International Communications

A Media Literacy Approach

Art Silverblatt, Nikolai Zlobin

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781317467595
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Leadership
• Index: Business

International communication affects the way we think about other countries and their people and sets the agenda of issues that face the global community. This book introduces the functions of international communications.

1

Introduction

International Media Literacy

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The world has moved into an unprecedented stage of human development—the era of global communications. In the past, national boundaries have impeded our ability to imagine communities beyond our borders. Benedict Anderson declares:

The nation is imagined as limited because even the largest of them, encompassing perhaps a billion living human beings, has finite, if elastic boundaries, beyond which lie other nations. No nation imagines itself coterminous with mankind. The most messianic nationalists do not dream of a day when all the members of the human race will join their nation in the way that it was possible, in certain epochs, for, say, Christians to dream of a wholly Christian planet.

… It is imagined as a community, because, regardless of the actual inequality and exploitation that may prevail in each, the nation is always conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship. Ultimately it is this fraternity that makes it possible, over the past two centuries, for so many millions of people, not so much to kill, as willingly to die for such limited imaginings.¹

However, innovations in media technology such as the Internet and communications satellites have obliterated these traditional borders. As United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan observes, “Today’s real borders are not between nations, but between powerful and powerless, free and fettered, privileged and humiliated.”² Thanks to media technology, people are now engaged in daily conversations across the globe. For instance, during 2000, an estimated 400 million people communicated and conducted business online. These channels of mass communication have the potential to bring people together who share common beliefs, attitudes, backgrounds, and experiences. To illustrate, media technology empowers political activists to organize at levels once available only to governments. In October 2002, individuals opposed to the impending U.S.-led invasion of Iraq built an antiwar coalition throughout the world by exchanging the following message via e-mail:

Stand for Peace.

War is NOT the Answer.

Today we are at a point of imbalance in the world and are moving toward what may be the beginning of a THIRD WORLD WAR. If you are against this possibility, the UN is gathering signatures in an effort to avoid a tragic world event. Please COPY (rather than Forward) this e-mail in a new message, sign at the end of the list, and send it to all the people whom you know.

If you receive this list with more than 500 names signed, please send a copy of the message to: [email protected]

Even if you decide not to sign, please consider forwarding the petition on instead of eliminating it.

This message crisscrossed the globe. One of the threads originated in France and found its way to sympathizers in Switzerland, Scotland, Sweden, Finland, New Zealand, England, Ecuador, Hong Kong, South Africa, Spain, Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, and a number of cities throughout the United States. This form of “virtual social activism” played a significant role in the rise of the international antiwar movement.

In addition, small revolutions occur every day around the world, thanks to the media. To illustrate, in the remote town of Robatkarim, Iran, students instituted an environment project on the Internet, researching information and programs that convinced their parents and their school to start a trash recycling program.

International media have even emerged as a factor in the geopolitical arena. In November 2001, the United States captured members of the Taliban in Afghanistan and took them to Guántanamo Bay, Cuba. Initially, there was little critical discussion on the part of the American press regarding the treatment of the prisoners. However, photographs showing the prisoners locked in six-by eight-foot open-air, chain-link cages were published by the British press. These photos launched a global campaign to pressure the U.S. government to grant the prisoners basic amenities, as stipulated by the Geneva Accords. Finally, the United States modified its policy, granting the captives status as prisoners of war and distributing copies of the Koran among them.

Why Study International Communications?

Increasingly, becoming an educated person in the twenty-first century requires an understanding of international communications. International communications has an impact on the way that we think about other countries and their people, sets the agenda of the issues that face the global community, and influences our attitudes toward these issues.

The study of international communications can lead to a broader understanding of issues and events that shape our lives. Unfortunately, many people remain woefully oblivious to international issues. Until the events of September 11, 2001, international stories made up only 6 percent of the news stories appearing on U.S. television. This ethnocentrism can lead to intolerance and misunderstandings between nations. Studies show that the less Americans know about the world, the more likely they are to favor punitive actions over diplomacy when dealing with troublesome foreign countries. As Eduardo Galeano points out, access to global information is key to empowering the populace:

This ignorance of what’s happening outside the States implies a high degree of impunity. The military power can do whatever it wants because people have no idea of where Kosovo is or Iraq or Guatemala or El Salvador. And they have no idea that, for instance, centuries before New York was established, Baghdad had one million inhabitants and one of the highest cultures in the world.³

After the events of 9/11, Americans began to seek out international sources of information. Following the invasion of Iraq by American and British forces in March 2003, news Web sites in the United Kingdom experienced huge increases in the number of American visitors, as Americans sought to broaden their understanding of the conflict. In the week immediately following the invasion, traffic to the BBC News Web site from the United States increased by 47 percent, while traffic to the Guardian Web site soared by 83 percent.⁴

The study of international communications can introduce students to a diversity of global perspectives, points of view, and ways of seeing the world that provide the following benefits:

• This discipline provides an opportunity for you to move beyond the provincialism of your national media coverage in order to gain a broader awareness of issues.

• Examining international sources of news can furnish insight into prevailing attitudes in other countries.

• Contrasting international media coverage can reveal the point of view of your own country.

• The study of international communications can help you to anticipate new developments around the globe.

• The study of international communications can promote human rights on a global scale. Indeed, a coalition of social action and labor organizations, including the Sierra Club, Oxfam, Amnesty International, and the AFL-CIO, calls for an international right to know, as a way to avert human rights violations, suffering, and oppression.⁵

A Media Literacy Approach to International Communications

Increasingly, global media have become available to international audiences. Satellite transmission enables an individual to pick up radio and television programming from around the world. For example, the BBC World News television program is broadcast throughout the United States on BBC America, a cable/satellite network.

In addition, the Internet has emerged as a tremendous resource for a range of international programming, including:

• Foreign films.

• International radio stations.

• News sources offering a multilingual format. For instance, Pravda, Eurasia.org.ru, and Gazeta.org.ru. provide daily news from Central Asia in both Russian and English. The BBC Web site also provides its news in many languages.

• Access to international newspapers in translation. For instance, newstran.com translates more than 5,000 newspapers and magazines daily.

• Search engines such as Lexus Nexus that enable individuals to compare daily international coverage of a particular issue.

• Listservs and mailing lists that distribute translated foreign information worldwide. For example, the Johnson Russia List has become a primary resource for people who have an interest in Russian affairs.⁶

A number of private organizations also furnish information to countries that face government restrictions on information. As an example, Washington ProFile (WPF) is a Russian-language agency that furnishes news and analysis to Russian speakers around the world. It features exclusive material, including news, statistics, and interviews from the United States; a fully searchable archive; and a subscriber database of over 30,000 media outlets and individuals. Information from WPF is read by millions of people across the former Soviet Union, including leading research organizations, ministries, military personnel, and political leaders.

However, universal access to the media should not be confused with media literacy. Media literacy is a critical thinking skill that is applied to the source of most of our information—the channels of mass communication. This discipline provides strategies that enable you to analyze and discuss the information being conveyed over the global channels of mass communication. Media-literate individuals have learned to develop a critical distance from the information they receive through the media, so that they are in a position to make independent judgments about: (1) what programming they choose to watch, read, or hear, and (2) how to interpret the information that they receive through the channels of mass communication.

Thomas Friedman provides a striking example of the need to develop a critical approach to media messages:

An Indonesian working for the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, who had just visited the Islamic fundamentalist stronghold of Jogjakarta, told me this story: “For the first time I saw signs on the streets there saying things like, ‘The only solution to the Arab-Israel conflict is jihad if you are true Muslim, register yourself to be a volunteer.’ I heard people saying, ‘We have to do something, otherwise the Christians or Jews will kill us.’ When we talked to people to find out where [they got these ideas], they said from the Internet. They took for granted that anything they learned from the Internet is true. They believed in a Jewish conspiracy and that 4,000 Jews were warned not to come to work at the World Trade Center [on September 11]. It was on the Internet.”

At its best, the Internet can educate more people faster than any media tool we’ve ever had. At its worst, it can make people dumber faster than any media tool we’ve ever had. The lie that 4,000 Jews were warned not to go into the World Trade Center on September 11 was spread...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Figures, Photos, and Tables
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Chapter 1. Introduction: International Media Literacy
• I. Media Literacy Approaches to International Communications
• II. Comparative Analysis: National Media Systems
• III. Applications of International Media Communications
• Notes
• About the Authors and Contributors
• Index