India Beats for Media Literacy

India beats for Media Literacy

Ratheesh Kaliyadan

Most of our children abounded with media messages emerged  from newspapers, magazines, TV, Radio and from the new media. The affluent flow of messages influences their life from various directions. Media syndrome is a major issue of city folk and even in villages, though the intensity is lesser. Increased exposure to the media is associated with multi-faceted problems like increasing obesity, body dissatisfaction, aggressive behavior and many more amongst Indian children. They are growing fast mentally and physically whom psychologists are termed now as  ‘The New Kid’. It is pathetic to realize that our children are not treated by the media world considerably. India has least number of kids channels. Out of total only 3 percent of channels are kids’ channels ( 17). In a country which has 550 TV channels, 77,600 newspaper types in multiple language, 595 movie releases ( including Hindi, regional and Hollywood releases) and so many FM channels have we ever wondered what space have we given in a such a wide canvas to our children. According to FICCI-KPMG Indian Media and Entertainment Industry Report 2011 “Hitting the High Notes” the Indian media and entertainment industry grew from INR 587 billion in 2009 to INR 652 billion in 2010. The growth is registering an overall growth of 11 percent. The industry includes TV, Radio Print, cinema and gaming. The educational and entertainment needs of a very vast population i.e. children is disregarded in this race.

 The kids’ genres of channels are not offering much better performance is yet another reality which we face. The children watch programmes produced for Adults. The reality shows, the soap operas, the highly sensualized news stories are definitely not meant for children. But they anyhow are watching them with great interest. In such an environment, there is a wider chance to implement media literacy programmes in schooldays. Children reach school at the age of 5 in India. Curricular and co-curricular experiments are possible in India environment. Sophisticated media consumers and the fact that they experience so many medium at home would seem to be as a good reason to include it in the curriculum than to exclude it. At national level, Central Institute for Education and Training, NCERT, New Delhi began an effort to make media literacy campaign. Their target audience is the secondary and senior secondary students. The institute started Media clubs in schools.

Government of Kerala introduced journalism course in Higher Secondary Schools is the first attempt in India to consider at a large. The course introduced in August 2000.  Higher Secondary Education began the course in seven schools, now the course runs in 75 schools. The growth indicates the social demand for the course. The major drawback of the curriculum is that it does not cover the critical thinking. If the curriculum is revisited in a style, which promotes critical analysis of the media sector, the effort will be the first one in India media education history at school level.

Non- Governmental Organisations like Mediaact in Thiruvananthapuram and Media Analysis and Research Center in Kozhikode tried their own efforts in media literacy sector in Kerala. These are not well framed and organized forms of activities. Lack of closely knitted curricula and research oriented documents pull back such efforts from the mainstream.

Media Literacy:International Experience in praxis

Media Literacy:International Experience in praxis

Ratheesh Kaliyadan

Several attempts are popular among developed nations media ecology. Different initiatives run wide ranges of programmes to establish media literacy among youth and children. Both across curriculum activities and co-curricular activities are available. Only the best practiced and universally applauded initiatives are mentioning here.

Media literacy through critical thinking is a package developed by NW Center for Excellence in Media Literacy. The work books and other documents developed by the center  is provided strictly for educational purposes and as a public service by the NW Center for Excellence in Media Literacy, based in the College of Education at the University of Washington. Their goal is to improve the training, research, and service opportunities for both adults and teens across Washington State who are interested in media literacy education and have particular interest in addressing teen health issues from a media literacy perspective.

The Media Literacy Project is a leading effort in United States of America to promote media literacy among children. The project founded in 1993, cultivates critical thinking and activism. “We are committed to building a healthy world through media justice” says the Media Literacy project leaders. As a nationally recognized leader in media literacy resources, trainings, and education, MLP delivers dynamic multimedia presentations at conferences, workshops and classrooms across the country. The project’s media literacy curricula and action guides are used in countless classrooms and communities. The training programs have empowered thousands of people to be advocates and activists for media justice. The project is organizing campaigns such as Siembra la palabra digna. This is an Anchor Organization for the Media Action Grassroots Network (MAG-Net) center communities of color, poor communities, rural communities, and immigrant communities in the creation of local, regional, and national media policy.

Realising the realities around, the ministry of education, Ontario put forward a unique experience in media literacy. The experts of Ontario rightly realised that critical-thinking and critical-literacy skills are tools students need in order to develop into active, responsible participants in the global community. They believe that professional collaboration and ongoing learning help teachers develop a deeper, broader, more reflective understanding of effective instruction. They practice the principle ‘catch them young’ by providing opportunities of media literacy exercises in junior classes. In the junior grades, students look for relevance and meaning in what they are learning. In today’s media-saturated world, media literacy is highly relevant. Students need to learn to view media messages with a critical and analytical eye as well as how to interact with media responsibly. By exploring the hows and whys of the media, students develop an increased understanding of the media’s unprecedented power to persuade and influence. “Media Literacy”, builds on the research findings and best practices in Literacy for Learning: The Report of the Expert Panel on Literacy in Grades 4 to 6 in Ontario. It provides a framework for the expectations in the Media Literacy strand of the Language curriculum (2006). It emphasizes the importance of developing a critical awareness of the media and describes effective ways of teaching about and using media. Media literacy instruction can be woven into all areas of the curriculum not only the learning expectations in all the Language strands (Reading, Writing, Oral Communication, and Media Literacy) but also other curriculum subject areas.

MEDIATED CULTURE

Mediated Culture

Ratheesh Kaliyadan

While we march from instructional television to internet protocol television a lot of change had happened. Technologically prestigious advancements are noted. We became one among the internationally appealing media markets. Gently the reflections happened in our attitude also. How does a child taught to ask for a particular brand of chocolate or tooth paste? Why do college students in Assam and Kerala tend to wear pretty much the same types of clothes? Why do they prefer same brands? Why do they tend to listen to the same types of music? Enjoy the same movies or television shows?  Because they are exposed to many of the same media messages and images!

Ours is a media driven society. With the emergence of cheap newspapers, magazines, paperback books, radio and television a new form of art made its debut, catering to the undeveloped tastes of massive. Its content is unsophisticated and simplistic. Confession magazine, popular time soap opera, reality shows, people participatory programmes like talkshaws and phone-ins, games show, comic strip and western movie are its typical forms.

Thanks to new economic policy and liberalization, commercial revenue cumulated in media houses. Media managers are in war to invite maximum revenue to their own house. To attract advertisement providers media giants are forced to make programmes as the ‘commercial bosses’ like it. This media output is an important part of popular culture. A term used to label such mass mediated art is the German word kitsch. It diminishes both folk and elite as it deprives its audience of interest in developing tastes for more genuine art forms. As media scholar David Buckingham tells, “The media do not offer us a transparent window on the world. They provide channels through which representations and images of the world can be communicated indirectly. The media intervene; they provide us with selective versions of the world, rather than direct access to it.” Moreover, it is mainly a tool for economic exploitation of the masses.

TELETEXT

TELETXT
Ratheesh Kaliyadan

Teletext is a communication system wherein text and graphics are transmitted as digitized signals through air broadcasting or cable channel for display on television set. The television functions like a computer terminal to retrieve textual information and graphics from remote database. The information is stored in centralized databases, sequenced and indexed in the form of pages of text or graphics. The signal can be transmitted over one-way cable or by air. The digitalized text messages or pages of information are continuously broadcasted in cycle. A viewer can access to all these messages on a given channel in cycle or through control unit. Major applications of teletext are:


• Teletext uses the television for information display, which is almost universally present in homes or community centers. Thus it has the potential to become mass media for imparting education to students in general and deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers in particular.


• Teletext provides the educational content in a very concise and effective manner and thus makes learning appealing, interesting and less burdensome. Further, the facility of quick updation keeps it is viewers informed of the recent happenings. It can be a very good media for career counseling along with providing information about courses-in-demand, hot careers, job opportunities, etc.

• Teletext uses in the area of education, agriculture, weather forecasting, farm management, libraries, and industries etc. would provide effective management of services.



First form of Teletext was developed in the early 1970s by engineers at the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) and ITC (then known as IBA), the regulating body of commercial networks in the United Kingdom. General specification regarding teletext was published in United Kingdom in 1974. First teletext service was put into practice for general public use only in 1976.


Parallel to England’s teletext system, France proposed its own system - Antiope. This system introduced and used in 1977. Antiop was designed to transmit data over telephone lines. It failed to make use of many of the characteristics of the television signal. France’s another teletext service, Mintel overcame the limitations. During late seventies Canada developed a teletext service Telidon. It designed to produce high-quality graphics. This facility needed a complex decoder. The decoder was not commonly available to the consumer market at that time.
The teletext system transformed World System Teletext (WST) by 1984. More than 30 countries now use the enhanced version of WST worldwide, utilizing decoders installed in television receivers. The service is available in five levels, with each level showing an increasing array of enhancements and graphics sophistication. The higher levels require more complex decoding devices with progressively larger memories capable of storing great numbers of teletext pages; thus, receivers capable of decoding levels three, four and five may cost somewhat more than their less-sophisticated counterparts. (NCAM, 2002)

Teletext in India
 

The Indian version of teletext service ‘INTEXT’ (Indian teletext) started on November 14, 1985 by the Doordarshan Delhi. Similar to other teletext system, the INTEXT data are organized into pages in the form of text and graphics. The information is pooled and transmitted on a few predetermined lines in vertical ’blanking’ interval of television signals. The content developed in the form of magazines. Each magazine contains about 100 pages. The first page contains the  contents of the magazine like news items, sport events, financial trends, timings of arrival and departure of important trains, weather forecast, city engagements, All India Radio and Television programmes to be telecasted, etc. Teletext is a powerful medium for educational instructions; no such much explored experiments have been reported in India.

Jhabua Communication project

milestones in television in India

Jhabua Communication Project

Ratheesh Kaliyadan

Jhabua is a remote hilly hinterlands region in Madhya Pradesh. The Jhabua district is noted for its large extension of tribal folks. Approximately 85% of population belongs to tribal communities.  Majority of them remain illiterate. The literacy rate is 15%. The district is blessed with abundance of natural resources. But poverty is the face value of these peoples. They are the poorest ones of the state. Infant mortality rate is high. Transportation and communication facilities are very limited. Agriculture is the main source of revenue.

To cater the development needs of the under developed sections of  Jhabua region, a television experiment is introduced.  The Development and Education Communication Unit (DECU) of Space Application Center (CAS), Ahmedabad launched Jhabua Development communications Project (JDCP) in the mid-1990s. Educational and entertainment values are merged in programmes. The edutainment programmes concentrated on live issues like agriculture, natural forestry, health, education, watershed management and local governance. The project assured active participation of local people of Jhabua villages.

Jhabua Development communications Project is an evening television exposure. Every evening they got two hours programmes.  This primetime edutainment venture trained village functionaries like teachers, angawady workers, panchayath members, hand pump operators etc. Interactive mode is used. Talkback terminals were utilized for training programmes. Twelve talkback terminals are installed in the block headquarters. The functionaries interacted with the Ahmedabad station officials and resource persons, asked question, provided feedbacks and reported on the progress of the project.

Technically Jahbua Development communications Project utilized interactive satellite-based broadcast network. The project is supported by 150 direct reception instruments like dish, television sets, VCRs and other equipment. DECU uplinked programmes to the satellite from Ahmedabad and received at the Jhabua villages.

Under the guidelines of DECU, the state government, Jhabua district administration, local panchayath governance and the Non-Government Organisations joined hands to implement the project. The project is a new milestone in the history of India’s development communication.

Kheda Communication Project

milestones in television in India

Kheda Communication Project

Ratheesh Kaliyadan

Kheda is a small district in central Gujarath. The district comprises more than 1000 villages. These villages became one of the important milk producing centers in India as an impact of ‘white revolution’. For empowering the rural community, an instructional television project was introduced. The experiment is named as Kheda Communication Project. Social evils were addressed in this special television experiment. The project was in operation under the charge of the Space Applications Centre, Ahmedabad. The Development and Education Communication Unit (DECU) of Space Application Center (CAS) is involved in the conception, definition, planning, implementation and socio-economic evaluation of space applications.

To implement the experiment, 650 community television sets had installed in 443 villages. The television sets were owned by the community and maintained by the state government. The sets kept in the buildings of the Milk Producer’s Co-operative Society, schools or the Panchayath ghar. The low power transmitter established in Pij village, about 50 KMs south from Ahmmedabad. This transmitter connected to a local studio, a satellite earth station in Ahmedabad and the local Doordarshan studio. By these arrangements, Kheda Communication Project enhanced to broadcast both local productions and national satellite television programmes.

Dooradarshan and the Space Application Centre produced programmes for over an hour every day. Programmes focused on alcoholism, caste discrimination, minimum wages, family planning, gender discrimination and cooperatives. Television serials, folk drama, puppet shows and other popular formats used for local productions. Villagers worked for the project as actors, script writers, directors and visualizers for the programme production teams. Constant interaction with the people was the distinct characteristic of this project.

Programmes designed in charotari, a dialect of Guajarati. One of the early serials Chatur Mota (wise elder) on dowry and widow remarriage became an “extremely popular serial”. In the weekend series for women, the most successful were Dadi ma Ni haton (wise women’s talks), Hun Ne Mara Ae (I and my husband) and Jagi Ni Jus to (When I wake up and see).

The focus of Kheda Communication Project was:

v Exposing the oppression and bondages in the present social and economic system in such a way as to heighten understanding.

v Mobilizing the community and the individual himself to break away from these bondages.

v Promoting self-reliance among the individuals and the community.

The project commenced its operation in 1975 and closed in 1990.

Satellite Instructional Television Experiment

milestones in television in India

Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE)

Ratheesh Kaliyadan

Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) is one of the pioneer experiments in Indian television scenario where television is used for social causes. The experiment became a tool for mass education through various programmes designed exclusively for the project. The programmes concentrated on education, agriculture, health and family planning. It was the first experiment to telecast educational programmes direct from satellite to receivers

The earth stations at Delhi and Ahmedabad telecasted four hours programmes every day.  Programmes are classified into two: Educational Television (ETV) and Instructional Television (ITV).Educational television programmes designed for school children. Such programmes focused on education. Broadcasted 1.5 hours programme on working days at school hours. Students are exposed to these programmes as part of the school activity. During holidays, the time used for teacher empowerment. Varieties of content developed to train teachers through the facilities provided by the project. Almost 10000 primary school teachers became part of the training programmes.

Adults are exposed to Instructional television. Majority of the adults were illiterates. The village folk assembled around television sets in evenings. The project broadcasted 2.5 hours programmes in every evening. It was a prime time channel to the adult stake holders. Programmes focused health, hygiene, family planning, nutrition, improved agricultural practices and events of national importance.

The experiment practiced in 2400 villages spread over six selected regions in Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Kamataka. Besides the villages, certain towns also got the programmes through earth transmitters. ETV and ITV used local languages like Hindi, Oriya, Telungu and Kannada.

All India Radio personnel planned and produced programmes at the production centers setup in Delhi, Ahmedabad and Cuttack. A committee included central and state government representatives, experts from universities, teacher training colleges and social workers helped the production team. Special committees on education, agriculture, health and family planning formed to support the production groups.  The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) set up its own Audio -Visual Instruction Division to plan and produce programmes for SITE.

SITE is   a result of a recommendation by the UNESCO expert mission in 1967. As per the request of government of India, UNESCO undertook a feasibility study for a project in satellite for communications.  The feasibility study conducted between November 18, 1967 and December 08, 1967. Following the UNECO report, three Indian engineers visited USA and France in June 1967 to get first hand exposure to the technical aspects. Government of India set up the National Satellite Communications Group (NASCOM) in 1968 to lead possible utilizations of synchronous communication satellite. The group consisted cabinet ministers, representatives of ISRO and All India Radio. The NASCOM recommended using ATS-6 satellite for communication purposes. AT-6 is a second generation satellite developed by NASA for an experiment in educational television. To practice the recommendation, Department of Atomic Energy made an agreement with National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA) of US for the loan of a satellite for one year in 1969.

As per the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the two countries, the objectives of the project were divided into two parts—general objectives and specific objectives. The general objectives of the project were to:

• Gain experience in the development, testing and management of a satellite-based instructional television system particularly in rural areas and to determine optimal system parameters;
• Demonstrate the potential value of satellite technology in the rapid development of effective mass communications in developing countries;
• Demonstrate the potential value of satellite broadcast TV in the practical instruction of village inhabitants; and
• Stimulate national development in India, with important managerial, economic, technological and social implications.

Using the facility SITE commenced its operation on August 01, 1975. The experiment became a great success. Villagers received the project whole heartedly. For the entire year people gathered around television sets and watched programmes eagerly. In the midst of demands from Indian villagers, journalists and others NASA shifted its ATS-6 satellite away from India. Thus the project concluded in July 31, 1976 remaining sweet memoirs of television realities.

Technologically the experiment put forward an insight and the demands took a positive initiative to develop own satellite for communications. After tiresome jobs, ISRO developed Indian National Satellite system. In August, 1982 India launched satellite.