Refereed Articles

Through the eye of the camera: a struggle

to define community video process.

Costas Criticos, Ansuya Chetty and Jeanne Prinsloo.

This paper describes in brief the production process of two videos

produced for local organisations, the Community Arts Workshop and

the Catholic Oblate Order. The producers are post-graduate students

in the Contemporary Cultural Studies Unit of the University of Natal,

Durban, who participated· in an attachment programme which develops

media skills through praxis and engagement in community media.

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The popular “Bottom Up” Approach to Community Development:
The example of the grassroots newspaper’s catalyst role in the Western Cape

(Reproduced with permission)

By P Eric Louw and Keyan Tomaselli

Like most concepts, that of “development” is is no less fraught with defintional contestation. What is commonly accepted as a positive intervention by dominant financial and political interests, may well be interpreted as exploitation leading to dependency by subject-communities or neo-colonial countries. In the final analysis it is a case of whose interest “development” will serve. In South Africa there is a legacy of development decisions coming exclusively from either government (which has served only narrow white interests) or from capital.

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Author: Tomaselli, Keyan
Date: 1997
Place: Nairobi, Kenya
Published; Africa Media Review, 11(1), 1-9. French: 10-17. In theme issues edited by Keyan G Tomaselli and E Kasongo.
Type of produect: refereed article
Copyright: Keyan G Tomaselli

Participatory action research and participatory communication practices, like the notion of development support communication, is not new to African scholars (Servaes et al 1996; White et al 1994). Most African university departments of communication, in fact, emphasise the latter, and work closely with educators on distance-learning applications (Ansu-Kyermeh 1991, 1994). This development emphasis, no doubt, reflects something of the more populous rural areas of most African countries in comparison to the First and Second Worlds. It is also indicative of an urgent need to deal with the consequences of underdevelopment and to involve citizens in meaningful interactions with message makers and government officials (Legakane 1997; Kasongo 1996). The extraordinary fact, as all those working within the broader `participatory’ paradigm well know, is the short-shrift given these scholar-practitioners by government departments and economists, the corporate media industries and even educators themselves. Academics are snidely told to get into the `real’ world, that they are living in `ivory towers’, and that they have no idea of anything beyond book learning. Frustration, irritation and finally alienation sets in, as academics predict failure upon failure of top-down projects which fail to “take culture into account” in policy-making and management (Klitgaard 1993:49). My own experience as the `media expert’ on the South African Department of Health’s Advisory Committee on AIDS and STDs has followed this depressing progression from an initial sense of positive participation, to alienation. This occurred as bureaucrats, and even sectors of the medical fraternity, seemed unable to understand that top-down message-imposition with regard to health and life skills issues largely correlates with audience alienation. The recipients have little or no sense of ownership of the messages. They therefore don’t see the the problem relating to them, because there are few points of reference to their actual experience. This endistancing of target groups from messages intended to be life-supporting and life-enhancing contributes to communication failure, no matter how big the budget or how professional the communications agency implementing the campaign.

Politicians seem to have little or no idea of communication strategy or accountability for communications. High profile projects imposed on campaigns without reference to target audiences, audience profiles and cultural differences, message integration and conceptual coherence, are quick fixes to the longer-term and much more focused grassroots learning brought about by participatory practices. Quick fixes also provide a spurious and temporary reassurance to bureaucrats that `they are doing something’. The sub-text, of course, is they want to be `seen’ by their voters as doing something `positive’ and immediate – irrespective of evidence which discredits the quick fix approaches – especially where medium-to-longer term strategies are required. Panic substitutes for strategy; confusion gets in the way of clarity, and messages are often constructed without reference to those to whom the messages are supposed to be speaking (see, eg., Mbozi [1996] on problems of billboard communication). And, the HIV epidemic continues irrespective of all this glossy, high profile politically self-serving media. As academic economist and advisor Robert Klitgaard (1992:49) reiterates: “The failures of `development’ … have spawned a series of calls to take African cultures more fully into account”.

What are these African cultures, and how can they be mobilised and incorporated into forms of expression which mesh indigenous and trans-cultural ways of making meaning and making sense? How can this be done in terms of contexts which mobilise indigenous values and knowledge? This is the thrust of Donald Guambe and Arnold Shepperson’s study in this volume. Their reconstitution of cultural policy concepts in the African context is intended to theoretically frame the more communication-focused papers which follow. The contradiction, however, is that banks and other lending bodies, government and development agencies, experts both local and imported, tend to impose unreconstituted First World Theories on Third World contexts regardless of their applicability.

The studies in this volume all, in their own way, address Klitgaard’s question. While this work is less policy related than Klitgaard’s own paper, the authors published here discuss problems of communication and education within South African, Zimbabwean, Botswanan, Malawian and Zambian contexts. These studies are based on extensive field experience, working with known real people, with known real needs, at the coalface, as it were. These authors have cut their teeth in the mud and the wind, the heat and the humidity, and the poverty and the optimism of rural and urban African communities. They might be employed by the `ivory tower’ but their vocations are geared to putting theory into practice, to effect real change in the face of structural forces far more powerful than all the participatory projects put together.

Theatre, action research, print and related forms of subject-generated expression and messages are argued to be much more effective in changing social attitudes amongst specific communities and groups than is the much more expensive, glossy, and audience-remote messages of the mass media which fail to link to delivery of services, and which assume that all citizens make sense of messages uniformly – the discredited assumptions derived by human communication scholars from the electronic Shannon and Weaver (1949) model. as Felix Fandyroy Moyo argues, drama has the ability to remove the “stigma of `mass’ from the concept of communication”, and thus to reorientate it from “organised manipulation” to “spontaneous, natural interaction”. Such grassroots communication is also less likely to be hijacked for political ends by national politicians who have little contact with living conditions on the ground. (Kerr, however, still warns of this possibility.)

The explanation by Lynn Dalrymple of a Drama in Aids Education (DramAidE) project, for example, reveals some extraordinary shifts in Zulu female gender identity which is indicated by a lessening regressive patriarchy. This trend is linked to the broader political processes set in motion by the onset of the `new’ South Africa. DramAidE methodology arose from a critique by Dalrymple (1987) in her doctoral thesis of received Western notions of `theatre’ and their incoherence in a rural African situation. Her alternative notion of `community theatre’ offered one way of identifying and then animating “African cultures” in health and life skills education.

Action media research where target groups design their own messages, facilitated by a media professional, is described by Warren Parker (1994), who developed the early Department of Health AIDS media campaign. Drawing on his MA thesis, here again like Dalrymple was an academic-practitioner whose extensive degree research this time became the backbone of a national AIDS media programme drawn from working with the potential beneficiaries within civil society and health NGOs. Unlike the DramAidE project, Parker’s recommendations, which had the backing of a National AIDS Media Forum, largely failed coherent implementation. The government preferred to waste most of the 1995 budget on a high profile play, Sarafina 2, which not only accomplished nothing in media terms, but also miscommunicated information about AIDS, resultantly prejudicial to those not infected as well as misinforming people with AIDS about their condition. Sarafina 2 was seen by perhaps several thousand spectators; DramAidE has actively involved millions of participants at a fraction of the cost of the Mbongeni Ngema extravaganza.

Sarafina 2 is an example of a top down, linear anti-communication. David Kerr might locate this performative intervention in terms of what he calls the crudest theories of cultural forms. These, he argues, provide attractive entertainment which can sugar the didactic pill of the developmental message.

The above comments may make for depressing reading. Indeed, Kerr even anticipates this negative effect on readers of his article. But he also provides some guidelines on how to deal with the problem. Society and praxis-oriented academics have appropriate theories and techniques, methods and experience, evidence and policy, but governments are reluctant to apply proven projects systematically on broader scales. This is partly because the Shannon and Weaver model of communication has such a universal toehold on conventional thinking; and partly because grassroots projects lack political glamour. Prejudice against small-scale activities not properly understood by quick fix proponents contributes to the uphill struggles of participatory communication and development workers.

In more sophisticated communication models, Kerr points out, cultural forms provide communication channels by which subaltern communities are able to negotiate change with those institutions attempting to bring about innovations in society. The DramAidE project offers one such success story, as Dalrymple explains in her article. This is the upside of Kerr’s rather pessimistic experience in other parts of Southern Africa. DramAidE’s relationship with the provincial government and its politicians has been unusual and productive. The project was initiated by the former KwaZulu Department of Health and went nationwide in 1996. In KwaZulu-Natal, DramAidE negotiated civil war, contexts of sexual violence in which HIV is spread, and it also mobilised both contemporary and traditional ritual and cultural forms to involve participants in the development of both messages and behavioural strategies to adrress HIV and STD infection. Fom this narrow focus it has broadened into a life skills emphasis.

Notwithstanding some scepticism, DramAidE is now national, and tracking studies by interdisciplinary teams including anthropologists, medical practitioners, statistitians, psychologists, AIDS researchers, and other social scientists, have built up a comprehensive body of knowledge where participatory action research links with participatory communication practices and health issues. Similarly, the 1997 national AIDS media plan for South Africa which emphasises an integration between big and small media and participatory practices and messages linked to health delivery, and in which programmes like DramAidE and the kind of work being done by Parker, Kerr and Moyo are assumed to have key roles, is finally getting the attention it deserves from the AIDS Directorate of the Department of Health, though implentation of the participatory philosophy continues to be buffeted by short-term, politically expedient and often counter-communication applications. Democratising communication practices is as much part of the struggle as is `the struggle’ itself.

Development projects across the African continent are caught between the contradictions of impatient urban elites looking for rapid embourgeoification and the bulk of the rural poor who make out as best they can, sometimes with the help of local NGOs, some of which are committed to the principal of participation and some not, as Kerr argues. These are the real success stories and the ones discussed by our authors. This issue of Africa Media Review thus examines both the problems and the prospects of participatory action research and of how governments can aid or impede such programmes.

* * *

The four papers published here are drawn from the DESCOM (Development Support Communication) project, initiated by the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), Pretoria, South Africa (Nyamnjoh 1997). The papers were originally presented at the HSRC’s 1996 Culture, Communication, Development Symposium co-organised with UNESCO, the Centre for Cultural and Media Studies, University of Natal, and the Department of Communication, University of South Africa. DESCOM is an attempt to put theory into practice, to rethink the notions of `arts’ and `culture’ in developmental contexts, and to re-energize moribund theories of development in terms of the beneficiaries, and what sense they make of development and health programmes, how they articulate and define their needs and the solutions they develop to achieve them.

Drama could easily become part of development studies courses – and this is indeed the case where many African drama and communication departments are concerned. But the caveat, as Klitgaard, a hard-nosed development economic reminds us, is in the requirement that we know about culture. Regrettably, few economists really care …

References

Ansu-Kyermeh, Kwasi (1994), Communication, education and Development. Edmonton: EISA Publishers.

Ansu-Kyermeh, Kwasi (1991), “Distance Education in a developing context: Ghana”. In Evans, Terry and King, Bruce (eds.), Contemporary Writing on Distance Education. Victoria: Deakin University Press, 137-151

Dalrymple, Lynn 1987: Explorations in Drama, Theatre and Education. a Critique of Theatre Studies in South Africa. Ph.D Thesis, University of Natal, Durban.

Kasongo, Emmanuel (1996), “Development by Effects to Development by Contexts through Communication”. Paper delivered at the Culture, Communication, Development Symposium, Human Sciences research Council, Pretoria, September.

Legakane, L. 1997: The Role of The News Agency in a Multi-Sectoral Approach to Development (Support) Communication. A Case Study of Lesotho. Ph.D Thesis, University of Natal, Durban.

Klitgaard, R. 1992: What if We Knew All About Cultures, Critical Arts, Vol 6 No 2, 40-67

Mbozi, P.S. (1996), The Impact of the Anti-Aids Billboard Media on Knowledge of and Attitudes About HIV/AIDS Among students in Zambia. MA Thesis, University of Zambia.

Nyamnjoh, Francis, B. (1997), “South Africa’s Future”, Media Development, Vol XLIV No 1, 68-69

Parker, W. 1994: The Development of Community-Based Media for AIDS Education and Prevention in South Africa: Towards an Action-Based Participatory Research Model. MA Thesis, University of Natal, Durban.

Servaes, Jan, Jacobson, Thomas L. and White, Shirley (eds.) (1996), Participatory Communication for Social Change. New Delhi: Sage.

White, Shirley, Nair, Sadanadan, and Ascroft, Joseph (eds.) (1994), Participatory Communication: Working for Change and Development. New Delhi: Sage.

Author: Parker, Warren
Date: 1997
Place: Nairobi, Kenya
Published: Africa Media Review, 11(1), 54-63. In theme issue edited by KG Tomaselli and E Kasongo.
Copyright: Warren Parker

Communication for health promotion is a complex process often affected by limitations within communication theory. Linear models of communication give primacy to the communicator and see communication as a largely objective process. Often referred to as `communicator-message-receiver’ (CMR) models, they incorporate the communicator as a primary agent in determining the nature of information and the mechanisms for information flow.

Application of CMR models within health promotion contexts typically incorporate expert-led message development with contextual evaluation. Such approaches may also include pre-testing with representatives of intended audiences. Conventional CMR approaches emphasise how meaning is made, rather than how messages are understood by ordinary people. Conventional communication models are sometimes supplemented with Text-based semiology, but neither provide for sufficient collaboration between communicators and receiver/readers.

Peiceian-based semiotics, however, offers a culturally open method for understanding both the making and the interpretation of messages, from an infinite variety of different class, political, language and historical contexts (Tomaselli 1996).

`Action media’ is presented in this paper a methodology for the development of media products that integrates the interests of both the communicator and representatives of target audiences within a health promotion context. The methodology has its roots in `participatory action research’ (PAR) approaches and incorporates qualitative contextual research with a media development process. The methodology is described in detail and includes a range of examples of activities and media products developed for the promotion of socially marketed condoms in the Soweto township near Johannesburg, South Africa.

It is not intended that the PAR methodology discussed here be perceived as an exclusive and absolute means for the development of health promotion materials. Rather, it adds to the range of methodologies health promoters can apply in media development, whilst also providing important insights into context-based activities that are consultative, collaborative and empowering.

CMR and Semiotic Approaches

Theories that focus on communication as a linear process are not entirely unified, but are typically represented as `models’ of communication. An example can be found in Shannon and Weaver’s `mathematical theory of communication’ which is depicted as follows: (Fiske, J (1982:7)

Similar models are propounded by Gerbner, Lasswell, Westley and Maclean, and Newcomb (Fiske 1982, pp6-39) In general, the models see information flowing from a communicator to a receiver, with the potential for distortion (noise) between the two — for example static on a telephone line, or the absence of a common language.

These models tend to have a common-sense appeal in that they endorse the notion that communication is about how effectively a communicator transfers a message to a receiver – ie. the communicator is a key actor in the communication process. Thus, the CMR models are largely about the process of communication and provide for a mechanistic analysis that seeks to scientise communication (Tomaselli and Shepperson 199*).Certain approaches to semiotics, on the other hand, provide for a radical inversion of the CMR models, placing deeper import on communication contexts and placing emphasis on the receiver (or reader). Semiotics allows for acknowledgement of the reader’s subjective interpretations of messages (Tomaselli 1996).

Semiotics is often referred to as the `study of signs’ for semioticians have tended to focus on the process of construction of meaning — thus, language is a sign system where words stand for tangible objects or ideational constructs. The word tree, for example, stands for a real world tree. Semiology provides for a similar approach, but focuses more closely on the internal systems and rules within language related to the process of meaning-making (Tpomaselli and Shepperson 199*). Both semiotics and semiology provide for an ideological dimension to communication.

It is beyond the scope of this paper to provide detailed analysis of these methods. However, they provide and important backdrop, and the comparative table may be useful in understanding the differences (Table 1).

Whilst the comparative Table is not wholly comprehensive, it however does provide some insights into the theoretical bases of communication. More importantly however, it underscores the problematic of two antithetical methodological strands, with little common ground or theoretical bridge in between.

Communication Methodologies

For the practice of a dialogical communication to occur, practitioners need to incorporate methods which allow for a balance between the interests of communicator and those of receivers (readers).

Health promotion provides a useful analytical context for communication practice — a context which in turn allows for the development and refinement of replicable methodologies. Obviously `health promotion’ is not without it’s ideological dimensions and political baggage, but in general its premise is that individuals are able to utilise information about their health and available health resources, to make beneficial health choices.

Health promotion is seen as an integral part of primary health care systems where information and resources are integrated into a holistic health infrastructure and where particular emphasis is placed on making resources accessible and relevant. Primary health care objectives and services include: (Population Communication Services (1993) `Reaching Young People’, Packet Series 5, John Hopkins School of Public Health, Baltimore, p1.)

analysis of community needs related to health – for example, prevalence of waterborne diseases, prevalence of unplanned pregnancieshealth education and promotion – for example, HIV/AIDS awareness, lobbying against smokingpreventative services — for example, immunisation, provision of condoms, ante-natal and post natal care

curative services – for example, therapeutic treatment of illness, surgical management of traumarehabilitative services – for example, physiotherapy and counselling

Typical methodologies for the development of health promotion communication are professionalised and tend to be based on CMR theories, with the addition of feedback and research elements to facilitate the refinement of communication messages. Activities would include assessment of audiences and needs, development of materials by health and communications specialists, pre-testing of materials by professional researchers, refinement of products and distribution. For example, analysis of research data may show low levels of child immunisation. The initial communication requirement would be raising awareness and promoting services. Health and communications professionals would work together to assess potential target audiences, develop key messages and concepts, pre-test these with representatives of the target audience, and then go on to develop finalised media products.

There are a number of shortcomings to this approach. Health and communications professionals tend to occupy somewhat different socioeconomic contexts to broader target audiences and material development is often skewed by their perceptions of how messages should be framed, what media and media products should be utilised and so on. The incorporation of message and product pre-testing helps to contextualise products. However, pre-testing is limited by an inherent assumption that communication is an objective process, and further, that products can be understood independently of contexts. Participants in pre-testing sessions are limited in terms of choices, and responses to words and images tend to be over-elaborated within analysis that is divorced from context. In a health context for example, a health worker might discuss a therapy with a patient, and supply a descriptive leaflet as a reminder of the key points and as a source of supplementary information. Testing such a leaflet outside of the intended use context can result in inappropriate commentary and may result in uneccessary changes to the draft product.

Products that emerge within such approaches are typically unidirectional in terms of their messages, and tend towards issuing of imperatives. Linney (1995:18)) describes such materials as `one way’ and lists typical components as:

Issue orders and instructions

Are `aimed’ at target audiences

Do not involve local people

Are produced outside local communities

Involve pre-testing

Show solutions to problems

Do not promote critical awareness

Whilst there is some narrowness in such communication, this is not to say that communication utilising this approach is not without value. Campaigns utilising such methodologies do achieve tangible results, and in many ways are similar to models used in commercial advertising — they raise awareness and link people to resources. Clearly however, there are considerable limitations in terms of audience/community involvement and opportunities for organic needs assessment and message development are lost.

In recent years there has been a trend towards the development of media utilising alternative approaches that seek to incorporate deeper audience participation. These approaches have tended to have their roots in Freireian theories around visual literacy and critical thinking.

Action Media

The Action Media methodology has grown out of my own diverse work in contextual communication in South Africa and has largely focussed on the development of materials for sexual and reproductive health. In this country, the rapid growth in HIV infection has provided added impetus to health promotion around sexual and reproductive health, and has allowed for broader focus on sexually transmitted diseases, unplanned pregnancy and abortion, and growing emphases on related areas such child abuse, rape and sexual harassment.

The Action Media approach involves a process that allows for integration of perspectives of representatives of target audiences — a process that allows for deep reflection around issues that affect their lives — and a process that allows for the incorporation of linguistic and cultural perspectives relevant to the target audience. This allows message development to become an organic process.

The methodology is such that it engenders action amongst the participants and this impetus can be harnessed in subsequent activities at the individual, group, or local community level.

The process has been developed and tested in a range of health promotion contexts related to reproductive and sexual health with groups of adolescents and young adults and has been a key component in activities related to the social marketing of Lovers Plus condoms under the auspices of a national non-governmental organisation – the Society for Family Health. Social marketing refers to a process of health promotion that uses techniques borrowed from commercial marketing and commercial infrastructures to realise health benefits. In the case of condom social marketing, lower to middle income groups are targeted through sale of condoms at subsidised prices, and reach is maximised through sale in diverse outlets such as spaza shops (informal shops in townships), shebeens (informal bars in townships), bars, taverns, filling stations, hair salons, commuter sites as well as supermarkets, chain stores and pharmacies. An allowance is made for mark-ups at wholesaler and retailer level to ensure sustained distribution within the commercial infrastructure.The Action Media methodology has its roots in a range of social theories (and practices) that fall within the ambit of the Cultural and Media Studies paradigm. These include understandings of communications processes, semiotics, culture, ideology and social change and participatory research.

Action media provides a framework for dealing with the divergent emphases of communication theory and brings together imperatives of the communicator, on the one hand, and readers on the other. At the same time the methodology allows for a number of tangential benefits in terms of critical awareness and action.

In overview, Action Media as it pertains to health promotion, has the following elements:

Identification of significant health challenges — for example, the prevention of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted diseases and unplanned pregnancy amongst adolescents and young adults.

Identification of sufficiently homogenous groups within defined geographic areas — for example, college students, youth formations in townships.

Collaboration with individuals within each context to co-facilitate workshops — for example, lecturers, teachers, administrators and health workers

Recruitment of 15-20 participants on a voluntary basis for participation in a series of four 3-hour workshops. These incorporate educative focus group sessions that engender high levels of participation and reflection. Other elements include activities such as games, role-plays, songs, distribution and demonstration of condoms and media development. There is also an opportunity for evaluation.

The media products that emerge typically reveal deep insights into perspectives of the target group, are immediately relevant to the participant’s peer communities, and may be relevant nationally as health promotion products. At the outset, it is intended that the products be integrated into existing infrastructures, and be utilised as a cornerstone for other community-based activities.

In the case of reproductive health, participants in the process became strongly committed to safer sexual behaviour and promotion of peer awareness. In the case of one group of participants who were tracked longitudinally, there is evidence of committed behaviour change. The methodology differs considerably from producer-centric approaches in that it sees contexts of media utility as dynamic, and furthermore, sets out to generate media products that are supportive of action, rather than simply as vehicles for information.

During the research process, promoting participant endorsement condoms was a particular objective of the research interaction. Emphasis on the development of critical perspectives allowed participants to explore their own practices, and many indicated that they had shifted their attitudes towards condoms and their sexual practices (albeit on the short term). This is somewhat different from research processes that are simply about understanding perspectives of particular groups, and that are not educative within themselves.

This process is often complex and it is during this session that researchers have to incorporate their own media perspectives and experience in refining the ideas that emerge into workable products. Quite often, group proposals are fairly naive from a media point of view, and interactive debate is encouraged between researchers and each group of participants. It is also not uncommon for ideas to incorporate contextual “realities” such as sexism or racism. Concepts for products thus emerge as a mixture of ideas and discussion between researchers and participants, as well as interpretations by the artists and designers who act on the brief.

Discussion

The Action Media methodology may, at first sight seem fairly complex. There is no doubt that it requires specialised skills and resources. However, it is in many ways far simpler, and more time- and cost-efficient than conventional approaches, and it offers potential to produce immediately relevant and viable media products. When compared to conventional expert-driven process it has some distinct differences and benefits. These include:

Participants learn how to think critically and are considerably enriched in terms of critical awareness about serious health issues that affect their lives. This approach is grounded in perspectives drawn from Participatory Action Research (PAR) and Freire’s notions of dialogue and critical thinking. Shoepf et al 1988) describe a process followed with commercial sex workers in Zaire as follows: “Grounded in principles of group dynamics, experiential training begins with the principle that people already know a great deal about their situation. Group leaders assist people to develop a `critical consciousness’ leading to co-operative social action and self-reliance’.And as Friere describes it:

“… the process in which people, not as recipients, but as knowing subjects, achieve a deepening awareness both of the socio-historical realty that shapes their lives and of their capacity to transform that reality” (Carr and Kemmis 1986).

Researcher / facilitators are able to extract qualitative data relevant to broader research and planning activities. Many qualitative researchers rely on short duration, single interactions with respondents in tightly controlled situations. The deeper, longer series of focus groups, which are part of Action Media elicit a considerable body of information that is relevant both for contextual activities and to understandings of particular sectors within communities.

A core group of highly aware individuals is created to the benefit of their immediate peer group and community. Clearly the workshops generate considerable impetus and the energy of participants can be channelled into subsequent activities that contribute to peer awareness and can be integrated into transformative activities. This is not always easy to achieve, given that most activities require infrastructure and commitment by parties beyond the media development context. Integration of existing resources into the process is beneficial at the outset — for example, social marketing programmes, peer education programmes and the like.

The products that emerge are deeply contextualised in terms of imagery, language, and potential utility. Pre-testing is not required as the methodology incorporates extensive analysis of imagery and messaging into the media development process.

The products tend to be discursive, to raise questions and to stimulate debate. This is considerably different to the issuing of imperatives or instructions that are more typical of conventionally developed media.

The products are directly applicable in the context of the group or community within which they emerge and can be directly applied within a health promotion context — particularly when they can be linked to tangible products, resources and services (eg. condom social marketing). Interestingly, many of the products developed using this methodology have been used beyond the immediate contexts within which they were developed. Examples include incorporation of the national flag into the shape of a condom under the banner “Viva Condoms” and the development of “Lovers Straight Talk”, a comprehensive question and answer booklet on sexuality for adolescents — both of which have been used as part of national activities.

Products that emerge through Action Media do not always fit into conventions of political correctness. Some of the products developed during the Soweto workshops reveal a lived environment of sexist practice, whilst the separately developed “Viva Condoms” image was viewed by some as an appalling degradation of the new national flag. Within the development of such products it is not the task of researcher /facilitators to “censor” products, but rather to open debate around contentious issues and seek resolution within the group that can be applied to the media products. It is important too, to move beyond the scientised CMR perceptions that see products as having singular meanings, or as functioning as direct communication. The power of media products lies not in the direct intention of their messaging, but rather in the contexts within which they are viewed and used. If a media product generates discussion and debate, its relevance within a societal context is multiplied several fold, and is far better than products that seek simply the transfer of specific concepts from communicator to receiver.

Content and Context

The Action Media methodology is positioned largely within the framework of semiotic analyses of communication and can be seen as a process of applied semiotics that allows for signs, messages, readers and contexts to interrelate. The media products that emerge have considerable value when analysed within cultural and ideological frameworks that incorporate notions of a “struggle for meaning”. Much of the developmental work around the methodology has focussed on adolescents and has provided an important voice to young people in contexts where they are typically disempowered The methodology is the antithesis of top down approaches, allowing instead for collaborative effort and empowerment in the creation of media products.

The ideological contexts of the participants cannot be ignored either, and products emerging through the Action Media methodology are often revealing of this context. As Tomaselli (1996**) puts it: “If ideology accounts for the ‘lived’ relations between people and their world, then we must accept that meaning is saturated with the ideological imperatives of society”. Action Media also describes an interesting tension between the two strands of communication theory. On the one hand Action Media describes a process of efficiently producing extremely accurate media products by overcoming limitations inherent in the application of CMR approaches that utilise professionalised conceptualisation and pre-testing. When analysed within a semiotic perspectives however, it becomes clear that media products must be viewed dynamically and that the subjectivity of readers must be clearly understood. Media products function within contexts, and are read from diverse subjective perspectives. We cannot assume an objectivity within media products that makes meaning and interpretation absolute. As Tomaselli (1996: **) observes: “Readers appropriate the meanings which best fit their imaginary solutions as interpreted by their individual, cultural and class experiences. These interpretants coincide most closely with their individual subjectivities.”

At best, media products provide a stimulus for a range of possible interpretations on the one hand, and a range of contextual applications on the other. In the case of “mass” media products, it is impossible to assume uniform interpretations. Even at the level of the individual, subjective responses can be framed by contextual factors, and meaning and interpretation may shift over time. If we imagine a teenager in Soweto listening to the two “Action Media” radio commercials on community radio, his/her interpretation may be influenced by a number of factors including, for example: What opinions are held about community radio? How often is the commercial heard? What programme content frames the commercial? If in the company of friends, does the commercial elicit discussion? If in the company of a parent, does the commercial elicit discussion? Are conflicting subjectivities resolved? Is the desired adoption of condoms achieved or is existing condom use endorsed?Meaning and interpretation need to be seen as dynamic processes, even at the level of an individual. Assumptions underpinning processes of media development need to incorporate subjectivity, dynamism and diversity amongst intended audiences, no matter how homogenous they are assumed to be. Media products should also not be seen as “stand-alone” interventions — an assumption that is embedded in CMR perspectives. Instead, media products need to be continually applied and contextualised within the resources and services available within communities. Condom promotion for example, needs to be closely tied to availability of condoms within a community. Synergy amongst media products should also be sought out — for example, between radio commercials, posters, point of sale materials.Within the complex contexts of media development, the Action Media methodology provides insight into the potential for integration and empowerment of individuals and groups within target communities. It demonstrates a replicable process that provides for the development of deeply contextualised media products on the one hand, and qualitative undertandings of community contexts on the other.

Finally, it is important that the Action Media methodology is perceived as malleable within the principles that frame it. Researchers, facilitators, resources and contexts frame the application of the methodology and colour the products that emerge. If communication and meaning are framed as dynamic and subjective, then processes that seek to generate meaning should be seen dynamically too.

Acknowledgement

I am indebted to workshop participants and co-facilitators for important insights and contributions made during the development of the Action Media methodology.

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Parker, Warren. (1994), The Development of Community-based Media for AIDS Education and Prevention in South Africa: Towards an action-based participatory research model”, Master’s thesis, University of Natal, Durban.Population Communication Services (1993) “Reaching Young People”, Packet Series 5, John Hopkins School of Public Health, Baltimore.

Schoepf, B.G. et al (1988), Action Research on AIDS with Women in Central Africa (Unpublished photocopy).

Tomaselli, Keyan and Tomaselli, Ruth et al (1988), “Community and Class Stuggle: Problems in Methodology”, Journal of Communication Enquiry, Vol.12, No.1

Tomaselli, Keyan (1994), Appropriating Images: the Semiotics of Visual Representation. Hojbjerg: Intervention Press.

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Author: Parker, Warren
Date: 2002
Other Authors: Lynn Dalrymple andEmma Durden
COMMISSIONED BY: The HIV/AIDS and STD Directorate of the Department of Health as part of the 1997/98 Beyond Awareness campaign

HIV/AIDS has given rise to tremendous social challenges and individuals and organisations worldwide have mobilised to meet these challenges. There have been many innovations, many startling successes, many costly failures, and many lessons learned along the way. As the disease has advanced over time it has become possible to understand its complexity, but also to begin to understand what needs to be done to minimise its impact on societies, communities and individuals.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s share of the global HIV infections remains high – in December 1997 the levels stood at over 20.8 million – some 68% of the international total of 30.6 million. The region’s children are also the most affected with an estimated 7.8 million orphans, representing some 95% of the world total. Infection levels in Asia are also rising rapidly.

Author: Kerr, David
Date: 1997
Place: Nairobi, Kenya
Published: Africa Media Review, 11(1), 64-74. Edited by Keyan G Tomaselli and E Kasongo, theme issue on “Culture and Communication”.
Type of product: refereed article
Copyright: David Kerr

This paper examines some of the problems associated with the use of indigenous cultural forms and institutions for instrumental purposes within programmes of social engineering. I also attempt a brief examination of approaches which might address those problems.

The reasons why both Government and NGO change agencies have turned to indigenous culture are well-known. They derive largely from the failure of modernisation development models to provide economic “lift-off” for underdeveloped nations during the 1960s and 70s. Numerous studies have condemned such development schemes for attempting to impose pre-packaged western models of development on alien cultures [Kerr, 1993 pp.55-56].

Since the 1970s alternative development models have emerged emphasising the indigenous element in culture, society and the economic base. Phrases such as “participation” “bottom-up” and conscientisation have become the shibboleths of such theoretical approaches. Cultural forms including songs, proverbs, dances, drama and stories are seen to play a crucial role in that they allow for communication to take place between the change agents and the “grass roots” of society.

In the crudest theories the cultural forms provide attractive entertainment which can sugar the didactic pill of the developmental message. In more sophisticated models, cultural forms provide communication channels by which subaltern communities are able to negotiate change with those institutions attempting to bring about innovations in society. There is no need for me to describe these models and the attempts to implement them, since the field has been quite thoroughly covered, especially for the medium of theatre. [See Mda, 1993 and Kerr 1995, pp.149-171].

Nor is it necessary for me to describe at length my own experiences with various projects to use drama for develop-mental purposes, as I have also recounted those experiences elsewhere [Kerr, 1989, 1991]. Instead, I wish to move immediately to an analysis (partly arising from my own mistakes) of some major problems which I have been able to identify in the instrumental uses of indigenous cultural forms.

The major cause of problems in the use of culture as a “tool” for developmental purposes lies in the relationship between the indigenous community which supplies the forms of the culture and those agents (variously called “facilitators”, “animateurs” and “catalysts”) who attempt to mobilize cult-ural forms for developmental purposes. Much of the history of cultural mobilization can be interpreted as that of theorists and activists trying to provide increasingly more sophisticated (or, put another way, less exploitative) models for the relationship between change agents and communities.

I have described elsewhere how Zambian “theatre for development” projects with which I was involved in the 1970s failed to live up to their revolutionary aims [Kerr and Chifunyise]. When I first became involved with “theatre for development” work in Zambia during the mid-1970s, the teams of University animateurs of which I was a part, had a simplistic view that we merely needed to study the cultural forms of rural communities, and create plays containing a pre-packaged radical social message performed in the local language, as a consequence of which, the communities to which we took the plays would be wonderfully uplifted and transformed. Such a model of cultural engineering is still surprisingly common.

These theatre campaigns, despite some genuine achievements, did not, of course, radically transform society. To our dismay, we found that the “revolutionary” messages of our plays were co-opted by local community leaders (such as District Commissioners, village chiefs and councillors) as a way of integrating the plays into the dominant ideology which supported local power structures.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s much debate among cult-ural activists centred on this issue, and a series of more flexible models emerged which attempted to create cultural practices capable of empowering the communities themselves. The emphasis moved away from taking pre-packaged cultural forms to the people, and towards a model of catalysts helping communities revitalise their own cultural forms, in order to help them understand, negotiate and promote social innovation and change.

Even with this more sophisticated model, however, the results of participatory cultural projects have not always successfully empowered local communities. This was a lesson I learned in the late 1980s in the Liwonde District of Malawi, working on a project to use participatory theatre for the purpose of promoting Primary Health Care. The facilitators were a combination of University lecturers and students and professional PHC communicators, the whole project funded by the German agency, GTZ.

The Liwonde project was certainly a big improvement on my earlier Zambian experience. The facilitators did not pre-package any cultural forms, but helped local communities to establish Village Health Committees which used their own songs and dramatic sketches to analyse Primary Health Care strategies. The total Primary Health Care campaign (targeting water-born diseases), did indeed create identifiable improvements in the lives of communities, and the cultural interventions made a significant contribution to them [Kalipeni and Kamlongera, pp.4-5].

There were some disappointments, however. I was expecting that once the Village Health Committees established their own cultural troupes, they would develop a strongly radical voice of opposition to local political and economic elites – that the PHC mobilisation campaigns would lead to movements of wider community conscientization. This did not happen. There were occasions when local communities used song and drama to attack local elites. In one incident, for example, embarrassing revelations (through a community play) of an Area Health Committee’s corrupt reselling of medicines intended for Village Health Committees led to the en masse resignation of the Area Health Committee, and the election of a new committee, more trusted by the community. Such incidents, however, only took place when there was a strong showing of external facilitators (as witnesses). When the VHC groups performed songs and plays in their own communities, they tended to recreate the stereotypes of political or developmental chauvinism.

What I was underestimating was the power of state institutions to co-opt radical movements in order to divert their potential for opposition. The Malawi Congress Party (in power at that time), with representatives and spies in every village, was perfectly capable, at least in the short run, of defusing any critical energy generated by the Primary Health Care movement.

Another problem associated with such campaigns of participatory cultural mobilisation is the nature of the facilitating agencies. Many of the agencies which are promoting change in Africa are NGOs which have international funding, and, in some cases, externally based administrations. In this sense change agencies are part of the rapidly expanding inter-national poverty industry.

Since the early 1980s, after the evident failure of Government-centered development policies to provide economic lift-off for African nations, (and thereby repay their loans to private and public transnational lending institutions) those states have become the objects of ever closer fiscal control by international funding agencies such as the IMF.

At the same time international aid agencies have linked themselves to African communities through a complex network of transnational and local NGOs. Many of these NGOs have adopted policies of privatisation in the poverty industry. That is, funding agencies have encouraged the professionalisation of development cadres, through training in entrepreneurial management techniques. Typically, this involves a senior NGO representative, who runs his/her NGO as an African franchise of an international corporation, sub-contracting various tasks out to middle and lower level local consultants or development workers.

That system seriously affects programmes of cultural mobilisation. Although cultural workers may start out as idealistic promoters of cultural indigenisation and social improvement, as soon as their effectiveness as facilitators is linked to the possibilities of financial reward, the honest relationship between facilitator and community becomes gradually traduced. The facilitator is under pressure to “come up with the goods” to fulfil his/her contract.

I have felt this temptation in Malawi, where, as an academic working on a local salary spectacularly below international standards, I felt the strong seductive power of NGO cultural consultancies. Lower down the donor chain, my students were glad to accept small payments for vacation cultural mediation work, in order to pay for IMF-imposed, cost-recovery student loans. However innocent such payments may be, there is always a temptation for facilitators to become mercenaries in the process of cultural mediation.

The cash nexus is also capable of affecting the communities themselves. Participants selected for workshops (even if the only reward is free food and the excitement of a visit to town), are liable to become objects of envy in the rest of the community, and their interpretation of the community’s culture may become skewed by a desire to project those aspects of culture which the donors expect.

Material incentives can affect a community’s cultural forms in subtle ways. Facilitators are under pressure to mobilize the communities to transform their culture along lines which will promote the NGO’s specific sectoral interests. Thus, indigenous wedding or initiation songs may have their words changed (and, in the process, usually simplified) to exhort fellow members of the community to dig pit latrines or use condoms [Kerr, 1994, 24-28].

I am not saying that oral culture always remains unchanged, but that if a song, for example, is to remain part of a community’s culture, changes need to develop organically within the community itself. Heavy-handed, tendentious interventions by external change agents do not constitute a revival of indigenous culture but a form of reification which is tantamount to developmental imperialism.

The social (not to say aesthetic) cost of such aggression can be high. When a community feels itself exposed to cultural invasion, there are strong temptations for it to over-valorize the “traditional”, by lapsing into forms of cultural fundamentalism (“muti”, traditional weapons, witch-hunting etc). These act as a debilitating, but understand-able, psychic defence against perceived assaults from an alien culture.

I would like to conclude this brief and perhaps rather gloomy assessment by looking at some possible ways to counter-act the excesses of cultural engineering.

I have perhaps overstated my case against Government and NGO interventions into community cultural processes. Clearly, government and NGO agencies are, at present, a fact of life. I believe, however, that an awareness of the dangers I have outlined can lead to a greater sensitivity in the all-important relationship between facilitator and community.

The tendency in the past, whether he/she was based in a government department, an academic institution or an NGO, has been for the facilitator, owing to his/her class position, to assume, wittingly or unwittingly, a position of superior know-ledge [Eyoh]. If campaigns of cultural revitalisation are to be linked to effective programmes of community renewal, they must take place in a relatively egalitarian context.

That implies a radical rethinking of the way facilitators are trained, so that they are able to conduct cultural campaigns not from a position of superiority, but in an atmosphere of mutual cultural exchange. For this purpose, facilitators not only need the skills of social analysis and communication, but also those of cultural analysis and aesthetic appreciation.

In addition, facilitators have to realise that culture is vital and organic; it cannot be reduced to a reified express-ion of a specific message. Professional facilitators have to cultivate an attitude of humility, acknowledging the limitations of their own inputs.

At present, when sectoral agencies explore the potential of indigenous culture, they tend to ghettoise the problems of underdevelopment. Facilitators need to be aware that the problems of literacy, primary health care, agriculture, crime, AIDS, drugs and so on are not discrete; they are all connected, not only to each other, but also to social stratification at the community level, and ultimately, even to fiscal imperialism at an international level. If communities are to make sense of their under-development, their culture cannot be reduced to that of a vehicle for simplistic sectoral campaigns. Communities must retain or develop cultural forms which contain the complexity required to identify linkages between very different areas of human activity.

Ultimately, the best solution to the problems I have raised is for cultural mobilisation to be taken out of the hands of mediating institutions and to be grasped by strong civic organisations created by the communities themselves. In that way the dangers of facilitators promoting financial or class-based distortions, sectoral reifications and neo-imperialist interventions would be much reduced. Indigenous culture would be in less danger of assaults by external agents, and might also be less tempted by atavistic forms of ethnic or religious fundamentalism. Culture would be avail-able to communities to negotiate change from a standpoint of social confidence and cohesion.

The challenge is, that at present in Southern Africa, existing civic organisations (such as trade unions, credit cooperatives, and community development clubs) are not very interested in cultural mobilisation. Strategies are required to build the cultural capacity of civic organisations so that they can appropriate the cultural mobilisation functions which have hitherto been abrogated by government agencies, academic institutions and NGOs.

Bibliography

Eyoh, N.H., (1984) Hammocks and Bridges: Workshop on Theatre for Integrated Rural Development, Yaounde, University of Yaounde.

Kalipeni, E. and Kamlongera, C., (1987) Popular Theatre and Health Care, University of Malawi, Zomba.

Kerr, D., (1989) “Community Theatre and Public Health in Malawi”, Journal of Southern African Studies, 15/3: 469- 485.

Kerr, D., (1991) “On Not Becoming a Folklorist: Field Methodology and the Reproduction of Underdevelopment”, Folklore, 102/1: 48-61.

Kerr, D., (1992) “Participatory Popular Theatre: The Highest Stage of Cultural Underdevelopment?” Research in African Literatures, 22/3: 55-76.

Kerr, D., (1994) “Ideology, Resistance and the Transformation of Performance Traditions in Post-Colonial Malawi”, Marang, 10: 1-37.

Kerr, D., (1995) African Popular Theatre, London: James Currey, Portsmouth, N.H.: Heinemann, Cape Town: David Philip.

Kerr, D., and Chifunyise, S., (1984) “Popular Theatre in Zambia: Chikwakwa Reassessed”, Theatre International, 11 & 12: 54-80.

Mda, Z., (1993) When People Play People, Johannesburg: Witswatersrand University Press, London: Zed Books.

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Author: Kelly, Kevin
Date: 2002
Other Authors: Pumla Ntlabati, Salome Oyosi, Mary van der Riet and Warren Parker
Developed for Save the Children by the Centre for AIDS Development, Research and Evaluation (Cadre)

During 2001, Save the Children commissioned a number of studies related to HIV/AIDS, children and young people in South Africa. This included the development of a literature review of young people’s responses to HIV/AIDS in South Africa entitled: Pathways to action: HIV/AIDS prevention, children and young people in South Africa.1 Running parallel to this study was the exploration, through formative field research, of approaches to engaging youth response to HIV/AIDS. This involved the development of two action research interventions – one in Amatole Basin, a rural community in the Eastern Cape, and the other at Sibonile School for the Blind, located at Klipriver in Gauteng. The overall aim was to examine in detail, through two case studies, the challenges facing the community and young people in particular, in developing a sustained and effective response to HIV prevention. Objectives included:

• Exploration of the challenges of HIV prevention in two different communities, based on the findings of Pathways to action.

• Exploration of the mediators of HIV/AIDS response in each of these communities.

• Engaging young people in the challenges of reorienting their personal, interpersonal, communal and social lives in a way that is conducive to HIV prevention.

• Engaging the community context through exploring and addressing the community and social2 dynamics (including service delivery) that impact on young people’s responses to HIV/AIDS.

Author: Emma , Durden
Date: 2003
Other Authors: Dominique Nduhura
Type of article: Honours Research Essay
Abstract

This paper examines the use of the participatory forum theatre methodology for HIV/AIDS education in a factory setting in Durban, 2003. The paper explores the field of Entertainment Education (EE), which is the strategic use of entertainment forms for educational purposes, and how EE is used in development communication. We investigate participatory communication theory, the work of Brazilian educationalist Paulo Freire, and the principles that inform Augusto Boal’s forum theatre methodology practice.

EE strategies and communication and behavioural change theories inform the design and practice of the PST (problem solving theatre) project, which is the case study for this research project.

This paper outlines the process of the PST project, investigating the environment at the chosen factory site, and the prevailing knowledge and attitudes towards HIV/AIDS, the creation of an appropriate forum theatre play, as well as observations and comments on the performance at the factory. Final summative research investigates the impact that the forum theatre had on the audience, and our conclusion suggests how forum theatre, as an EE strategy, can be further used in a factory setting.

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Author: Dalrymple, Lynn
Date: 1997
Professor, Department of Drama, University of Zululand, South Africa and Director of the Drama in AIDS Project.
To most South Africans, `traditional dance’ means the local, folk or indigenous dance forms of Africa, although of course ballet is also a `traditional’ dance. The question is whose tradition? A broader sense of `traditional’ is `established’, and in this paper, as the argument develops, `traditional’ takes on this broader connotation.

One of the difficulties of socially contested words such as culture is that they instantly raise suspicion in people’s minds. For example, what does a woman with a different heritage know about traditional South African cultural forms?[1] One of the narrower meanings of `culture’ is `the arts’ and so by `traditional cultural forms’ I mean a general body of art forms. Why then did I not entitle this paper `The use of art forms in community education?’ I preferred `traditional cultural forms’ because it is a broader concept which denotes forms that express a whole way of life, allowing me to include customs and rituals in this discussion. For me, traditions and cultures are not fixed or bound but free-flowing and by their very nature are ductile, flexible and interactive. Apartheid was rooted in fixed notions of culture and heritage, with the tragic consequences that I do not need to rehearse here.

I shall speak about `community education’ with special reference to DramAidE. DramAidE is a state-funded sexuality and HIV/AIDS education programme offering information about the transmission and prevention of the spread of HIV/AID and STDs, and providing life skills to cope with the implications of the information (Dalrymple 1994). The emergence of a global AIDS pandemic has aroused a global response. AIDS, as a disease of the late 20th Century, with no cure, has brought the cultural politics of information and education into the foreground.