New Age media and the digital divide in developing/under developed countries.

Does New Age media have an impact in third world regions?

(Saturday October 2nd, New Jersey-USA)

Blog description:

This blog will briefly explore the relevance of New Age media in developing and underdeveloped countries. Is New Age media relevant to people living below the international poverty with no formal education?

Muni’s day begins at 4 am. Her small single room hut protected by a thatched roof that leaks during the rainy season in Chennai (in India), is shared by her family of five, including three grown up sons. With just a single 60 watt bulb that lights the whole house and no fan or air conditioner to brave the scorching summer temperatures, Muni needs no alarm clock to wake her. The sound of the sate run water tanker’s engine revering up in her street is enough to get her on her toes. She need to hurry to join the large queue waiting outside to get the allocation of one bucket water per family. Muni is thankful that she is atleast able to get that one bucket. Others are not as fortunate as her. Muni slogs all day working as a domestic servant in several houses (including mine) during the day and rushes home to cook and fend for her family at night. Life is a struggle. Muni is one among millions of slum dwellers in India who struggle to get a bare minimum supply of electricity, water and healthy sanitation. She has no health insurance and has had no formal education and doesn’t know to even sign her own name or read an alphabet.

Does new age media/technology matter to people like Muni who are worried about how to provide the next meal to the family? Perhaps not. Why should we be concerned about Muni? Let’s take a look at world statistics to get a larger picture.

According to the US census bureau (www.census.gov),the world population is around 6.8 billion. Of this world population, developing and underdeveloped regions like Asia and Africa account for more than 75%. (India and China alone constitute 40% and Africa accounts for 26%). According to the World Bank statistics, as of Aug 2008, it is estimated that 1.4 billion people in the world live below the international poverty line (US $1.25 a day). It is also estimated that 885 million people across the world were illiterate as of year 2000 according to UNESCO report of 2002. So here is a population that is poor, has no access to technology and cannot read or write. Why or how would new age digital media make a difference to their lives? Is it even relevant? These are the issues I am exploring in my blog entry this week.

Researchers indicate that new age media is indeed making inroads in the developing and underdeveloped nations. In the Global Media Journal, Mindy A. Sipe-Haesemeyer’s (2005) article on Integrating technology access across the globe, (http://lass.calumet.purdue.edu/cca/gmj/fa05/graduatefa05/gmj-fa05gradinv-sipe.htm) dicusses some pertinent issues on the role of globalization and the third world countries’s access to technology. One research indicates that that it took the radio 30 years, television 13 years, and the Internet only four years to expand its audience to 50 million people,,” (Chernov, 2004, pg. 22). The internet and new age technology is penetrating the developing world in a rapid state.

Today most average Indians living on the borders of the poverty line owns a mobile phone. In fact people use the mobile services to call street hawkers and simple auto rickshaw drivers for their services. Every slum dwelling home is being provided with a cable television in India. For people like Muni, her only source of entertainment, relaxation and connection to the world outside the four walls of her slum is the cable TV provided by power hungry politicians for the vote she would cast to bring their party to power. An article by Robert Jensen (2008) http://home.uchicago.edu/~eoster/tvwomen.pdf spells out the power of TV in India. The number of television sets has increased more than six fold in Asia from 100 to 650 million. According to the National Readership Council 2006, 112 million households in India own a television with 61% having cable and satellite service.

This is just one example of rapid invasion of technology and new age media in the developing world. While the newspaper, internet, and online media may not be a good platform to reach out to this uneducated population, new age media through television and mobile services is definitely creating waves in the region. Consumption pattern of media is changing. Education, health and government interventions through radio, television and phone services are increasing. Awareness on world issues is increasing in the developing world thanks to new age media. But there is also resistance to this overwhelming invasion. People are resistant to the world wide web and the western influences in their societies and cultures that result from it. What are some of the pros and cons of new age media intervention?

Over the next several weeks, this blog will explore the various aspects of new age media and the role it plays in the developing world.