom of expression is done by journalists themselves. Self-censorship is widespread. Instead of developing their critical approach to governments in the power, they become hypersensitive to political climates and unspoken rules
BLIND SPOTS AND WASTED EFFORT IN CARIBBEAN HIV/AIDS POLICY MAKING: Communication and behaviour change
Get PDFThe Caribbean region faces daunting challenges from HIV/AIDS: it is the region with the second highest HIV/AIDS infection rate in the world, HIV/AIDS is the leading cause of death among adults between 15 and 44, and almost two decades after the first case was diagnosed, concerted action has failed to halt or even slow the pandemic. Experts in the region are beginning to realize that their HIV/AIDS prevention efforts, in which communication plays a crucial role, have not been very successful. As in many other parts of the world –in spite of a general high level of knowledge about HIV/AIDS transmission among some of the prime risk groups– desirable changes away from risk-taking sexual behaviour are not happening
In this issue (September 2006)
No full textI was browsing Issue 34 of Development magazine [1], produced and distributed by the British government’s Department for International Development, when I found an article by Kenyan writer Binyavanga Wainaina originally published in Granta magazine [2]: “How to write about Africa”. In his piece, Wainaina reveals, with a sharp, satirical humour, the clichés and stereotypes common when writing about Africa. Some of his critical remarks –supposedly, suggestions for writers- refer directly to development. He says, for instance, “The Modern African is a fat man who steals and works in the visa office, refusing to give work permits to qualified Westerners who really care about Africa. He is an enemy of development, always using his government job to make it difficult for pragmatic and good-hearted expats to set up NGOs or Legal Conservation Areas”. Or “Among your characters you must always include The Starving African, who wanders the refugee camp nearly naked, and waits for the benevolence of the West […] She must never say anything about herself in the dialogue except to speak of her (unspeakable) suffering”. Wainaina is the editor of Kwani?, a literary and political magazine published in Nairobi. As John Ryle explains in his introduction to Granta’s issue 92, “The view from Africa”, Kwani? means “so what?” in Sheng, the language of East African hip-hop. … In the spirit of collaboration that is at the core of Glocal Times, we are proud to present our September 2006 issue, which focuses on Africa. Contributions in this new issue, as always grounded in communication for development and social change, reflect two on-going processes of exchange, cooperation and networking. The Memories of Modernity (MoM)[3] project, bringing together artists and academics from South Africa and Sweden, and the Researcher Network on Media, Communication and Popular Culture in Africa [4], bringing together a number of scholars from different locations and academic venues. From MoM, Ruth Teer-Tomaselli analyses collective memory as expressed via the recollection of media events by different age cohorts in different countries as studied by the Global Media Generations project. From the Researcher Network, Hilde Arntsen introduces us to a series of five articles derived from the Uppsala Workshop held in June 2006 to kick off the network’s activities, capturing key issues raised during the seminar, contextualizing the field, historicising previous debates and initiatives, and looking ahead. We thank researchers Mari Maasilta, Sabine Marschall, Nkosi Ndlela, Norbert Wildermuth, Mette Grøndahl Hansen, Stine Vikkelsø, Lise Grauenkær Jensen, Stine Kromann-Larsen and Martha Topperzer for their readiness to abridge and revise their original Uppsala papers for publication in this issue of Glocal Times. We also welcome Malmö University’s graduates from the Master course in Communication for Development. Naomi Delap discusses the potential for sharing Uganda’s knowledge and best practices in HIV/AIDS prevention through communication. Louise Frykheden looks at the obstacles in terms of participation faced by South African women engaged in an Internetbased higher education programme. Clever Maputseni analyses the value of radio as a tool for advocacy among farming communities in Zimbabwe. … Please contact us with your comments, questions and suggestions regarding this issue of Glocal Times while we head for Rome to cover the first World Congress on Communication for Development (WCCD)[5]. A new issue, further exploring communication for development and social change and related fields in Africa, and giving you an insider’s account of the WCCD, will be online in November 2006. [1] www.developments.org.uk [2] www.granta.com [3] http://webzone.k3.mah.se/projects/mom/cmt04/default.asp [4] http://www.nai.uu.se/research/network/media/ [5] www.devcomm-congress.org
FARM COMMUNITIES IN ZIMBABWE: Using radio for advocacy and communication
Get PDFThe aim of my research was to assess the use radio for advocacy and communication in community development, focusing on radio as a medium, radio audience behaviour in farm communities, issues affecting farm communities, advocacy and communication of the issues through radio, and power dynamics in programme production. The study attempted to do so by answering the overall question ‘how and why radio?’
WALKING THE TIGHTROPE
No full textReconciliation is not just what scholars and researchers have thought of, studied and written about, but also the expectations and thinking of those working with reconciliation in the field. Does sharing personal experiences with people from the other side of a conflict contribute to reconciliation? In this article I look at how theories and research on reconciliation and narrative fit into the reality of four organizations working with reconciliation in Bosnia- Hercegovina ten years after the end of the war
ADVOCATING FOR HIV VACCINES. A communications framework
Get PDFIn your opinion, does HIV prevention work or not? Figures show that the epidemic will become even worse than the current annual pace of 5 million people contracting HIV and other 3 million dying due to AIDS (UNAIDS, 2003). Given the fact that redressing the social determinants of HIV/AIDS has been showing critical deficiencies to halt this epidemic, a highly effective and affordable HIV vaccine is the biggest hope we have to stop the spread of HIV. Based on this rationale, the question is: what can communicators do to accelerate the development of this vaccine
TRANSNATIONAL SENEGALESE CINEMA BETWEEN NATIONALISM AND GLOBALISATION
Get PDFThe big dilemma of transnational cultural products is how to please simultaneously different audiences with different cultural backgrounds, religious beliefs and expectations. Cases like Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses, Scorsese’s The Last temptation of Christ and lastly, Mohammed cartoons in Denmark, have shown that what certain audiences consider highly entertaining and attracting can be a direct provocation among others. This article focuses on a controversial reception of the Senegalese transnational film Karmen (Senegal/France/ Canada, 2001) in the home country of filmmaker Joseph Ramaka, and compares the debate raised by the film in Senegal to those caused by The Last Temptation of Christ and Satanic Verses in international circles
IN THIS ISSUE (MAY 2006)
No full textOctober 27, 2006. I sat in the impressive plenary room of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) headquarters in Rome during the final session of the World Congress on Communication for Development while participants raised their arms, more or less frantically trying to call the master of ceremony’s attention. In this very civilized manner, they struggled to be given the floor and have a chance to address the panel regarding the Congress’ recommendations. Some were lucky. Some were not. At that stage, the well-known device did not allow for much input. Staring at the FAO, World Bank and The Communication Initiative representatives situated atop of us, I couldn’t help thinking: are they listening? In his article “How can the global be local?” (2005) [1], social anthropologist Thomas Hylland Eriksen states: “This is a world of impurities, grey zones, uncertainties and ambiguities, were the belief in progress is being replaced by ambivalence, where selfconfidence is replaced by anxiety, where trust is threatened by suspicion, and where the ability to listen has become a more important faculty than ever before in history”. How can we develop and nurture that faculty? How do we make ourselves better able to listen? How do we make ourselves heard? How do we give dialogue every possible chance? … Our sixth issue of Glocal Times is grounded in contributions from authors located in the Scandinavian region, many of them closely affiliated with Malmö University’s Master course in Communication for Development. With a common geographic locus, our guest contributors aim at the global scene. Rikke Andreasen takes us to Brazil, to present the collaborative work developed by the Danish art group Superflex with a group of farmers in Maués: the Guaraná Project, a provocative experience in the realm of art for social change (make sure to check the video footage included in the article for a series of four commercials developed within the project). Kerstin Gossé takes us to Tanzania, to discuss the power of words in the context of the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the role of the media. Anders Hog Andersen takes us to Israel, to explore the boundaries and potential of an alternative education project aimed at addressing conflict between Jewish and Palestinian Arab youth. We thank Cecilia von Feilitzen, who on behalf of The International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and Media, a joint effort of UNESCO and the Swedish government based at the Nordic Information Centre for Media and Communication Research (NORDICOM), Göteborg University, Sweden, introduces us to media literacy. We also welcome Malmö University’s graduates from the Master course in Communication for Development. Maud Hell discusses the situation of school libraries in post-apartheid South Africa. Ann Jornéus Tenfalt makes a case for the implementation of community radio in development programmes based in her fieldwork in Uganda and Tanzania. Johanna Stenersen explores Kyrgyztan’s venturing into community-based tourism and its implications in terms of social identity. … Please contact us with your comments, questions and suggestions while we write down our experience of the Rome World Congress on Communication for Development (WCCD) and look into its immediate effects and outcomes[2]. A new issue of our webmagazine will be online early in 2007. [1] Thomas Hylland Eriksen 2005 “How can the global be local?” in Media & Glocal Change/Rethinking Communication for Development , Hemer, O. and Tufte, T. (eds.), CLACSO-Nordicom: Buenos Aires. [2] Although we intended to provide coverage in this issue, the time available since it took place proved to be too short to do it adequately
A LEGACY ON WHICH TO BUILD
Get PDFThe following is a personal perspective on how the Fogo Process evolved in Newfoundland and Labrador in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, and a description of some of the methodologies and key principles that became a part of it. The Fogo Process was a seminal participatory communications initiative that empowered people through the use of film (and later video). Some 30 years after it created considerable “buzz” as an innovative participatory tool, the Process may be more iconic than understood, but not because it is no longer relevant. Incorporating participatory communications components, built on the legacy of the Fogo Process, could significantly strengthen many current development initiatives