Speak up…Write out

Speak up…Write out….. by Medha Kulkarni (June 09) Why can’t we take the value of brotherhood to the people just like we sell soap using advertising? The basic point is turning people to your side, to make them a part of your agenda, to inspire them to fulfill their responsibilities, to guide them towards ‘action’ by making them hold the finger of ‘thought’, to convince them that you are doing their work and to include them in the task some way or the other. This is in fact a long winding road. Technology is an aid, a medium. The modern-times technology has made this long route to reach people short and easy. But have our social, political workers, leaders realised this? Since 2006, a project on the issue of Mother n Newborn Health is being implemented in seven cities in Maharashtra. After reading words like ‘Mother-Newborn- Health’ and ‘project’, one might mistake this to be the same old routine, social (boring) ‘ngoetic’ stuff. But anything related to human being, anything related to its existence is never boring, can’t ever be! And where there is a mother, a child, there exists an entire human culture. Thus this is one subject that remains as fresh as ever. Those working in Media can identify, reveal a human aspect in any issue. Well, aren’t otherwise believed to be mundane figures and statistics use to denote existence of mankind? A series of workshops which we (Sampark Network) organise for the volunteers participating in the above mentioned project are based on the same principle. If these volunteers aspire to expand the scope of their work, if they want to take their work to the people with the help of Media, if they wish people to contribute their fair share in solving social problems, then these volunteers must make the human angle in their work visible by thinking beyond the purview of their project. Supporting facts, figures, case studies and resolutions related to every topic are always readily available. Importance of information is paramount. But what is the use of mere information? One must be able to team up information with a human face. When this happens, effective Social Marketing is possible. Yes, Social Marketing. A contemporary term which in the past was termed as ‘Enlightenment’. Today, it is also branded as Advocacy, Social Marketing. In the year 1952, J. D. Webb, a professional from the field of advertising in America presented a question - Why can’t we take the value of brotherhood to the people just like we sell soap using advertising? Webb conducted a comparative study of material marketing and social campaigns of that era and propounded that social campaigns which adopted the exact technique of material marketing were a complete success (Reference: Journal Of Marketing – Issue No. 35, 1971). In the US, marketing of the Presidential election is quite an old tradition. Recently, during the election campaign of Barak Obama, we witnessed an extensive and clever use of all information and audio technologies, right from radio to modern facilities like internet. Obama had even requested the citizens to suggest him points for his post-oath-taking-ceremony speech and American citizens participated enthusiastically, happily to prepare a format of their newly elected President’s maiden speech. A special blog created for this purpose was flooded with people’s opinions, desires and expectations. The basic point is turning people to your side, to make them a part of your agenda, to inspire them to fulfill their responsibilities, to guide them towards ‘action’ by making them hold the finger of ‘thought’, to convince them that you are doing their work and to include them in the task some way or the other. This is in fact a long winding road. Technology is an aid, a medium. The modern-times technology has made this long route to reach people short and easy. But have our social, political workers, leaders realised this? Here I would like to mention the observations during my stint at Aakashvani and while advocating social issues on behalf of Sampark. Social activists always voice their grievance that the space social issues command in Media is getting sparse. Earlier the blame was put on newspapers which were looked upon as agents of the capitalists. Now things like globalisation, corporatisation of media are held responsible for the same. Some days back, during a training programme organised by us for its Zilla-level members, one national party observed that these members saw the world from a certain fixed angle. Because of this, limitations arise in understanding the changing world. It is important for the party workers to understand their party, its role and must have faith in it. But to extend the scope of their work and to help it reach people outside the party, they must assume that the people outside their party think differently than the party workers. You must have a main stream Media to reach them. Every social, political organisation has its own mouthpiece. However, its readership is limited. If one has to increase the circulation of these mouthpieces, then it must include content that will appeal to those who believe in an ideology different than yours. We then took up the task of reading and analysing content of several main stream newspapers. By the way, today this activity is an inseparable aspect of Sampark’s Media Training programme. After we finish reading and analysing any newspaper, the common reaction of the workers at all times we get that they had never read the newspapers in such a manner, with such an ‘open’ mind. Mainstream Media is all-inclusive by nature. There is a scope for everyone to play a role in it. And like I said in the beginning, whatever is related to human being, whatever is related to its existence can never be boring. What we learn here is that we must have the skill to use the position we get to its fullest. While producing programmes on the social issues on Akashwani, one hurdle I faced was that a person having a grip over a particular topic couldn’t present his thoughts in a way compatible to the medium of radio. If the interview is slotted for 10 minutes, then the interviewee use to think that his topic was so vast, so important, and with so much to tell how can he finish it all in just 10 minutes? Now TV channels have shrunk the same time to mere seconds. Since all social, political activists have this habit of speaking lengthy for hours in meetings and public gatherings, they find it difficult to keep their talk short and to the point. Basically, studying how to speak and write, practicing it, experimenting in it and attempting to influence using it, is not given much of an importance in social and political arena. The general assumption is that people take it casually & are sick of doing study. But now due to the growing power of Media and call for turning the young generation towards oneself, time has come for the workers & leaders to pay attention to the detail while communicating, speaking and writing everything, everything right from formatting an SMS to preparing a format of a speech. The point is, it is important to keep talking and writing in Media for social & political workers. Mainstream Media has interests of its own. In such times, one can surely reach people through a regulation-free e-medium. Again, the language of e-Media is different. If one wants to reach the young generation, then e-Media is more important. We began the training programme for the young volunteers of the earlier mentioned ‘Mother n Newborn health’ project which is being implemented in seven cities in Maharashtra with newspaper reading and news writing. Now they have reached a level where they recently organised an advocacy campaign called ‘Jananni Surakshaa Jagruti Abhiyaan’. This is replicable. To influence government’s policies, to make work the implementing machinery, role of Media is vital. Also, such social marketing definitely has enough power to influence political processes. (from www.netsampark.org)