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The Voiceless Victims of Pakistan’s Blasphemy Laws: 28 Pakistani Christians Currently in Prison and a Guide to Effective Advocacy on Their Behalf

William Stark

Silver Spring, MD: International Christian Concern, February Update (2021), 30 pp.

"In 2018, Asia Bibi, a Christian woman, was acquitted of the blasphemy charges that had kept her on death row for nearly a decade. The lessons learned from her case, including the international advocacy critical to her acquittal, help to create a template for advocating on behalf of other religious ... more

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Information Disorder and Mainstream Media in Sri Lanka: A Case Study

Anisha Dias Banadaranaike (coord.)

Verité Research (VR) (2021), 34 pp.

"This study attempts to contribute to literature that analyzes the role of Sri Lanka’s mainstream media as a producer and distributor of information disorder. For this purpose, a case study approach is used to evaluate reporting on Dr. Segu Siyabdeen Mohamed Shafi. The study focuses on the Sri Lan ... more

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Listening to What Trust in News Means to Users: Qualitative Evidence from Four Countries

Benjamin Toff, Sumitra Badrinathan, Camila Mont’Alverne, Amy Ross Arguedas, Richard Fletcher, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen

Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (2021), 50 pp.

"This report examines how people in Brazil, India, the UK, and the US view news media in their countries, the factors they use when determining whether sources are trustworthy, and what ‘trust in news’ ultimately means to them [...] While we note throughout the report areas of difference between ... more

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Overcoming Indifference: What Attitudes Towards News Tell Us About Building Trust

Benjamin Toff, Sumitra Badrinathan, Camila Mont’Alverne, Amy Ross Arguedas, Richard Fletcher, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen

Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (2021), 69 pp.

"This report contains a range of findings about news audiences in each of the four countries [Brazil, India, United Kingdom, United States], focusing on audiences overall as well as different segments of the public categorised according to their degree of trust towards news brands in their country. ... more

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Religious Communication Amid the Pandemic

Religion and Social Communication, volume 19, issue 2 (2021), pp. 192-356

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Paulo Freire, 100 anos

Matrizes, volume 15, issue 3 (2021), pp. 5-284

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Digital Archives and Collections: Creating Online Access to Cultural Heritage

Katja Müller

New York; Oxford: Berghahn (2021), viii, 239 pp.

"Museums and archives all over the world digitize their collections and provide online access to heritage material. But what factors determine the content, structure and use of these online inventories? This book turns to India and Europe to answer this question. It explains how museums and archives ... more

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Afghanistan: August 2021. A Tentative Reassessment of Cultural Foreign Policy and Civil Society Support

Asiem El Difraoui, Caspar Berges

Stuttgart: Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (ifa) (2021), 22 pp.

"[...] If Afghanistan is to avoid a renewal of civil war, there is no viable alternative to Taliban rule and Taliban dialogue. Engagement with the Taliban in terms of urgently needed humanitarian aid opens avenues for cooperation in the field of cultural foreign policy and civil society support. Her ... e, the Taliban are especially open to support in the educational sector. Education, including for women, is a widespread demand in Afghanistan, even in the rural areas. As a member of civil society stressed, the Taliban are not ready to accept political activities but seem so far result-oriented in what concerns practical improvements for the Afghan population. Under seemingly non-political activities, for example competitions about daily life concerns like waste or water management, independent thinking and the respect of human rights can still be fostered. Generally, activities can be promoted with Afghan and Islamic references acceptable to the Taliban mindset. Fostering women’s rights, for example, can be done by giving the examples of the wives of the prophet Mohammed and of the relative freedoms of women in Saudi Arabia and Iran, who have more rights than those under the previous Taliban regime. As one participant states “the only progressive ideas which can be ingrained in Afghan society need to be somehow referring to internal cultural heritage Afghan and/or Islamic”. In this context, a lot of venues can be explored. Herat, for example was a major cultural centre over centuries. Afghans know also very little of the significance of historically important Islamic cities like Bukhara or Samarkand in neighbouring Uzbekistan, despite the fact that a sizable proportion of the Afghan population are Uzbek. Even more significant is the fact that Afghans who are very attached to their religion know very little of the achievement of the golden age Arabo-Islamic culture in science like mathematics, geography, astronomy, medicine or architecture or literature. There are also some classical art forms through which we can engage with the Taliban, such as poetry, as well as opportunities in contemporary comedy, where a certain criticism can be voiced and tolerated. The interplay of new and traditional media also provides unique opportunities in terms of education and human rights. Here DW-TV, Radio and internet activities can play an important role. Independent initiatives should also be promoted. These can offer considerable opportunities to connect regional civil society actors, which for one of the interviewees is one of the most effective ways of engagement “for example, feminist groups of neighbouring countries which supported feminist groups in Afghanistan”. (Conclusion, page 17) more

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Local Media Survival Guide 2022: How Journalism is Innovating to Find Sustainable Ways to Serve Local Communities Around the World and Fight Against Misinformation
Inspiring Practice

Jacqui Park

Vienna: International Press Institute (IPI) (2021), 81 pp.

"This report is meant to share the experiences and lessons of local media practitioners globally, and to build a community for networking and support. It’s about telling their story in their own voice – and helping all involved learn from one another. By talking to both new digital start-ups and ... more

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How Information Disorder Affirms Authoritarianism and Destabilizes Democracy: Evidence, Trends, and Actionable Mitigation Strategies from Asia and the Pacific

Michael Buehler, Ed Schatz, Sameen Ali, Christopher Green, Janjira Sombatpoonsiri

Washington, DC: USAID;Integra Government Services International LLC;Asia Emerging Opportunities (AEO) Activity (2021), 130 pp.

"Section 2 of this report provides an overview of information disorder in Asia and the Pacific and describes how it destabilizes democracy and strengthens authoritarianism. After situating information disorder in Asia and the Pacific in its historical context, Section 2 examines which actors 1) spre ... more

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Mobile Training Center: Closing the Digital Divide for Marginalized Youth. Skills to Succeed Bangladesh

Save the Children (2021), 2 pp.

"The opportunity for further growth in the ICT sector by leveraging the sizeable youth workforce, including females, is immense. The Skills to Succeed program in Bangladesh helps vulnerable youth (ages 15-24), living in slum communities, develop employability, ICT technical and entrepreneurship skil ... ls, and provides job linkage services to prepare them to obtain decent work in the ICT & Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) value chain, from which marginalized youth have traditionally been excluded. Since 2017, 10,800 youth have received employability skills training (41% female). Additionally, 6,810 youth have received vocational training in ICT and 2,730 entrepreneurship training. Of these, 3,117 youth have been placed in jobs and 504 in self-employment. One of the key learnings from the S2S program in Bangladesh is that, in order for youth to be more likely to advance in the ICT sector, where technology leaps forward at a fast pace, they need to become lifelong learners and, ideally, develop technology skills at an earlier age. This is why the S2S program is expanding to reach marginalized in-school and out-of-school very young adolescents (ages 10 to 14) to build their life skills, growth mindset and digital skills so they are able to continuously learn, adapt and be prepared to take advantage of the jobs of the future. An innovative approach for providing access to the internet and build the digital skills of to the most marginalized adolescents and youth in Bangladesh, particularly girls, is the use of a Mobile Training Center (MTC). The MTC moves around Chattogram to provide skills training to adolescent girls and boys at their doorsteps. The MTC has one technical instructor and two life skills trainers. These instructors facilitate a 24-hour training on life skills and growth mindset, and a 24-hour training on digital literacy and citizenship. The MTC is set up in a large bus, it is equipped with 15 laptop computers, internet connection, and furniture to facilitate trainings. Internet access is provided through 3G/4G portable Router Access Points. Service is procured from high quality mobile network service providers in Bangladesh, such as Grameen Phone or Robi, with whom the program has corporate agreements. By meeting adolescents close to their homes and communities, the MTC will overcome common participation barriers for marginalized and vulnerable adolescents, such as personal safety and the time and cost of traveling to training centers. These barriers frequently prevent girls from pursuing or completing trainings." (Pages 1-2) more

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Paulo Freire, 100 Years

Adilson Citelli, Ana Cristina Suzina, Thomas Tufte (eds.)

Matrizes, volume 15, issue 3 (2021), pp. 5-284

"Only one of Freire’s (1969/1983) books directly and more broadly addresses the scope of communication; it is 'Extension or Communication?' published in 1969, originally in Spanish, during Freire’s exile in Chile. This book became an important reference for the studies and practices of participa ... more

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Open Data Country Report Bangladesh

Dhaka: Management and Resources Development Initiative (MRDI) (2021), viii, 41 pp.

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Role of Frequency Modulation Radio in Disaster Communication: A Case Study of Pakistan Earthquake

Syed I. Rahman, Nauman Sial, Sanya Moazzam

Jàmbá - Journal of Disaster Risk Studies, volume 13, issue 1: a1047 (2021), 9 pp.

"Pakistan suffered from a massive earthquake in October 2005 that caused the deaths of more than 87 000 people. As a result of this calamity, around 3.5 million affected people had no access to information. In these scenarios, community media became an important catalyst. In developing countries, ra ... more

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Online Caste-Hate Speech: Pervasive Discrimination and Humiliation on Social Media

Damni Kain, Shivangi Narayan, Torsha Sarkar, Gurshabad Grover

Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) (2021), 32 pp.

"In India, religious texts, social customs, rituals, and everyday cultural practices legitimise the use of hate speech against marginalised caste groups. Notions of "purity" of “upper-caste” groups, and conversely of "pollution" of “lower-caste” groups, have made the latter subject to discri ... mination, violence and dehumanisation. These dynamics invariably manifest online, with social media platforms becoming sites of caste discrimination and humiliation. This report explores two research questions. First, what are the specific contours of caste-hate speech and abuse online? Semi-structured interviews with 12 scholars and activists belonging to Dalit, Bahujan and Adivasi (DBA) groups show that marginalised groups regularly face hate and harassment based on their caste. In addition to the overt hate, DBA individuals and groups are often targeted with abuse for availing reservations – a constitutionally mandated right. More covert forms of hate and abuse are also prevalent: trolls mix caste names and words from different languages together so that their comments appear meaningless to individuals who are not keenly aware of the local context. Such hateful expression often emerges as a reaction from “upper-caste” groups to DBA resistance and social justice movements. Our respondents reported that the hateful expression can sometimes silence caste-marginalised groups and individuals, exclude them from conversations, and adversely impact their physical and mental well-being. The second question we explore is how popular social media platforms and online spaces moderate caste-hate speech and abuse. We analysed the community guidelines, policies and transparency reports of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Clubhouse. We find that Facebook, Twitter and YouTube incorporated "caste" as a protected characteristic in their hate speech and harassment policies only in the last two or three years – many years after they entered Indian and South Asian markets – showing a disregard for the regional contexts of their users. Even after these policy changes, many platforms – whose forms for reporting harmful content list gender and race – still do not list caste. Social media companies should radically increase their investment and capacity in understanding regional contexts and languages; they must focus on the dynamics of casteist hate and abuse. They will need to collaborate with a diverse set of DBA activists to ensure that their community guidelines effectively tackle overt, covert and hyper -local forms of caste-hate speech and abuse, and that their implementation and reporting processes match these policy commitments." (Eexecutive summary) more

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Platforms, Power & Politics: Perspectives Form Domestic & Care Work in India

Aayush Rathi, Ambika Tandon

Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) (2021), 61 pp.

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Can Health Information Through Mobile Phones Close the Divide in Health Behaviours Among the Marginalised? An Equity Analysis of Kilkari in Madhya Pradesh, India

Diwakar Mohan, Kerry Scott, Neha Shah et al.

BMJ Global Health, issue 6: e005512 (2021), 10 pp.

"Kilkari is one of the largest maternal mobile messaging programmes in the world. It makes weekly prerecorded calls to new and expectant mothers and their families from the fourth month of pregnancy until 1-year post partum. The programme delivers reproductive, maternal, neonatal and child health in ... more

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Online Attacks Against Journalists: Know Your Rights

International News Safety Institute (INSI);Thomson Reuters Foundation;UNESCO (2021), 146 pp.

"This practical guide aims to provide journalists with concrete legal tools to deal with online harassment, be it to identify punishable offences, to seek help from appropriate organisations, to efficiently gather evidence and to take steps should they decide to file a complaint against the perpetra ... more

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Can Media Campaigns Change Attitudes and Spark Actions to Reduce Early Child Marriage? Impact Evaluation of Breakthrough’s Early Marriage Campaign in Jharkhand and Bihar States of India

International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie) (2021), vi, 45 pp.

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Sexual Violence and the News Media: Issues, Challenges, and Guidelines for Journalists in India

Chindu Sreedharan, Einar Thorsen

New Delhi: UNESCO (2021), 96 pp.

Local Media Survival Guide 2022: How Journalism is Innovating to Find Sustainable Ways to Serve Local Communities Around the World and Fight Against Misinformation Inspiring Practice

Local Media Survival Guide 2022: How Journalism is Innovating to Find Sustainable Ways to Serve Local Communities Around the World and Fight Against Misinformation
Inspiring Practice