An Assessment of the Changing Community Media Parameters in East Africa

Women’s mass media exposure and maternal health awareness in Ota, Nigeria

“…Weinstein (2010) observes that since change occurs at different times and in different places under different circumstances, there is no independent theory that comes up to explain all changes that occur. However, one factor observed in all the theories that occur is that there must be communication and the exchange of information (Nassanga, 2009) and this partly explains why some of the earliest theories of development communication, such as modernization theory, had an overblown view of the impact of the mass media and communication on development. Models like the diffusion of innovation, the mass media were seen to have the potential of "blowing the winds of modernization" to isolated traditional communities, replacing their structure of life, values, and behaviour with ones seen in modern western society (Lerner, 1958;Singh, 2018;Thussu, 2000).…”

The case for communication rights: A rights-based approach to media development

“…It should, however, be noted, that similar to most community media, VoK suffered from limited resources, low community engagement and low accessibility of content because of low Internet access among the slum dwellers (Tully, 2016). Indeed, the key challenges in the utilization of new media technologies by community media in Eastern Africa include lack of media literacy, lack of awareness of the opportunities and skills to participate, as well as lack of understanding of the right of communities to express themselves through the new platforms (Nassanga, 2009: 44). In her fieldwork, Tully has further noted the clash of visions between the founders and a volunteer board of editors, which saw VoK’s role as that of giving the community global visibility as opposed to an earlier focus on local audiences (Tully, 2016: 74–76).…”

A community of communities? Emerging dynamics in the community media paradigm

“…Waisbord (2008) says that participatory communication ‘questions the view of development as an externally-driven process’ and ‘posits that communities should be the main protagonists of processes of social change rather than “passive beneficiaries” of decisions made by foreign experts’ (p.507). For these theorists, mainstream media (state or commercial) was largely conceptualized as being top-down, or elite driven, precluding meaningful citizen participation in the communication process (Alfaro, 2005; Gumucio Dagron, 2001; Kivikuru, 2006; Nassanga, 2009a).…”