amity journal of media and communication studies

AMITY JOURNAL OF MEDIA AND COMMUNICATION STUDIES Volume 6 Number 2 Published in December 2016 ISSN 2231-1033

Chief Patron Dr. Aseem Chauhan Patrons Prof. S. K Dube Prof. S. L. Kothari Editorial Advisory Board Prof. Richard J. Peltz University of Arkansas, USA Prof. B. K. Kuthiala MCU, Bhopal, India Prof Sanjeev Bhanawat RU, Jaipur, India Dr. Vikas Dogra HPU, Shimla, India Dr. Ruchi Jaggi SIMC, Pune, India

Prof. Hamid Abdollahyan University of Tehran, Iran Prof. Sarah Barrow University of Lincoln, UK Dr. Sony Jalarajan Raj MacEwan University, Canada Prof. Bradley Clark Mount Royal University, Canada Prof. Pradeep Krishnatray Johns Hopkins University, USA

Prof. Vepa Rao HPU, Shimla, India Prof. Sanjay Johri Amity University, Lucknow Prof. Debashish Choudhury Amity University, Noida Dr. Sumit Narula Amity University, Gwalior Ms. Esha Jainiti Amity University, Gurgaon

Editor Prof. Manish Verma Assistant Editors Jayati M. Sharma Nithin K In-house editorial team Dr Ramesh Chandra Pathak Dr. Ashish Rao Gautam Bhattacharya Avinash Swaroop Tripathi Dr Tanushri Mukherjee Dr Ruchi Singh Gaur Gayatri Rai Rajesh Sharma Debastuti Dasgupta Saket Raman Dr Archana Nisha Thapar Brijesh Kumar Chaurasia Copyright@2015 by the Amity School of Communication. All rights reserved. The views expressed in the articles are those of the contributors and not necessarily of the Editorial Board or the Institution. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of Amity School of Communication.

Contents 1

Editorial

2

Going ‘Viral’ on Social Media: A Study of Popular Videos on

5 7-22

Facebook Prof Archana R Singh & Ishrat Singh 3

Design and Development of a Pitch for a Short Animated Film

23-28

based on the Success of Japanese Anime in India Sanjhiya Mayekar & Abhilash B.S. 4

Social Networking Sites and Social Capital: A Chandigarh-Based

29-39

Study of Undergraduate and Postgraduate Students Devashish Chakraborty 5

Pocoyo’s Approach to Good Values, Pro-social Behavior and True

40-44

Friendship for Young Viewers Dr. Fouzia A Shaikh & Dr. A.A.S.Azam 6

Brands on Stage: A Study on Brand Activation Business over an

45-48

Intellectual Property in an Event Dr. Archana 7

Facebook as Platform for News Dissemination, Possibilities of

49-56

Research on Facebook in Indian Context Sushobhan Patankar 8

Interpreting the Representational Meanings of a Movie from a

57-63

Subaltern Perspective: A case Study of Kabali Shiva Thrishul Punyamurthy 9

New Media and Governance: Issues in Democracy and the Transiting Public Sphere in India Bibu V N

64-72

Amity Journal of Media & Communication Studies (ISSN 2231 – 1033) 2016, Vol. 6, No. 2

Copyright 2016 by ASCO Amity University Rajasthan

Editorial

Amity Journal of Media and Communication completes six years of academic exploration. The current issue focuses on media and communication research traditions in Globalized world. The topic of discussions of our past issues were mainly around research in digital media, development culture, public relations, visual communication, cultural studies and journalism. This issue, we tried to bring an understanding of changing research trends and traditions in globalized world. The separation of social scientific 'research' and humanistic ‘studies’ draws lines between theory and empiricism as well as between quantitative and qualitative methods. It was clear that humanistic approaches are more ‘cultural’ in that they rely on qualitative methods and put more emphasis on theories and concepts of symbolic reality than do social approaches, which are more ‘materialist’ and have stronger traditions in the use of quantitative methods and the reliance on empirical data about social realities.” This observation from Juha Herkman is crucial and important. With amorous growth of data and digital atoms, the structural changes and roles of actors been changing and understanding it is also very significant. The public as an agent and the role of user in defining citizenships are very critical in current media research. Growing media globalization and the wreckage happening in the public sphere is more evident in global conditions. It is the time for a critical move towards finding the possibilities to regain the public sphere with all its democratic flavors. It will be more prudent to seriously concentrate on the potentials of an alternative media. We need to focus more on the new media technologies than the conventional media systems. With the innate capabilities like interactivity, user-friendliness, cost effectiveness and the radical structural decentralization is making this new medium as one of the best options for a democratic mode of communication.



Going ‘Viral’ on Social Media: A Study of Popular Videos on Facebook Prof. Archana R Singh Ishrat Singh Punjab University, India Abstract This study identifies ‘viral’ videos shared on official Facebook pages of three top leaders of Punjab, the state that is set to go for assembly elections in early 2017.Once the videos are identified, they will be analysed for various elements in the content. This study uses multi stage sampling process. In the first stage, the three top politicians belonging to three major parties are identified. The official Facebook pages of the selected political leaders are chosen as the universe of the study. The results of this study show that internet is not as effective a medium to reach the masses as far as the popular perception go because having large number of ‘views’ or ‘likes’ does not translate into a simple gesture such as ‘share’ in order for a video message to go viral. Keywords: viral, social media, political sphere,video

Introduction With the world increasingly going digital and political campaigns being driven online, one finds every political party trying hard to join the bandwagon and register an online presence. We have witnessed the phenomenon in the 2014 General Elections in India and are also witnessing it in the Presidential Race in the USA. The phenomenon is true not just for national level election campaigns but is evident in the assembly elections as well. This paper casts a look at the Punjab Assembly election scenario as the race to go ‘viral’ is on. In the politically- charged atmosphere of Punjab, social media is flooded with memes, trolls, videos, tweets, posts, all aiming to go ‘viral’. Be it Twitter, Facebook or YouTube, ‘trending’ and ‘viral’ content keeps ‘breaking’ the internet every day. This study compares the videos of three top political leaders of Punjab uploaded on their official Facebook pages to identify the viral ones. Just like the spread of an epidemic, from one living being to another in a very short time whose spread is uncontrolled, ‘viral’ content on the internet does the same. Initially called ‘eworm’ or ‘electronic- word of mouth’ which means spreading by sharing from one person to the other, the concept has entered marketing, entertainment and even political campaigns. It’s not one of those concepts that lack credibility or affect only a section of people. ‘Viral’ and ‘trending’ are sections included in most websites today even if they are conglomerated with traditional media. The Indian Express has a ‘viral’ section in its e-edition which showcases viral videos and posts trending nationally and globally. The phenomena has also triggered credibility issues as many unconfirmed rumors go viral before the facts are out and this may prove disastrous to a person or organization. The website of ABP news has a section called ‘Viral Sach’ which means ‘viral truth’. These are unconfirmed reports which went viral on the internet. This study identifies ‘viral’ videos shared on official Facebook pages of three top leaders of Punjab, the state that is set to go into assembly elections in the early 2017. Once the videos are identified, they will be analysed for various elements in the content.

Figure 1: Viral or trending videos on www.indianexpress.com

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Figure 2: Viral Sach on ABP News Review of Literature In this review, which has been arranged in a thematic chronological manner, the researchers have tried to cast a look at the previous studies in the various areas of communication studies. The purpose of the review is to identify the aspects that make a video go viral so that they can be studied in the context of the social media campaigning of the political parties in Punjab. Advertising: In one of the earliest studies conducted on viral messages, Lance Porter and Guy J. Golan in their 2006 journal article ‘From subservient chickens to brawny men: a comparison of viral advertising to television advertising’ have referred to electronic word of mouth as viral advertising, thereby coining the term. “Significantly more than traditional advertising, viral advertising relies on provocative content to motivate unpaid peerto-peer communication of persuasive messages from identified sponsors” (Golan, Lance Porter and Guy J., 2006). This study proves that such viral content uses raw emotions and “devices of sex, nudity, and violence are what motivate consumers to pass along content online.” This study also found that bigger companies like the Fortune 500 ones are less likely to use this kind of advertising but the number is increasing owing to the success of this method. The study finds that humour is the most common appeal followed by sex and nudity especially because these ads are unregulated unlike television. This exploratory study analyzed a total of 501 advertisements through content analysis method. In a similar study conducted in 2011 by Blaise Jenkins, the comparative content analysis method was followed. His paper was titled ‘Consumer Sharing of Viral Video Advertisements: A Look into Message and Creative Strategy Typologies and Emotional Content’. The paper studied some viral advertisements and identified their features. A key finding was that none of the advertisements used a comparative strategy, comparing them to other brands. However, every advertisement used unique selling proposition and brand image strategy. The main finding that transforms online video advertising is the use of brand image strategy: focusing primarily on the brand (image) itself, not the users (Jenkins, 2011). It is an exploratory study that examines 30 viral online ads. In the same year Petya Eckler and Paul Bolls in their study titled, ‘Spreading the virus: emotional tone of viral advertising and its effect on forwarding intentions and attitudes’ extend knowledge by exploring how the emotional tone (pleasant, unpleasant, coactive) of viral video ads affects attitude toward the ad, attitude toward the brand, and forwarding intentions. Results indicate that pleasant

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emotional tone elicits the strongest attitude toward the advertisement, attitude toward the brand, and intention to forward. The effects were weaker for coactive tone and weakest for negative emotional tone. These results challenge the common approach of shocking or scaring online users to motivate them to forward a viral video. The results indicate that in the context of product viral video advertising, emotional tone has a simple linear relationship with both attitudes and intentions. It used survey method in which participants watched viral ads and then filled a questionnaire (Bolls, 2011). Research questions were addressed with an experiment that incorporated a 3 (emotional tone) × 4 (ad) within-subjects repeated measures design. All participants viewed 12 video ads, or 4 ads in each level of emotional tone (pleasant, unpleasant, and coactive). There is always a mystery surrounding the reasons of the viral phenomenon. Christian Schulze, Lisa Schöler, & Bernd Skiera demystified the reasons behind this with their study titled, ‘Not All Fun and Games: Viral Marketing for Utilitarian Products’. This study aims to answer questions that link product characteristics and contexts to viral marketing success: Should primarily utilitarian products rely on the same sharing mechanisms for their viral marketing campaigns as less utilitarian products? If not, why is this the case, and how should viral marketing for primarily utilitarian products differ? Unsolicited and incentivized broadcast messages from friends are the least effective sharing mechanisms for primarily utilitarian products. Consumers generally do not visit Facebook to learn about utilitarian products, so they process viral marketing messages about such products differently than, say, messages about games. Stark differences were found in the effectiveness of sharing mechanism characteristics for different types of products. A survey of 751 apps by noting the downloads and sharing on Facebook was mathematically coded and success was proposed through models (Christian Schulze, Lisa Schöler, & Bernd Skiera, 2014). Proposed conceptual model was tested with a large-scale empirical study based on 751 Facebook apps; collected information about the number and characteristics of the sharing mechanisms employed in each app. A team of coders, thoroughly trained by the authors, evaluated the app characteristics. Videos: On closer observation of the phenomenon, one notices that videos have a greater tendency to go viral. Kevin Wallsten in his 2009 paper ‘Yes We Can’: How Online Viewership, Blog Discussion, Campaign Statements and Mainstream Media Coverage Produced a Viral Video Phenomenon’ talks about how bloggers seem to occupy a unique and influential position in determining the extent to which online videos impact election campaigns (Wallsten, 2009). Results suggest that the discussions that take place on a blog and not the size of the audience are responsible in driving users towards a video and also getting media attention, thus making an election campaign successful. The research proves that interest of the bloggers in the video was the single largest reason for it going viral. This study includes only one political video, thus the results may or may not be true for only this video. Methodology used was that of detailed analysis of the video over time, blogs that were written about it and the print media attention it got. In the journal article, ‘Going Viral – The Dynamics of Attention’ of 2009 by Bob Boynton, ‘going viral’ has been interpreted in three ways. One is the high number of views for a video but it is a vague concept as there is no clarity as to how many views mean “viral”. The second way is the relation with the biological concept of the spreading of an epidemic. For something to go viral, a few users adopt it and spread it to others. “The structure of spreading the word is: 1) making it your own by adding a copy to your own blog or website, which has been made easier in the last year as embedding has become popular, 2) blogging, i.e., writing publicly about the video and ordinarily including a URL for the video, and 3) private communication that is also made easier by web connections” (Boynton, 2009). The third way is a functional form that says that if a video has less infected people at the start and end of its popularity, then it should form a sigmoid graph which was not true for the samples studied. He thus concludes that only the number of views for a video does not mean that it is viral. The study analysed the content and statistics related to all the campaign videos of presidential candidates and results showed that no video of

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the 2008 US presidential election campaign went viral. Similarly in a study by Tyler West, Going Viral: Factors That Lead Videos to Become Internet Phenomena’ (2011), 20 viral videos as listed by Times magazine are monitored to bring out the common elements which are responsible for a YouTube video going viral. “Understanding the prevalent elements within viral videos will allow for the prediction of which videos will become popular. This information will be useful for viral marketing campaigns” (West, 2011). Title length, run-time, element of laughter, surprise and irony, presence of minority and musical elements, youth and talent are some of the elements, which can be altered to make videos viral (revealed by results). The author examined the top 20 viral videos as determined by Time Magazine. Each video’s content was recorded for analysis of its main features. Predicting and controlling the virus: It is a general belief that virality can neither be predicted nor be controlled. Mauro Bampo, Michael T. Ewing, Dineli R. Mather, David Stewart and Mark Wallace in their 2008 journal article ‘The Effects of the Social Structure of Digital Networks on Viral Marketing Performance’, disprove the conventional belief that spread of viral messages are random and unmanageable (Mauro Bampo, 2008). It provides models for advertisers that can be helpful in controlling external as well as internal factors responsible for virality. The proposed models can be used to measure the impact of the viral campaign. Findings confirm that the social structure of digital networks play a critical role in the spread of a viral message. Analyses of viral marketing campaign and stimulation experiments were a part of the methodology. ‘A Viral Branching Model for Predicting the Spread of Electronic Word of Mouth’ ,a 2010 paper ,discusses the lack of models to help marketers to predict how many customers a viral marketing campaign will reach and how marketers can influence this process through marketing activities. This paper develops such a model using the theory of branching processes and empirical studies of real viral campaigns (Ralf van der Lans, Gerrit van Bruggen, Jehoshua Eliashberg and Berend Wierenga, 2010). The results show that the model quickly predicts the actual reach of the campaign. The model is applied to only one viral marketing campaign where it is successful but the same is a limitation of this study. Motivation and emotion: What emotions should an advertisement or video have so as to go viral? What factors can motivate users to share content enough to make it viral? A study in 2010, ‘A multi-stage model of word-of-mouth influence through viral marketing’, a model is developed to help identify the role word-of-mouth plays during each stage of a viral marketing recipients' decision-making process, including the conditions that moderate such influence. It then presents an innovative methodology for collecting data unobtrusively and in real time. It empirically tests the model and methodology via a field study, where reactions of 1100 individuals were observed after they received an unsolicited e-mail from one of their acquaintances, inviting them to take a survey and in turn spread the word about it. It was found that characteristics of the social tie influenced recipients' behaviours but had different effects at different stages: tie strength facilitated awareness, perceptual affinity triggered recipients' interest, and demographic similarity had a negative influence on each stage of the decision-making process. It is an Internet-based field study using Stanley Milgram's ‘small world methodology’ (Arnaud De Bruyn, Gary L. Lilien, 2008). it was found while close relationships can be effective in capturing recipients' attention and creating awareness (e.g., to drive traffic to a website), they had no influence at later stages. ‘Viral marketing: Motivations to forward online content’ by Jason Y.C. Ho and Melanie Dempsey in 2010 identifies four potential motivations for sharing: (1) the need to be part of a group, (2) the need to be individualistic, (3) the need to be altruistic, and (4) the need for personal growth. “Using a survey of young adults, we examine the relationship between these motivations and the frequency of passing along online content. Results show that Internet users, who are more individualistic and/or more altruistic, tend to forward more online content than others.” (Jason Y.C. Ho, 2010) First, of the two motivations underlying the concept of inclusion, only individuation was positively related to the forwarding of online content. A survey was conducted for this study. Data were collected by sending 586 participants a link to an online survey which took approximately 30 min to

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complete. Similarly, ‘What Makes online Content Viral?’ was a question asked in a paper by the same name in 2011 by Jonah Berger and Katherine L. Milkman which takes a psychological approach to understanding diffusion. Using a unique data set of all the New York Times articles published over a three-month period, the authors examine how emotion shapes virality. The results indicate that positive content is more viral than negative content, but the relationship between emotion and social transmission is more complex than valence alone. Virality is partially driven by physiological arousal. Content that evokes high-arousal positive (awe) or negative (anger or anxiety) emotions is more viral. Content that evokes low-arousal, or deactivating, emotions (e.g., sadness) is less viral. These results hold even when the authors control for how surprising, interesting, or practically useful content is (all of which are positively linked to virality), as well as external drivers of attention (e.g., how prominently content was featured). Experimental results further demonstrate the causal impact of specific emotion on transmission and illustrate that it is driven by the level of activation induced. Taken together, these findings shed light on why people share content and how to design more effective viral marketing campaigns (Milkman, Jonah Berger and Katherine L., 2011). It is a content analysis of articles published in the New York Times. Role of users: No message can go viral unless the users decide. Therefore, the role of users in making content viral is paramount. The question is who are the ones that can share and create a trend that has the potential of making the post viral? Michael Trusov, Anand V. Bodapati and Randolph E. Bucklin’s 2010 paper titled ‘Determining Influential Users in Internet Social Networks’ identify the users of the internet who influence internet usage of other people, in turn potentially making something viral. The objective was to estimate the influence of each Social Networking site member on the site usage of other member on the basis of a simple metric of their activity level (Michael Trusov, Anand V. Bodapati and Randolph E. Bucklin , 2010). A user was considered ‘influential’ if his or her activity level, as captured by site log-ins over time, has a significant effect on others' activity levels and, consequently, on the site's overall page view volume. The authors propose a nonstandard form of Bayesian shrinkage implemented in a Poisson regression and apply the model to data obtained from a major Social Networking site, which wants to remain anonymous. ‘Seeding Viral Content: The Role of Message and Network Factors’ by Yuping Liu-Thompkins as a research, examines key aspects of the seeding strategy by tracking the diffusion of 101 new videos published on YouTube through a Content analysis of No. of seeds, their influence and homogeneity. The results of this study suggest that a positive outcome is more likely if more seeds are used to start a viral campaign. Results show that it is best to start a viral campaign with consumers who have a strong tie with the viral message originator. Analysis showed that it is not ideal to use seed consumers with a large number of connections. A moderately heterogeneous group of consumers can best increase the reach of a viral message to more diverse consumer populations (Liu-Thompkins, 2012). Studies identified several key factors for why a video becomes viral. However, they did not address the path videos take to reach wild popularity. The next step will be examining the route a viral video takes on the web. Authors such as, Wallsten (2008) argue that much of the reason a video becomes popular can be attributed to its distribution through social networks. For this reason, continuing research on this topic should be combined with social media pathways. By understanding how and why a video becomes viral, and how social media promotes the medium, fabricating viral videos will become more of an art form than a guessing game. Rationale for this study The phenomena of viral videos of different nature are a recent development in the context of mass media research over the years. The researchers have been able to find different studies under variety of themes but not a body of work which could take any theme into greater depths.

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The need for this study is also vital because Punjab would be going in for elections in the coming year and this will be the apt time to observe the phenomena of the online nature of political campaigns. Recent parliamentary elections in India (2014) have already demonstrated that social media and online campaigns have been used effectively. It is only obvious that they will be used predominantly in this election as well. This research will, therefore, observe the videos whose shares from the official pages made them viral. Theoretical Perspective In the early 40s, before the invention of television, Lazarsfeld, Berelson and Goudet conducted an American survey on mass campaigns and gave the multi step flow theory of communication. The study revealed that informal social relationships had played a part in modifying the manner in which individuals selected content from the media campaign. The study also indicated that ideas often flow from the radio and newspapers to opinion leaders and from them to the less active sections of society. Thus, informal social groups have some degree of influence on people and mould the way they select media content and act on it. According to this model, ideas flow from mass media - to opinion leader - to the majority of the population. The ‘viral’ phenomenon is all about the selecting and sharing of content by people once opinion leaders share it on mass media (here, internet) Diffusion of Innovation (DOI) Theory developed by E.M. Rogers in 1962, originated in communication to explain how, over time, an idea or product gains momentum and diffuses (or spreads) through a specific population or social system. It traces the process by which a new idea or practice is communicated through certain channels over time among members of a social system. The model describes the factors that influence people's thoughts and actions and the process of adopting a new technology or idea. For anything to go ‘viral’, it has to be viewed and shared by people over a time period, which are the initial days. Once it gains momentum, it will be shared i.e. diffusion will take place. Thus, it is an essential model to be followed by creators of content aiming at virality. Uses and gratification theory is the theory which explains of how people use media for their need and gratification. As media users become increasingly confronted with choices, this approach should direct our attention to the audience. For this study, this theory’s relevance comes in terms of users of the internet who will watch videos only if it gives them gratification, only then will it be shared and will have the potential to go viral. This is an important theory for content creators to keep in mind as to how to make content which will fall into the categories of needs and gratifications of their prospects. Propounded by Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann, the spiral of silence theory states that the media publicizes opinions that are mainstream and people adjust their opinions according to their perceptions to avoid being isolated. Individuals who perceive their own opinion as being accepted will express it, whilst those who think themselves as being a minority, suppress their views. Innovators and change agents are unafraid to voice different opinions, as they do not fear isolation. The content created to go viral must directly or indirectly concur with the majority opinion or must make their opinions that of the majority especially in case of political campaigns. Formulated by Albert Bandura at Stanford University, the social learning theory specifies that mass-media messages give audience members an opportunity to identify with attractive characters that demonstrate behaviour, engage emotions, and allow mental rehearsal and modelling of new behaviour. The behaviour of models in the mass media also offers vicarious reinforcement to motivate audience members' adoption of the behaviour. The viral content creators will definitely want to employ these techniques for people to relate to their content and trigger sharing patterns that will make their post viral. The Agenda setting theory puts forth the ability of the media to influence the significance of events in the public's mind. The media set the agenda for the audience's discussion and mentally order and organize their world. McCombs and Shaw assert that the agenda-setting function of the media causes the correlation between the media and public ordering of priorities. The people most affected by the media agenda are those who have a high need for

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orientation. Content that aims to go viral will have to influence minds that the events referred to are of high significance and should be discussed by them. Developed by Ball-Rokeach and De Fluer, the key idea behind the Media dependency theory is that audiences depend on media information to meet needs and reach goals, and social institutions and media systems interact with audiences to create needs, interests, and motives in the person. The degree of dependence is influenced by the number and centrality of information functions and social stability. New media is fast growing and more and more people are depending on it for information. Thus, In order for a message to go viral, it has to seem credible and public should become dependent on it enough to share it in large numbers.

Objectives • • •

To identify the popular political videos of Punjab’s political leaders To analysis the content of the popular videos To identify viral videos

Methodology This study uses multi -stage sampling process. In the first stage, the three top politicians belonging to three major parties are identified. The official Facebook pages of the selected political leaders are chosen as the universe of the study. In the time frame of the study i.e.1st January, 2016 to 1stJune 2016, the videos have been identified. The chosen videos are those that have more than 400 shares at the official pages of leaders from the 3 most important parties in Punjab: Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal from SAD-BJP (Since the CM does not have an official page on Facebook), Former CM Amarinder Singh from Congress and AAP Member of Parliamnet Bhagwant Mann as he had declared himself as the CM candidate of the party on record in 2015. In the third stage of the methodology, `view: share’ formula is applied to calculate the extent of virality of the videos. The units of analysis are as below: • The genre of the video: whether it was a speech, a visit/rally, an interview, a video message, a song or something else. • The content of the video • Appeal(s) used • Emotional elements used • Topic/theme Timeframe This study focuses on videos from 1st January, 2016 to 1stJune 2016. Data Presentation and Analysis The videos shortlisted from the pages have been watched, analysed and elements form the content have been noted. The data is presented in tabular form with the leaders mentioned in alphabetical order.

Date

No of views (in thousands)

Number of shares

Amarinder Singh (Congress) Views : Shares (Ratio)

April 19

35

420

83:1

Mar 16

24

413

58:1

Content

Personal video message on reaching America. Appeal to oneness of NRI’s Interview to channel; discusses current issue (SYL), demeans rival. Appeal to patriotism and is provocative

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in nature. Personal video message, talks of development strategy, unemployment and drugs and youth in politics. Demeans rival and uses emotional appeal Speech at Panjab University. Talks about youth education and drugs followed by a QnA session. Mostly uses development appeal. Short video showing audience response on arrival in Panjab University. Personal video message explaining boycott of Khadoor Sahib by-election. Demeans rival.

Feb 7

26

572

45:1

Feb 3

25

551

45:1

Jan 28

51

442

115:1

Jan 28

33

450

73:1

Jan27

26

456

57:1

Press conference on election boycott announcement, talks of sacrilege and Bargari firing, demeans rival and is provocative in nature.

Jan 10

48

466

103:1

Personal message inviting people to maghi mela; uses religious appeal.

Jan 8

51

536

95:1

Interview with zee news; demeaning rival.

Table 1: Views: Shares ratio on Captain Amrinder Singh’s timeline on Facebook

Figure 3: FB page of Captain Amrinder Singh

May 17

Number of views (in thousands) 72

Bhagwant mann (AAP) Number of Views : Shares shares (Ratio) 821 88:1

May 16

113

1555

73:1

May 15

50

400

125:1

May 15

113

1046

108:1

Date uploaded

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Content Media coverage of the rally at Chandigarh. Personal video message thanking people for being a part of the rally and being non- violent. Personal video message asking people to come for rally, stay non violent. Personal video message asking



May 7

109

2050

53:1

May 6

163

3473

47:1

May 5

90

470

191:1

Apr 26

103

576

178:1

Mar 23

198

1117

177:1

Mar 7

92

2086

44:1

Mar6

52

1561

33:1

Mar1 Feb27

204 145

1331 2075

153:1 70:1

Feb26

87

921

94:1

Feb18

83

1106

75:1

Feb11

203

2339

87:1

Feb11

212

3053

69:1

Feb11

153

3046

50:1

Feb11

58

1752

33:1

Feb10

150

1753

86:1

Feb4 Feb1

110 40

919 967

120:1 41:1

Jan20

305

2397

127:1

Jan18

135

2992

45:1

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people to join him in gheraoing CM’s residence in Chandigarh. ‘Global Punjab’ interview with Bhagwant Mann about Zee blackout; calls it a threat to media and promises breaking the cable mafia network when in power Personal video criticising Zee network blackout on fast way cable network, blaming ruling party for the same and expressing solidarity towards the channel. Public video; Indians stuck in Saudi Arabia thanking Bhagwant Mann for helping them come back to India Public video; Indians stuck in Saudi Arabia thanking Bhagwant Mann for helping them come back to India Personal message about going to khatkar kalaan, Bhagat Singh and then holla mahala rally cum program. Uses religious appeal. Public video, boys stranded in Saudi Arabia talking about their problems. Speech in parliament; demeans rival and criticizing working of Prime Minister Kejriwal’s car attacked in Punjab. Kejriwal’s NDTV interview; talks about Punjab problems- farmer suicides, loans, no compensation, drugs, cancer and demean rival. Saudi Arabian boys video just before returning home, thanking Mann. Public kabadi cup video saying that we will vote for AAP; poem praising AAP and demeaning SAD. Saudi Arabian boys video just before returning home, thanking Mann. Personal message shot outside Videsh Mantralya, informing of help provided to Saudi Arabian boys. Public-made spoof film dubbed with Sukhbir Badal’s speech, showing Kirron Kher fed up. Public-made poem for Kejriwal and AAP and demeaning SAD and BJP for price-rise and drug menace. Interview saying I will help Saudi Arabian boys and demeans government. Public-made video against congress. Public-made video; kids shouting AAP slogans in streets. Public- made video; volunteers in rally sloganeering and praising AAP. ABP Sanjha news report showing anti government slogans at SAD rally; people thrown out,



Jan15

203

3592

57:1

Personal message thanking people for coming to maghi mela rally.

Jan14

158

1039

152:1

Speech video praising people for coming to the rally.

Jan14 Jan13

395 58

4201 457

94:1 127:1

Jan13

117

2676

44:1

Jan13

226

2510

90:1

Jan11

84

1574

53:1

Kejriwal’s entry at a rally in Punjab. Maghi mela rally preparation video by Mann and invitation/request for public to come. AAP Canadian volunteer video demeaning rivals and listing Punjab’s problems and invite to Maghi mela rally. Same video as above (uploaded twice) AAP Mansa volunteers demeaning rivals and listing Punjab’s problems, praising AAP and Kejriwal and inviting people to Maghi mela rally

Jan10

188

3169

59:1

Jan9

226

3968

57:1

AAP overseas volunteer video, Muktsar Maghi mela invitation song demeaning rivals and talking of Punjab’s problems. Maghi mela invite personal video, Mann says it is to save punjab from drugs, corruption, mafia, poverty, unemployment, Congress and Badals.

Table 2: Views: Shares ratio on Bhagwant Mann’s timeline on Facebook

Figure 4: Facebook page of Bhagwant Mann The closest ratio (33:1) is that of a video uploaded on March 6; it is an assembly speech of Bhagwant Mann wherein he recites a poem called ‘Achhe din’, which is a sarcastic comment on the work done by the prime minister in almost one year of his being in the office. It uses sarcasm to highlight the unfulfilled promises made by the PM at the time of campaigning. It is a common observation that stories that go viral have sensational content. This video is an

16



example of the same wherein satirical recitation has been used to convey a message. This video has all the ingredients of a sensational news story and hence is the most popular video of all. A screen capture of the same is shown below.

Figure 5: Screen capture of the most popular video Sukhbir Singh Badal (SAD) Date uploaded Number of views (in thousands) May 14 74

Number of shares

Views : Shares (Ratio)

1399

53:1

May 10 May 1

22 50

429 1067

51:1 47:1

Apr 30 Apr 29 Apr 23 Apr 15

34 89 167 137

659 926 2324 1859

52:1 96:1 72:1 74:1

Apr 13

94

697

135:1

Apr 10

100

520

192:1

Apr 8 Apr 7

80 80

457 470

175:1 170:1

Apr 5

78

612

127:1

Apr 4

84

800

105:1

Apr 2

97

511

190:1

Apr1

37

711

52:1

Mar31

41

712

58:1

Content

Advertisement about Chappar Chirhi memorial ‘Fateh Burj’ Clipping of Sukhbir Badal’s China visit Advertisement about SGGS University in Fatehgarh Sahib Advertisement about Driving school in Muktsar Advertisement about Jung-e-azadi memorial Advertisement about automated driving test parks. Sukhbir Badal speech at Baisakhi rally at Talwandi sabo talking about development schemes Sukhbir Badal and Prakash Badal speeches at Baisakhi rally at Talwandi sabo Sukhbir Badal boasting about the awards bagged by state in assembly Sukhbir Badal boasting about sewa kendras in assembly Sukhbir Badal boasting about Punjab’s industrial growth in assembly Sukhbir Badal boasting about their development schmes in assembly Sukhbir Badal boasts about Industrial and farming growth in Punjab in assembly. Sukhbir Badal boasting about schemes for farmers and villages in Punjab in assembly Development advertisement video about Rajpura 1400 MW thermal plant. Assembly speech on development, electricity i.e. powers

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surplus state, 4-6 lane roads and demeaning rival. Assembly speech on per capita income of state rise in last 9 years, development and poverty reduction. Rally speech on farmer’s electricity bill subsidy. Golden temple ad about entrance plaza construction. Assembly speech explaining productive debt and GDP increase comparing with other states.

Mar30

34

578

59:1

Mar29 Mar29 Mar28

55 111 67

823 1831 808

67:1 60:1 83:1

Mar27 Mar27 Mar26

46 178 97

718 2464 423

64:1 72:1

Mar20

96

1490

64:1

Mar19

99

1318

75:1

Mar18

133

1236

107:1

Mar15 Mar14 Mar11 Feb19 Feb13

134 179 330 159 266

1652 1649 1612 427 1435

81:1 108:1 204:1 372:1 185:1

Feb13

182

761

239:1

Feb10

175

489

358:1

Some function speech on investment friendly Punjab; comparison with other states.

Feb10

172

552

311:1

Feb9

178

833

213:1

Function speech on good governance policies, development and jobs. Function speech on Punjab’s growth, development, power surplus state, demeaning congress, road network, bridges, Mohali airport, urban and rural development, health, education, sports and welfare schemes.

Feb8

173

728

238:1

Feb7

243

978

248:1

Speech on debt and GDP increase, demeaning rival. Virasat e Khalsa ad video. Assembly speech on financial health of Punjab comparing with opposition, talking about development and demeaning rival. Advertisement of Indian School of Business. Assembly speech demeaning rivals and demanding answer from cong leader-comedy/insult video. Mohali hockey stadium ad. Chhapar Chirhi ad. Flyovers of Punjab; construction ad Ropar bypass ad. Old age pension doubled ad. Rally speech using religious appeal, self praising leadership, Sikh heritage preservation, religious constructions and development of Amritsar. Rally speech on drugs claiming Punjab not responsible and comparing with other states. Uses patriotic appeal (community)

Function speech on financial health of state, debts, revenue, tax devolution from centre, reduced poverty, health and education using central statistics. Function speech using provocative and patriotic appeal, demeaning rival. Talks of revenue increase, financial health of Punjab along with comparison with other states.

Table 3: Views: Shares ratio on Sukhbir Badal’s timeline on Facebook

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Figure 6: Facebook Page of Sukhbir Badal Discussion The main finding of this study is that none of the videos qualify as ‘viral’ according to the formulated methodology. No video could even feature in the twenties as far as the views: shares ratio of 24:1 is concerned. From videos having 400 shares to 4,000 shares and videos with 20,000 views to videos having 2,00,000 views, these figures stand useless as far as going ‘viral’ is concerned. This shows that the perception of online campaigning being very big is after all, not correct. Especially in Punjab, whose assembly elections are around the corner, where campaigning has already begun and reached its peak one expects better results but it is not to be. As far as all videos being similar are concerned, it is not true. Some videos are public- made while some are high quality advertisements. Some videos are funny parody songs while some are TV interviews. Some were hot burning issues while some were controversial and sensational. This goes to show that content and genres were contrasting and aplenty but none could create enough impact to trigger viewers to share them enough so as to go viral. Another thing to be kept in mind here is that many of the videos have content that demeans rival parties and politicians, or talk about development in the state while rampantly using the patriotic and religious appeals. This perhaps, as the results suggest, is not the way to go for Punjab’s politicians if they want to go ‘viral’ and help their own campaign in a state that has 70% of its population under the age of 40. In the journal article, ‘Going Viral – The Dynamics of Attention’of 2009by Bob Boynton (Boynton, 2009), the researcher analysed the content and statistics related to all the campaign videos of presidential candidates and results showed that no video of the 2008 US presidential election campaign went viral. Although, the methodology adopted was different, the results were the same as this study. The ‘viral’ phenomenon is all about the selecting and sharing of content by people once opinion leaders share it on the internet. With respect to the multi step theory of mass media, ideas often flow from the radio and newspapers to opinion leaders and from them to the less active sections of society. The online media however paints an absolutely new picture because the information flow on online medium is characterised by the `all-at-once-ness’ of information flow where the opinion leaders may be present at various levels and not necessarily amongst the media persons. In this context it is apparent that the multi step flow theory will have to be observed in a different manner on online media. The virality of videos depends upon the interest levels amongst the persons who view the videos online or with whom the videos may have been shared by another individual. The chances of the commonality of choices is very limited hence the videos need to have unique characteristics that may be found interesting by majority. In the present study only one

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video ( Mr. Bhagwant Mann’s speech) comes closest to being called `viral’ in a tentative way as discussed on page number 14-15. This video involves special combination of characteristics such as: 1.Celebrity 2. Theatrics 3. Poetry 4. Narration 5. Dramatic effect 6. Satire in content 7. Anti establishment 8. Prominent location (Parliament) 9. Credibility due to location and identity of individual 10. Human interest The fact that presence of all these qualities could not make the video go viral in the `real’ sense of the word goes to prove that many more special qualities are required to make the video appeal to all sections of the masses because the opinion leaders may be present in any strata amongst the audiences. With respect to the uses and gratification theory,public is increasingly becoming selective due to the information overload online today. For someone to share a video, more that one of his needs have to be satisfied. It is becoming increasingly difficult to make people watch a video, sharing is an altogether different issue. Politicians have to keep in mind these things and prepare content which will make the public choose to watch their video. The reason for this should be that the video fulfils all their needs. The video should be such that the people are happy to emulate the sam behaviour to their advantage as social learning theory suggests. If he video is in consonance with the thought and behaviour of the target audinece they will be motivated to share the particular video. Thus, this element of motivation is an important feature that video makers must include to make potentially viral videos.This element is lacking in the studied videos and could be a major reason for the videos not being shared enough.If the media are able to keep a finger on the audience’s pulse they will be able to set the agenda for change. The videos are primarily created to initiate public discussion.The media (here news oriented media) set an agenda and make an issue popular. This quality is used in many videos but still those videos are not viral. The reason is that the set agendas are discussed but lack qualities of progressive mindsets discussed above. These agendas are used to blame the rivals which defeats the purpose. As the review of literature has pointed out positive, progress oriented, optimistic videos have a better chance of going viral, which does not seem to be the case in the above sample. In a study by Tyler West, ‘Going Viral: Factors That Lead Videos to Become Internet Phenomena’ (2011) 20 viral videos as listed by Times magazine are monitored to bring out the common elements which are responsible for a youtube video going viral. This study was trying to adopt the same approach but the finding that revealed that no video could qualify as viral changed the focus on suggesting how to make videos viral and what were the reasons why the studied videos failed to go viral. A study in 2010, ‘A multi-stage model of word-of- mouth influence through viral marketing’ by Arnaud De Bruyn, Gary L. Lilien, a model is developed to help identify the role word-of- mouth plays during each stage of a viral marketing recipients; decision-making process, including the conditions that moderate such influence. This study also established that electronic word of mouth i.e. sharing of the videos by viewers is the way to go viral. This was the basis of identifying virality by calculating the views to shares ratio of each video which had to be enough to say that it is spreading like information travels in case of word-of-mouth.

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Conclusion The study began by analysing videos to identify virality and hence the reasons behind it. Previous studies indicated that the general way of tagging a video as ‘viral’ just because it got a huge number of hits was not correct. Any video shared by a celebrity or a popular person can get those numbers. Thus, going by the biological definition of ‘viral’, the shares made by general people in comparison to the views can make it viral. Hence, a ratio was used for views and shares, whose relationship in a video can identify ‘virality’. Keeping in mind the literature connected to this study, factors that identify ‘virality’ have been established. No set definition of ‘virality’ is in place but many studies have given their own definitions and criteria. This study has also established criteria for the same and recognized no video as viral which is the main finding of this study. Similarly, this study established a mechanism that drives virality. It says that sharing of the video by influential users or celebrities does not make it viral as they have an already established fan base. Thus it is not the current video/post that is driving the views and shares. Sharing by regular users has to be in such huge numbers that the video can be considered as viral. The results of this study also show that internet is not as effective a medium to reach the masses as far as the popular perception goes because having large number of ‘views’ or ‘likes’ does not translate into a simple gesture such as ‘share’ in order for a video /message to go viral. Therefore, to expect that ‘Like’ to translate into a vote is too farfetched. There is no doubt about the fact that internet as a medium has the potential of maximum reach in minimum amount of time and money but extracting such results is a whole different ball game. Reference Anurag Tiruwa, R. Y. (2014). Going Viral: An Effective Strategy for Marketing. RESEARCH AND SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS (pp. 598-603). New Delhi: EXCEL INDIA PUBLISHERS. Arnaud De Bruyn, Gary L. Lilien. (2008). A multi-stage model of word-of-mouth influence through viral marketing. Intern. J. of Research in Marketing, 151-163. Bolls, P. E. (2011). Spreading the virus: Emotional tone of viral advertising and its effect on forwarding intentions and attitudes. Journal of Interactive Advertising, 1-11. Boynton, B. (2009). Going Viral – The Dynamics of Attention. The Journal of Information Technology and Politics, 11-38. Christian Schulze, Lisa Schöler, & Bernd Skiera. (2014). Not all fun and games: Viral marketing for Utilitarian Products. Journal of Marketing, 1-19. Golan, Lance Porter and Guy J. (2006). From subservient chickens to brawny men: A comparison of viral advertising to television advertising. Journal of Interactive Advertising, Vol 6 No 2 , 26-33. Jason Y.C. Ho, M. D. (2010). Viral marketing: Motivations to forward online content. Journal of Business Research, 1000– 1006. Jenkins, B. (2011). Consumer Sharing of Viral Video Advertisements: A Look into Message and Creative Strategy Typologies and Emotional Content. Taoyuan: Capstone. Liu-Thompkins, Y. (2012). Seeding Viral Content The Role of Message and Network Factors. Journal of advertising research, 59-72. Mauro Bampo, M. T. (2008). The Effects of the Social Structure of Digital Networks on Viral Marketing Performance. Information Systems Research, 273-290. Milkman, Jonah Berger and Katherine L. (2011). What Makes online Content Viral? Journal of Marketing Research, 1-14. Michael Trusov, Anand V. Bodapati and Randolph E. Bucklin . (2010). Determining Influential Users in Internet Social Networks. Journal of Marketing Research, 643-658. Ralf van der Lans, Gerrit van Bruggen, Jehoshua Eliashberg and Berend Wierenga. (2010). A Viral Branching Model for Predicting the Spread of Electronic Word of Mouth. Marketing Science, 348-365. S.Shankland. (2009 йил wednesday-February). “The Twitter Effect: Possibilities and Limits. Retrieved 2016 йил 23-April from www.cnet.com: http://www.cnet.com/news/the-twitter-effect-possibilities-and-limits/

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Wallsten, K. (2009). “Yes We Can”: How Online Viewership, Blog Discussion, Campaign Statements and Mainstream Media Coverage Produced a Viral Video Phenomenon. YouTube and the 2008 Election Cycle in the US, 39-62. West, T. (2011). Going Viral: Factors That Lead Videos to Become Internet Phenomena. The Elon Journal of Undergraduate Research in Communications, 76-84.

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Design and Development of a Pitch for a Short Animated Film based on the Success of Japanese Anime in India Sanjhiya Mayekar Abhilash B.S. Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences, India Abstract Children’s television programs in India have received a tremendous growth in recent times with a lot of Japanese Anime being aired which help bring very high ratings to them. This dissertation tries to investigate the reasons for popularity of Japanese anime in India as well as in the World. The results are then applied to develop a pitch for an animated series/short film for the target audience of teenagers and young adults. Factors for the success of Anime around the world, like collaborative creativity, universal appeal etc., are derived after reviewing the literature on the popularity of Japanese Anime in India and the success of Japanese anime in the world. A few factors such as unique and complex storyline which is reflective of the current post-modern society etc. are chosen, which could cater to the Indian audience. Considering the current Indian animated content on television, a unique plot is developed, which tells the story of a girl in search of her missing father under extraordinary circumstances. Characters and environments are designed to incorporate the nuances of the postmodern society. A pitch book is designed, which contains information of the entire story and its characters. Finally, a teaser trailer is made which showcases the gist of the story and a small survey is conducted to test the success of the pitch. Even though the survey was conducted on a small scale, nearly 50% of the respondents felt that Indian animation has the scope of doing better. With the small amount of data, it can be concluded that though there was interest in the teaser due to the visual appeal, it lacked in creating the expected amount of hype. Keywords: Japanese Animation, Indian Animation, Children, Television Series, Story

Introduction Despite the huge popularity of Western animation all over the world, especially that of Disney, a unique style of animation coming from a small eastern culture, has its own ground to stand on. Anime is famously defined all over the world as all animated material that has been produced in Japan. The television industry in India has grown to be almost as large as the film industry of the country. Ernst & Young’s newsletter Newsreel states that children’s genre has emerged as the largest viewership segment after India’s general entertainment channel (GEC) sector (Jaggi, 2015). With economic liberalization and privatization in early 1990s, television was also opened to foreign investment. The ‘Cool Japan’ campaign by the Japanese government to globalize Japan, helped bring dubbed anime content on Indian television. However, it has been restricted to anime for young children and teenage boys with shows like ‘Doraemon’ and shown on Hungama Channel, and ‘Shinchan’ on Nick, getting some of the highest TRPs. The latest study shows that Doraemon, the robotic cat on Hungama TV, is now the number one favorite character among kids (Omaxe Research, 2012). But Anime is popular amongst Indian teens and young adults as well. The core element that attracts Indians to Anime is the wide variety of genres and topics that are not even found in Indian cinema. This wide variety of genres means that there is something for everyone. With the increase of internet usage, Indian fans get easier access to their favorite Anime and it only helps in increasing the fan base further.

Method Literature Review The literature survey has been conducted in two parts; first one being about the popularity of Japanese Anime in India and in the world, and the second one being about understanding Japanese culture. A study by Manion (2005) suggests that Anime is a reflection of Japanese culture and the interest in Anime in the West is due to interest of people in Japan as a country. But the study for the above mentioned claim was conducted only in 3 states of the U.S.A. All Anime stories, that are popular in India, offer ways to confront the different stages of growing up into proper & balanced adulthood. Kids discover universality and contemporarily in both characters and stories and also Anime has a unique flavour (Thomas, 2014). However, these are just observations of recent broadcasted television series made by the author and are not backed by facts or interviews of the target audience.

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It is observed that dubbing in local languages and endearing characters are the factors that are most responsible for attracting Indian children towards Japanese Anime (Jaggi, 2015). This study was concluded by conducting group interviews of the target audience in schools all over Pune city. But its limitation is that the opinions are restricted to only children of one city of India. A case study of the Anime influenced American T.V. show ‘Avatar’ and concludes that Avatar was a huge hit due to the extremely high quality in every aspect of production (Bakonyi, 2010). Also, it has a complex storyline that can be enjoyed by children as well as adults. However, the case study is written considering that the reader already has a good amount of knowledge about Anime. A study of film, narrative, perception and emotions of Japanese Anime and states that even though Miyazaki’s Anime uses western concepts of character design and narrative schemas, the stories and characters are based on Japanese fables (Stenild, 2011). However, the case studies are only restricted to two similarly themed Miyazaki films. A study of artistic traditions in Studio Ghibli films quotes Miyazaki’s belief that ‘we should embrace our cultural heritage and educate our children about it’ (McDonald, 2004). The strong female leads of Studio Ghibli films are derived from Japanese mythology. However, the films that are analysed are all of a similar theme. Post-modernism has come to shape the fundamental characteristics of an entirely new genus of popular cinema consumed by millions world-wide (Wright, 2009). However, the study which is done on the postmodern aesthetics, scholarly appeal, and remaking of contemporary popular Indian cinema does not include an observation about the Indian audience, even though it is about Indian Cinema.

Problem Statement There is very few amount of research done on the impact of Japanese Anime on the youth and adults of the world and India. There is not much animated content on Indian television which pertains to an older audience of teenagers and young adults. Another aspect that remains unexplored is the reason why Anime is more popular outside Japan as television series than a film released in the Box Office. Hence, a problem statement was formed which stated the need to design and develop a pitch for a short animated film which was based on the factors that determine the success of Japanese Anime in India.

Objectives 

To conduct Literature survey on the popularity of Japanese Anime among pre-teens, teens and young adults worldwide, and India in particular



To determine the factors that would make a successful entertaining story for kids and young adults alike, which is age and culture appropriate



To create a pitch for a short animated film



To test the success of the pitch for a short animation film

Scope of the present investigation There is very less animated content that is meant for teenagers and young adults on Indian television currently. Most of the content is targeted towards young children. India does have an enthusiastic audience for animation – which is evident in the success of Disney films in the country and a large fan base for anime. Indians generally have an approach that animation is meant only for children. By making a television series which has content meant for a higher age group, it is aimed to challenge that approach and establish the fact that animation can be enjoyed by everybody because after all, it is just a mode of storytelling.

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Methodology A study of research papers was conducted on Japanese anime in Indian television as well as success of Japanese animation all over the world. Also, a study of books on Japanese culture and the media success of Anime. To determine the factors that would make a successful entertaining story for kids and young adults alike, which is age and culture appropriate, conclusions drawn in the literature review and doing case studies of popular Japanese anime were studied. To create a pitch for a short animated film, a storyline was developed with the help of mentor. Visual development was done and a ‘pitch book’ was created. A teaser trailer is produced for the story. The resources utilized to fulfill this objective are softwares like Autodesk Maya, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe AfterEffects, and Adobe PremierePro. To test the success of the pitch for a short animation film, a rendered video was shown to the target audience and the results were gathered through the website, www.surveymonkey.com.

Creation of Pitch According to the factors derived from the literature review, it is determined that the story needs to have a unique concept. The current content on Indian television was analysed and it was concluded that most of the shows are either based on Indian Mythology or else are of foreign content. And almost all of the series that are currently aired are aimed towards children. It was felt that content should be about something that is enjoyed by most. Hence the Thriller/Mystery genre was chosen. Even though some element of Indian mythology was used, the story is very modern in all other aspects. In its heart it is just a story about love, determination and never giving up hope. Log Line of the Story ‘A 16 year old girl in search of her lost father stumbles upon something extraordinary.’ Premise In present day India, there is a mysterious serial killer on the loose who is executing non-convicted criminals all over the country and leaves no trace. The police force is baffled and a group of private investigators are sent to various parts of the country to further investigate on the case. 45 year old Vijay Agnihotri is one of them. He is sent to Kolkata to investigate the murder of a local politician and disappears without a trace within two months of the investigation. After a thorough search with no avail, the news is sent to his family back in Mumbai. Determined that her father is still alive and needs help, 16 year old Shreya Agnihotri sets out on a journey to find him and on the way, stumbles upon something extraordinary. In its heart, ‘Lost’ is a simple story about not giving up hope and listening to your heart. And that sometimes, it is best to leave some things upon Fate.

Characters For a story to be interesting, it is very important for the characters to be well developed and have the potential to have good chemistry. There are four main characters in this story – Shreya, who is the lead, Minnie who is her sidekick and best friend, Rohan, who is Minnie’s younger cousin brother and a comic relief, and Vikram, who is a slightly grey character but turns good later and a potential love interest for the main character, as shown in Figure 1. As it was observed in the case studies, the better looking the characters, the more popular they will be amongst the audience. The bigger the eyes, the more innocent the characters; for example, Rohan who is young and very innocent has quite large eyes, and Vikram who has grey shades to his character, has comparatively smaller eyes.

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The story and the characters were recorded in a book form in order to give clarification on the subject. It is called the ‘Pitch book’. A teaser trailer was created in order to test the success of the pitch. It was decided that as it a teaser trailer, it needed to be minimal but giving out vital information to the audience so as to capture their attention. Hence, the teaser trailer starts with establishing the place where the events are going to happen – that is, Kolkata, India. It is done so by showing Victoria Memorial, one of Kolkata’s most famous landmarks. A few broken leaves are shown flying in front of it to represent sadness as well as winds of change. Then a locket is shown fallen on the ground with the shadow of a tree falling on it in order to establish that this object is going to be vital in the story. The tree and the ground also establish that the location that the locket has fallen on, is not in the main part of the city. The rest of the trailer goes ahead to show the protagonist of the story, Shreya, has found the locket in a cemetery and a mysterious portal is opened. For the production work, backgrounds which were required for the scenes were created digitally. A 3D model was modelled based on the concept sketches, a basic texture was given and it was rigged. Animation was done according to the storyboard and the 3D animation and 2D animation were combined in Adobe AfterEffects. Appropriate background music and SFX were provided to reflect the sadness of the scene. From the factors that were derived from the literature review, the factors that were used in the plot and the character design for the project are as follows: •

The story has to have a unique theme

•

The story and characters have to be reflective of the current post-modern society

•

There can be elements of Indian culture and fables/mythology to represent the uniqueness of our heritage and provide a sense of familiarity to the Indian audience.

•

Character design concepts can be inspired from Japanese Anime and ‘Indianised’

•

The language/dialogue has to be very local in order for Indian audience to enjoy it

•

The characters have to be believable and relatable

•

The storyline should be complex in order to create more long-term curiosity especially if it has to have the potential to be produced as a TV series These factors were implemented as much as possible in creating a plot that would be potentially entertaining for a

target audience of teens and above. The plot would have the potential to be an animated television series.

Survey An in depth survey was conducted to find out a bit more about the respondents’ likes and opinions on the subject.Also it was done to find out whether the target audience thinks that Indian animation has the potential to do better or have they accepted that foreign animation content will always be better. Questions like ‘do you like to watch animated films or series’ and ‘would you be interested in watching Indian animation if it explored themes like Thriller or Romance?’ etc. were asked. A record of 17 respondents was taken, all of whom belonged to a similar strata of the Indian society – that is, middle class and upper middle class graduates. This means that they have access to and opinions about world cinema and are more aware of their likes and dislikes pertaining to entertainment.

Results and discussion The survey was conducted on a very small scale. However, going by the age and economic group of the respondents, and recording their likes and dislikes, a few factors pertaining to the possible success of the genre can be deduced. It can be said that the teaser trailer was interesting enough to entice 80% of the people who had said that they would be willing to watch Indian animation which explored various themes, as shown in Figure 2.

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However, to some extent the theme was not exciting enough or the trailer did not create enough hype in order to have more people interested in it. Hence, seeing that all of the respondents liked to watch animated films and series in general, and all of them thought that they would be interested in watching Indian animated content if it explored more genres, the trailer needed to be more specific about the genre and reveal a bit more about the story to create more hype about it. An in-depth interview can be taken with a wider audience which explores questions like whether the target audience watches Indian animation, whether they would be interested if a more ‘grown up’ theme was showcased on television, and what they expect when they watch animation. The aim of this would be to find out the needs of the target audience as to the content on television and whether the pitch and execution of the story that was developed in the thesis excites them. Conclusion It can be concluded that if given a chance, Indian animation does have the potential to get more of an audience considering the amount of people who are interested in watching animation or are fans of animated content in general. As the survey was not done on a large scale, it is difficult to make a solid conclusion on the success of the trailer. But from whatever data that was recorded, it is felt that there is a potential for Indian animation to have a wider audience as the youth of today are open to the possibility of animation having more genres.

Acknowledgement I would like to take this opportunity to thank Senior Tutor Mr. B. S. Abhilash for guiding me throughout the project and Senior Tutor Mr. Murali Krishna J. for providing his inputs whenever I needed them. I would also like to thank all my friends who gave me great feedback and the people who answered my survey questions. This research would have been incomplete without them. Lastly, I would like to thank Head of Department, Industrial Design Mr. Lohit H. S. for allowing me to go ahead with this project.

Figure 1. The Four Characters of the Story

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Figure 2. Final survey question

References Bakonyi, K. (2010). The Influence of Japanese Animation on Avatar: The Last Airbender. UCLA School of Film and TV Jaggi, R. (2015). An Overview of Japanese Content on Children’s Television in India. MEDIA ASIA 41(3), pp. 240-254 Manion, A. (2005). Discovering Japan: Anime and Learning Japanese Culture. University of Southern California: East Asian Studies Centre McDonald, R. (2004). Studio Ghibli Feature Films and Japanese Artistic Tradition. June Stenild, B. I. (2011). Japanese Animation Films; Narratives, Perception and Emotions. Dias: The Royal Library and Copenhagen University Library. Thomas, A. (2014). The Allure of the Orient: Japanese Anime and Indian Kids. VISTAS Vol. 3, No. 1 Wright, N. S. (2009). Bollywood: The Postmodern Aesthetics, Scholarly Appeal, and Remaking of Contemporary Popular Indian Cinema. University of Sussex.

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Social Networking Sites and Social Capital: A Chandigarh-Based Study of Undergraduate and Postgraduate Students Devashish Chakraborty Panjab University, India Abstract This study aims at finding out if there is a relationship between students’ intensity of use of SNSs and their social capital, both bridging and bonding. Also, the study seeks to examine if there is a significant difference with regard to intensity of use of SNSs between undergraduate and postgraduate students, and also between male and female students. For this purpose, a survey was conducted on a sample of 300 students, 150 each from the population of undergraduate and postgraduate students (males = 158, females = 142) pursuing regular courses from departments under various Faculties of Panjab University. The results of the study showed that there was a significant positive relationship between students’ intensity of use of SNSs and their bonding social capital. It was also found that there was a significant positive relationship between students’ intensity of use of SNSs and their bridging social capital. Also, while no significant difference with regard to intensity of use of SNSs was found between undergraduate and postgraduate students, significant difference was evident in terms of intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students. Keywords: Bonding social capital, bridging social capital, hyperpersonal, social networking sites, social network.

Introduction The modern times have been witnessing unprecedented opportunities for communication through a variety of media, inconceivable in the past. The youth have a wide range of options to choose from regarding the media for communication. Also, the number of options is likely to increase even further in the future. In India, studies have revealed that the advent of the Internet and social media, including SNSs such as Facebook, Twitter, etc., have changed the very landscape of communication media impacting the media preferences and habits of people, youths in particular.

Theoretical Framework This study is based on four theories: Media System Dependency theory (MSD), Social Network theory, Hyperpersonal Model and Social Capital theory. The core idea of the MSD theory, given by Ball-Rokeach and DeFleur (1976, as cited in Eke Miss, Obiora, and Odoh Miss, 2014), states that the media, individuals, their interpersonal environment, and the social environment comprise a complex system in which each of them is involved in dependency relationships with the other. The MSD theory was initially perceived as more of a macro-level theory. But besides studying macro-level dependency relationships, the MSD theory also studies the micro-level relationship of dependency between needs of an individual and his/her media use (Ball-Rokeach, 1985). The Individual Media Dependency theory, an offshoot of MSD theory, aims at providing an explanation as to how the cognitive process of an individual may affect him/her when he/she makes use of the media. According to proponents of this theory, the process is initiated when an individual begins to use the media in a bid to take a decision actively as to what content he/she wants to consume. When an individual begins using media, for instance SNSs, a dependency relationship is developed between the media and the individual, which ultimately leads to the individual experiencing cognitive, affective, and behavioural effects of using the media. Social Network Theory states that social relationships can be understood in terms of nodes and ties. In a social network, nodes are the individual actors in the network and ties are the relationships between these actors. The significance of social network theory lies in its laying emphasis on social relationships and ties rather than individual attributes. The Hyperpersonal model suggests that computer-mediated communication participants adapt themselves to the context where nonverbal cues are absent and in this process of adaptation they engage in selective self-presentation and partner idealization. As a result the interactions can be more intimate in intensity than in a face-to-face situation, leading to the formation of a different relationship than the one formed on the basis of face-to-face interaction (Walther, 1997). Social Capital theory regards the network of social relationships as potential sources of resources. This theory mainly considers three kinds of social capital i.e. bridging social capital, bonding social capital, and linking social capital. Bridging social capital

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arises as a result of weak ties or relationships between individuals. Bonding social capital arises due to flow of resources from strong ties. Linking Social Capital refers to relationships with people who are in powerful positions and it links people to important political and other resources, and economic institutions (Woolcock, 2003). According to MSD theory, when individuals become dependent on SNSs for fulfilling their motives, it results in cognitive, affective and behavioural effects. The dependence of individuals on SNSs can be observed by measuring their intensity of use of SNSs. As a result individuals will experience changes in their bridging social capital and bonding social capital. On the basis of previous studies (Ellison et al., 2007; Steinfield et al., 2008), this study posits that students’ intensive use of SNSs will have a positive relationship with both their bridging social capital and bonding social capital. This study considers dependence on online social networking sites in general (Griffiths, 2012) and not any specific social networking site. This is because students use more than one SNS and it is the study of all these SNSs used by an individual that will be more useful in understanding the impact of online social networking, in general, on students’ bonding social capital and bridging social capital.

Review of Literature Intensity of use of social networking sites Researchers have used various indicators to study the usage of SNSs. It is significant to understand the distinction between the various indicators of usage of SNSs so as to appreciate their respective effects on youth in general and students in particular. For some researchers, this variable stands for self-reports of respondents about the number of hours they spend on a SNS on a typical day, the number of days in a week they use the SNS and the average duration of an average session they use the website (Ellison, Steinfield and Lampe, 2007). There are also researchers who have conceptualized it by including the number of “friends” as a measure of use of a SNS such as Facebook Intensity (Ellison et al., 2007). This measure is important, as in normal circumstances the number of friends will be indicative of the period of time for which a user has been using the SNS (LaRose, Ellison, and Steinfield, 2011). Social networking sites and Social Capital The term social capital has been defined differently by scholars (Adler and Kwon, 2002). However, they all concur that the term refers broadly to the benefits an individual receives from his/her social relationships (Lin, 1999). For an individual to accumulate social capital, it is important that he /she should form and maintain relationships. This is how Coleman (1988) perceives social capital as resources that are accumulated among people by virtue of the relationships they build. In this regard, Ellison et al.’s (2007) study found a strong association between the use of Facebook and all the three types of social capital: bridging social capital, bonding social capital, and maintained social capital. To further understand the issue, Steinfield, Ellison, and Lampe (2008) conducted a longitudinal analysis of panel data from Facebook users. The study found that the intensity of Facebook use in the first year of the study was strongly associated with outcomes of bridging social capital in the second year, even after the researchers controlled for measures of self-esteem and life satisfaction. Later, in an effort to replicate the study conducted by Ellison et al. (2007), Johnston, Tanner, Lalla, and Kawalski (2013) found a strong association between intensity of Facebook use and three indicators of individuals’ social capital i.e. perceived bridging social capital, perceived bonding social capital, and perceived maintained social capital. A study by Barker, Dozier, Weiss, and Borden (2013) suggested that intensity of SNS use was a strong predictor of both concentrated experience of an activity and social capital affinity. In another of their studies, Ellison, Vitak, Gray, and Lampe (2014) found that Facebook users had higher level of bridging social capital than non-users.

Research gap

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Studies regarding relationship between SNSs such as Facebook and students’ social capital have mainly considered institution-specific bridging social capital and bonding social capital (Ellison et al., 2007; Steinfield et al., 2008). But students have social networks that are beyond the confines of any institution. Therefore, this is a research gap and this study has made an attempt to fill this gap by incorporating students’ general bonding social capital and general bridging social capital i.e. both offline and online networks beyond any particular institution. Also, studies have mainly considered a specific SNS, but not taken into account the impact of SNSs in general i.e. the different SNSs being used by an individual regularly and actively. This study strives to fill that gap in the literature. Objectives of the Study 1.

To examine if there is any significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between UG and PG students.

2.

To examine if there is any significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students.

3.

To analyze the association of students’ intensity of use of SNSs with their bonding social capital.

4.

To analyze the association of students’ intensity of use of SNSs with their bridging social capital.

Hypotheses of the Study H1: There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between undergraduate and postgraduate students. H2: There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students. H3: Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bonding social capital. H4: Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bridging social capital. Research Methodology Survey A survey was conducted on a sample of 300 students, 150 each from the population of undergraduate and postgraduate students (males = 158, females = 142) pursuing regular courses from departments under various Faculties of Panjab University. These 300 students were administered a questionnaire comprising questions related mainly to students’ intensity of use of SNSs and their bridging social capital and bonding social capital. Before administering the questionnaire, prior permission of the respondents was sought after explaining to them the purpose of the survey. Sampling Procedure A multistage sampling technique was used in which three departments from each of the 10 faculties were selected by simple random sampling using the services of randomizer.com, a web-based service which helps in generating random numbers. The 11th faculty, which is a multi-faculty department, was ignored as students from this faculty came for their classes only in the evening and were not accessible. First, departments under each of the 10 faculties considered in this study were coded numerically on the basis of the order in which they occurred in the list of students obtained from the office of the Deputy Registrar (Colleges), Panjab University, Chandigarh. Then using randomizer, three departments from each of the 10 faculties were selected. From the selected departments classes were likewise selected randomly using randomizer. Then out of the classes a certain number of students were selected depending on their proportionate strength in the faculty. The students whose roll numbers corresponded with the numbers generated by randomizer were selected for the sample. In all 300 undergraduate and postgraduate students (150 undergraduate and 150 postgraduate students) were selected from 10 faculties of Panjab University, Chandigarh. Then a survey was conducted between August and October 2015 in which the students comprising the sample were administered a close-ended questionnaire. The student-respondents were contacted in their classrooms or at their respective department libraries immediately after their class hours. The number of undergraduate and postgraduate students required for the sample from each faculty was calculated depending upon their proportionate strength in the university.

Independent variables

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Age: 18-19 years=1, 20-21years=2, 22-23 years=3, 24-25 years=4, and Above 25 years=5 Sex: Male=1, Female=2 Course being pursued: Undergraduate students: Those students who are pursuing undergraduate degree courses in any of the streams at Panjab University, Chandigarh. (UG=1) Postgraduate students: Those students who are pursuing postgraduate degree courses in any of the streams at Panjab University, Chandigarh. (PG=2) Family’s monthly income: Up to Rs 20,000=1, Rs 20,000-40,000=2, Rs 40,000-60,000=3, Rs 60,000-1lakh=4, Above Rs 1 lakh=5 No. of years of using SNSs: Less than 12 months =1, 1-2 years =2, 2-3 years = 3, 3-4 years = 4, More than 4 years = 5 Hours of Internet use per day: Less than 30 minutes=1, 30-60 minutes=2, 1-2 hours=3, 2-3 hours=4, More than 3 hours=5

Self-Esteem (Cronbach’s alpha = 0. 95) Self-esteem of undergraduate and postgraduate students was measured using the Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1989). The original Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale is a 4-point Likert-type scale. Th current research adapted the original scale by seeking responses from the participants in the research on a five-point Likert-type scale to ensure uniformity in scoring for all types of Likert scales used in the study. The higher scores of students on Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale will indicate their higher self-esteem and vice-versa. The items comprising this scale are: I feel that I'm a person of worth, at least on an equal plane with others; I feel that I have a number of good qualities; All in all, I am inclined to feel that I am a failure; I am able to do things as well as most other people; I feel I do not have much to be proud of; I take a positive attitude toward myself; On the whole, I am satisﬁed with myself. Neuroticism (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.87) The items for this scale have been adopted from the Neuroticism subscale of the Big Five Inventory (BFI) (John and Srivastava, 1999).

The

inventory comprises

items

pertaining to

openness

to

experience,

conscientiousness,

introversion/extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism. Only those items that measure neuroticism of an individual have adopted for this study and a Neuroticism scale was devised after conducting Exploratory Factor Analysis on the items. The Exploratory Factor Analysis done while conducting the pilot study showed that all the eight items loaded on a single factor. So this is a one-dimensional scale. The items of this scale are as follows: I see myself as someone who is depressed, blue; I see myself as someone who is relaxed, handles stress well (reversed); I see myself as someone who can be tense; I see myself as someone who worries a lot; I see myself as someone who is emotionally stable, not easily upset (reverse); I see myself as someone who can be moody; I see myself as someone who remains calm in tense situations (reverse); I see myself as someone who gets nervous easily. Participants were asked to indicate their agreement or disagreement on all the eight items on a fivepoint Likert scale, ranging from 1= Disagree strongly, to 5= Agree strongly. These items have been used to measure students’ level of neuroticism. Intensity of use of SNSs (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.89) The Intensity of using SNSs Scale has been adapted from the Facebook Intensity Scale created and used by Ellison, Steinfield and Lampe (2007). Various scale items of the Facebook Intensity Scale have been reworded to suit the context of SNSs in general such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and Instagram. Unlike the simple measures of frequency and duration of SNS usage, the Intensity of using SNSs Scale, much like the original Facebook Intensity Scale, incorporates emotional connectedness to SNSs and its integration into a person’s daily activities. The scale contains items which have been reworded from the original Facebook Intensity Scale, such as: SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram) are part of my everyday activity; I am proud to tell people I'm on SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+,

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Instagram); SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram ) have become part of my daily routine; I feel out of touch when for a while I haven't logged onto SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram); . I feel I am part of the online social networking community; I would be sorry if SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram) shut down; Approximately how many total friends do you have on SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram )? 1 = Less than 50, 2 = 51-100, 3 = 101-200, 4 = 201-300, 5 = More than 300; In the past week, on average, approximately how much time per day have you spent using SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram)? 1= Less than 30 minutes, 2 = 30-60 minutes, 3= 1-2 hours, 4= 2-3 hours, 5= More than 3 hours. For the first five statements, respondents were asked to rate the statement in a Likert scale with categories ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree (Ellison et al., 2007). The last two questions, “Approximately how many total SNS friends do you have?” and, “In the past week, on average, approximately how much time per day have you spent actively using SNSs?” pertain to self-reported assessments of SNS behaviour so as to measure the extent to which the respondent was actively engaged in SNS activities: the number of SNS “friends” and the amount of time spent on SNSs per day. These questions were asked as close-ended questions (Steinfield et al., 2008). The Intensity of using SNSs score was found by calculating the mean of all the items in the scale. Dependent variables Bonding Social Capital (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.92) The Bonding Social Capital Scale is a 10 item scale to measure Bonding social capital of the respondents which is related to their entire social network, including both offline and online social networks. It has been adapted from Bonding Subscale created by Dmitri Williams (Williams, 2006). The Bonding Social Capital Scale contains items such as: There are several people in my entire social network, both online and offline, whom I trust to help solve my problems; There is someone in my entire social network, both online and offline, I can turn to for advice about making very important decisions; There is no one in my entire social network, both online and offline, that I feel comfortable talking to about intimate personal problems; When I feel lonely, there are several people in my entire social network, both online and offline, I can talk to; If I needed an emergency loan of Rs 500, I know someone in my entire social network, both online and offline, I can turn to; The people I interact with in my entire social network, both online and offline , would put their reputation on the line for me; The people I interact with in my entire social network, both online and offline , would be good job references for me;. The people I interact with in my entire social network, both online and offline, would share their last rupee with me; I do not know people in my entire social network, both online and offline, well enough to get them to do anything important; The people I interact with in my entire social network, both online and offline, would help me fight injustice. For each of the 10 statements given above, respondents were asked to rate the statement in a Likert-type scale with categories ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree. The Bonding Social Capital score was found by calculating the mean of all the items in the scale. Bridging Social Capital Scale (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.88) The Bridging Social Capital Scale is a 10 item scale to measure Bridging Social Capital of the respondents which is related to their entire social network, including both offline and online social networks. It has been adapted from Bridging Subscale created by Dmitri Williams (Williams, 2006). The Bridging Social Capital Scale contains items such as: Interacting with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, makes me interested in things that happen outside of my town; Interacting with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, makes me want to try new things; Interacting with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, makes me interested in what people unlike me are thinking; Talking with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, makes me curious about other places in the world; Interacting with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, makes me feel like part of a larger community;. Interacting with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, makes me feel connected to the bigger picture; Interacting with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, reminds me that everyone in the world is connected; I am willing to spend time to support general community activities, both offline and online; Interacting

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with people in my entire social network, both online and offline, gives me new people to talk to; In my entire social network, both online and offline, I come in contact with new people all the time. For each of the 10 statements given above, respondents were asked to rate the statement in a Likert-type scale with categories ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree. The Bridging Social Capital score was found by calculating the mean of all the items in the scale.

Statistical Analysis For hypotheses H1: There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between undergraduate and postgraduate students; and H2: There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students, Independent Samples T-test was conducted separately. For hypotheses H3: Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bonding social capital; and H4: Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bridging social capital, hierarchical multiple regression was conducted for each separately. Table 1 (see appendix) shows that 40% of the students in the sample (n = 300) use a combination of Facebook (FB) and LinkedIn regularly and actively; 10% prefer a combination of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn; 5% like to be regular and active users of Facebook and Google+; 2% show preference for Facebook and Instagram; 30% use only Facebook; 5% report using only Twitter; the same percentage of students report using only LinkedIn; only 2% prefer using only Google+; and 1% use only Instagram. Figure1 (see appendix) shows students’ preference for using SNSs as given in Table 1. Figure 2 (see appendix) shows that the trend of ties or relationships is predominantly from offline to SNSs. It implies that individuals prefer to have their offline friends as their online friends and not in the opposite direction.

Findings of the Study With a view to exploring the research hypotheses H1: There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between undergraduate and postgraduate students; and H2: There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students, Independent Samples T-test was conducted. Since the result of Independent Samples T-Test for hypothesis H1: (There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between undergraduate and postgraduate students) was found to be not significant, this hypothesis was not supported, as shown in Table 2 (see appendix). Since the result of Independent Samples T-Test for hypothesis H2: (There is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students) was found to be significant ( p < .05), this hypothesis was supported, as shown in Table 3 (see appendix). With a view to understanding the relationship between use of SNSs and different forms of social capital such as bridging social capital and bonding social capital, regression analyses were conducted. Each regression was controlled for variables such as course being pursued i.e. undergraduate course or postgraduate course, age, sex, family’s monthly income, general Internet use, the number of years of using SNSs, self-esteem, and neuroticism, so as to find out if use of SNSs explained variance in forms of social capital such as bridging social capital and bonding social capital over and above the aforementioned independent variables. For the purpose of testing Hypothesis 3: “Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bonding social capital”, an initial investigation was done to find out the extent to which control variables, course being pursued i.e. undergraduate course or postgraduate course, age, sex, family’s monthly income, general Internet use, the number of years of using SNSs, self-esteem, and neuroticism predicted the amount of students’ bridging social capital. This resulted in an adjusted R Square of 0.40. This is followed by the entry of the variable ‘intensity of use of SNSs’ in the model to find out if

34



it has an impact on the predicted variable bridging social capital. This raised the adjusted R Square to 0.48 ( see appendix Table 4). The important finding is that, initially after controlling for variables pertaining to course being pursued i.e. undergraduate course or postgraduate course, age, sex, family’s monthly income, general Internet use, self-esteem, and neuroticism, the extent to which students (both undergraduate and postgraduate) used SNSs intensively contributed significantly (Standardized Beta = 0.36, p < .001), which supports Hypothesis 3: Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bonding social capital. The testing of Hypothesis 4: “Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bridging social capital”, found that after controlling for variables, course being pursued i.e. undergraduate course or postgraduate course, age, sex, family’s monthly income, general Internet use, the number of years of using SNSs, self-esteem, and neuroticism predicted the amount of students’ bridging social capital. This showed an adjusted R Square of 0. 43. Then ‘intensity of use of SNSs’ was entered into the model. This raised the adjusted R Square to 0.60 The important finding is that, initially after controlling for variables pertaining to course being pursued i.e. undergraduate course or postgraduate course, age, sex, family’s monthly income, no. of years of using SNSs, general Internet use, self-esteem, and neuroticism, the extent to which students (both undergraduate and postgraduate) used SNSs intensively made a significant contribution (Standardized Beta = 0.55, p < .001), which supports Hypothesis 4: Students’ intensity of use of SNSs is positively associated with their bridging social capital.

Discussion This research makes an attempt to study if use of SNSs has a relationship with students’ social capital. Two distinct indicators of social capital have been considered for the study i.e. bridging social capital and bonding social capital. Previous studies have also attempted to find a relationship between individuals’ social capital and their intensity of use of SNSs. As cited in the review of literature, a study by Ellison et al. (2007), Steinfield et al (2008), and some other studies have also sought to determine if there is a relationship between individuals’ intensity of use of a SNS and their bridging social capital as well as their bonding social capital. Where this study differs from other studies is in considering the use of SNSs in general and not any particular SNS. For example, Ellison et al.(2007) considered intensity of Facebook use of students and attempted to find a relationship of this construct with students’ bridging social capital, bonding social capital and maintained social capital. This study differs from other studies in considering use of SNSs in general i.e. various SNSs generally used by the students in the sample. This is important from the perspective of this study because students use more than one SNS regularly and actively. While they may not be equally active on all these sites, their dependence on online social networking is a phenomenon which is beyond use of any single SNS. The use of one SNS encourages the use of other sites and these sites together determine individuals’ dependence or intensity of use of SNSs measurable in terms of the number of hours they spend on these sites, the total number of ‘friends’ they have on these sites, their level of involvement with these sites and their emotional attachment to these sites. For instance, individuals may use Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google+ regularly and actively. While they may appear to be more active on Facebook, it is the regular use of LinkedIn and Google+ that may be encouraging and even adding to their intensity of use of Facebook because ‘friends’ on LinkedIn and Google+ may be the same across these different social networking platforms. Since different platforms have different utilities and element of interest, the study of individuals’ overall intensity of use of SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and Instagram) i.e. their intensity of use across all SNSs being used by them becomes more useful. Therefore, students are asked as to which SNSs they use regularly and actively. Another difference between this study and other previous studies is that while Ellison et al (2007), Steinfield et al (2008) and many other studies have considered students’ institution-specific bridging social capital and bonding social capital,

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this study has taken into consideration students’ general bridging social capital and general bonding social capital, which is beyond any institution and relates to both their offline and online bridging social capital and offline and online bonding social capital. In other words, this study considers students’ social capital, both bonding and bridging, that arise through their entire social network, both offline and online. Also, students’ offline and online social networks have been found to overlap as 94% students have reported that majority of their offline friends are also their friends on SNSs and only 3% have reported that majority of their friends on SNSs became their offline friends. This shows the trend is more from offline to online which has also been found by Ellison et al (2007) in their study. The first hypothesis of this study that there is significant difference in intensity of use of SNSs between undergraduate and postgraduate students has not been supported by the findings. This is to be expected because in an era when SNSs are popular across generations and individuals belonging to different institutional and social strata, there won’t be any significant difference in their intensity of use of SNSs. However, with regard to the second hypothesis of this study that there is significant difference in the intensity of use of SNSs between male and female students, it has been found that female students use SNSs more intensively than their male counterparts, so this hypothesis has been supported. This could be owing to the fact that female students find SNSs more comfortable media since most of their offline friends are on these sites. Moreover, SNSs offer them the advantage of an asynchronous virtual environment in which they can plan their feedback to messages and even initiate messages carefully. The study has found that intensity of use of SNSs has positive association with students’ bonding social capital (H3). Bonding social capital comprises strong ties between relatives and close friends. It has been found that SNSs have provided relatives and close friends a new and interesting platform to strengthen their bonds. Bonding social capital is a source of emotional and social support. SNSs facilitate this owing to the fact that many relatives and close friends may not be accessible offline as they may be living at a place far-off from one another. Individuals may have lost contact with many of their relatives and close friends. However, SNSs have ensured that individuals find the media to connect with their lost near and dear ones. Therefore, students’ intensive use of SNSs may also strengthen their strong ties or bonding social capital and the findings of this study seem to suggest the same. The fourth hypothesis that intensity of use of SNSs will be positively associated with students’ bridging social capital has been supported. Bridging social capital arises due to weak social ties and these relationships have many advantages. The social networks that allow bridging social capital to arise and strengthen do not overlap with one another. So these networks are sources of new information pertaining to many areas that interest students, job-related information for instance. When students use SNSs intensively, sites such as LinkedIn (and even other sites) become a source of useful information for the students as their active use of these sites encourages others on these sites to form ties and share information with them. Conclusion This study has found that students’ intensive use of SNSs has a relationship with their social capital. No significant difference with regard to intensity of use of SNSs has been found between undergraduate and postgraduate students in the sample (n = 300). However, female students have been found to be using these sites more intensively than their male counterparts (males = 158, females = 142). The study has also found that there is positive association between students’ intensity of use of SNSs and their bridging social capital as well as their bonding social capital, which shows that these sites are useful for strengthening both types of social capital i.e. bridging social capital and bonding social capital. References Adler, P., & Kwon, S. (2002). Social capital: Prospects for a new concept. Academy of Management Review, 27(1), 17– 40. Retrieved from http://www.csee.wvu.edu /~xinl/ library/papers/social/social_capital.pdf

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https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Charles_Steinfield/publication/247935743_Facebook_Fiends_Compulsive_s ocial_networking_and_adjustment_to_college/links/0c960529de04ad6e9c000000.pdf Lin, N. (1999). Building a network theory of social capital. Connections, 22, 28−51. Retrieved from http://www.insna.org/PDF/Keynote/1999.pdf Rosenberg, M., Schooler, C., & Schoenbach, C. (1989). Self-esteem and adolescent problems: Modeling reciprocal effects. American sociological review, 1004-1018. Steinfield, C., Ellison, N. B., & Lampe, C. (2008). Social capital, self-esteem, and use of online social network sites: A longitudinal analysis. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 29(6), 434-445. Retrieved from https://msu.edu/~nellison/Steinfield_Ellison_Lampe(2008).pdf Walther, J. B. (1997). Group and Interpersonal Effects in International Computer-Mediated Collaboration. Human Communication Research, 23(3), 342-369. Retrieved from http://www.itu.dk/people/khhp/speciale/videnskabelige%20artikler/Walther_1997%20%20group%20interpersonal%20efftes.pdf

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Williams, D. (2006). On and off the’Net: Scales for social capital in an online era. Journal of Computer‐Mediated Communication, 11(2),

593-628.

Retrieved

from

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-

6101.2006.00029.x/pdf Woolcock, M. (2003): Social Capital. In: Christensen, K. & Levinson, D. (Editors), Encyclopedia of Community: From the Village to the Virtual World. Sage, Thousand Oaks et al., pp. 1258-1262. Appendix Most Regularly and Actively Used SNSs Percentage of students ( n = 300) 40% 10% 5% 2% 30% 5% 5% 2% 1% Table 1: Students preference for using SNSs

SNSs used FB & Linkedin FB, Twitter & LinkedIn FB & Google+ FB & Instagram FB Twitter LinkedIn Google+ Instagram

Intensity

Sex

N

Mean

SD

*UG

150

25.80

5.997

t-value

df

Sig(2-tailed)

-1.119

298

0.264

of use of SNSs *PG

150

26.57

5.869

*UG – undergraduate; *PG – postgraduate Table 2

Student Intensity of *M

N

Mean

SD

158

25.49

5.989

use of SNSs

**F

142

26.96

t-value

df

Sig(2-tailed)

-2.155

298

0.032

5.799

*M – Male; ** F - Female Table 3 Independent Variables

Model: Control Factors, and Intensity of use of SNSs Standardized Beta P Intercept 1.753 0.000 Course being pursued 0.085 0. 105 Age -0.014 0.789 Sex 0.082 0.060 Family Income 0.189 0.000 No. of years of using SNSs 0.236 0.000 Hours of Internet use per day -0.116 0.006 Self-esteem 0.066 0.139 Neuroticism -0.145 0.001 Intensity of use of SNSs 0.365 0.000 N= 300 F = 31.366, p = 0.000 Adj R Square = 0.48 Table 4: Regressions predicting the amount of bonding social capital from demographic, attitudinal, personality, and SNS variables Independent Variables Model: Control Factors, and Intensity of use of SNSs Standardized Beta P

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Intercept

1.345

0.000

Course being pursued Age Sex Family Income No. of years of using SNSs Hours of Internet use per day Self-esteem Neuroticism Intensity of use of SNSs N= 300

0. 97 0.057 0.042 0.138 0.175 -0.072 0.020 -0.105 0.553 F = 50.978, p = 0.000

0.034 0.204 0.272 0.000 0.000 0.050 0.616 0.006 0.000 Adj R Square = 0.60

Table 5: Regressions predicting the amount of bridging social capital from demographic, attitudinal, personality, and SNS variables

Most Regularly & Actively Used SNSs 45% 40% 35% 30% 25% 20% 15%

Most Regularly & Actively Used SNSs

10% 5% 0%

Figure 1: Students’ use of different SNSs

Offline Friends & Friends on SNSs 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0%

Offline friends & friends on SNSs

Figure 2 Students’ relationship trends

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Pocoyo’s Approach to Good Values, Pro-social Behavior and True Friendship for Young Viewers Dr. Fouzia A Shaikh Dr. A.A.S.Azam Amity University, India, Abstract The present paper provides a content analytic review of three episodes of the children animation series Pocoyo. The series is originally a Spanish production which revolves around the experiences of a three year old boy Pocoyo and his animal pals. The review along with the backdrop of supporting research evidence, highlights on how good moral values and helpful behavior can help children engage in healthy and pure friendships through an animated story telling. The article provides content analytic reviews of three episodes Whale’s Birthday. Horse and Elli’s Tea Party. Review of the episodes clearly indicates that the series emphasizes on values necessary for healthy and everlasting friendships. Keywords: Pocoyo series, edutainment, values, friendship, pro social behavior

Introduction Friendship is all about loving, caring & sharing. The central character in the popular edutainment series Pocoyo, is a human boy surrounded by animal friends – Pato, the duck and Elli the elephant. Falling in the genre of ‘edutainment’ the series serves explicit purpose of providing knowledge via fun learning. In the explicit of process of educating the children viewers about the purpose and functions of different objects (like telephone, radio, umbrella, cloud) or concepts like colour and shapes, it serves an interesting implicit purpose. The purpose is to enlighten the young viewers about the values responsible for true and pure friendship. The Pocoyo series also shoulders responsibilities of edutainment by catering to the responsible socio-cultural development of the toddlers by imparting the right moral and social values. (Zin, Nazir, Ghazali, 2010). In fact one of the major components of the edutainment genre is to project good moral values among children and adolescents. (Isa, Amin, Idris,Rahim & Samaden, 2015). In the present day scenario, when children have greater screen time, it is extremely important to ensure that they receive healthy dose of edutainment. Exposure to positive story telling (via anime) has become a necessity as exposing children to negative content (violence, verbal aggression, troubled relations) has been found to be hazardous for a child’s personality development and mental health (Sallehuddin & Omar, 2011, Kremar & Hight, 2007; Anderson & Carnagey, 2004). In 2006, The Kaiser Family Foundation published a report which claimed that majority of the children in the study’s sample imitated aggressive behaviors of the television cartoon characters. (www.kff.org). In sharp contrast to aggressive behavior of animated characters of many current animation films, the major highlight of the Pocoyo series is its emphasis on prosocial needs among small children. The present paper provides a content analytic review of three episodes of the Pocoyo series. The review depicts how the good moral values of sharing and co-operation is imparted by the animation.

Review of Episode - Elli’s Tea Party Preference to company of good old friends over materialistic concerns, is beautifully depicted when one fine day (in the episode Whale’s birthday), Pocoyo and his true friends decide to go under the water to greet their water animal friend whale on her birthday. Boarding the Vamoosh (Pocoyo’s magical vehicle which can fly, ply and swim) and ecstatically holding the presents (Pato with the balloon, Elli with the cake box and Pocoyo with a self designed birthday greeting carrying the birthday message), they navigate the interiors of the sea to visit the whale. Marked with complete innocence along with the factual message that true friendship knows no boundaries, the three friends go all the way under the sea to meet their friend. During their journey, both Elli and Pato lose their gifts to be gifted to whale. The only one which remains intact is Pocoyo’s greeting card . Unfortunately, the self designed illustration of whale on the card get wiped off by sea waves – a realization which comes to Pocoyo when he gifts the card to the whale. The utmost innocence & purity of thoughts of the child toon and

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his three comrades can be inferred from their endeavors unaware of the precautions needed to be taken for keeping the gifts safe. Very explicitly the episode is able to educate the young viewers about how aquatic life, looks like and how aquatic buoyancy is capable to pull away things from its location. Interestingly, the implicit purpose of inculcating value of true friendship is well served towards the end of the episode. Surprisingly, the three disappointed friends are greeted with a gleeful smile by the whale, leaving Pocoyo, Pato and Elli puzzled up. The narrator then clarifies that the whale is indeed happy as their land friends came all the way down to the sea to wish her. Hence the message that is conveyed is that the real present is the presence of her friends which made her birthday special. The segment passes young children an important message of being more emphatic towards a friend’s presence and honest efforts in comparison to pomp and gifts.

Review of Episode - Elli’s Tea Party The linearity between togetherness and happiness is always the benchmark of this series. In another segment Elli’s Tea Party, Pato, Pocoyo and Baby Bird are invited by Elli for tea party which the former duo refuse on grounds of strict rules imposed on guests by the host. A surprised Elli is shown desperately making efforts to attract the uninterested Pocoyo and Pato (who are absorbed in their play world). While Baby Bird agrees to attend the party, the aroma of Elli’s menu spread reach the duck and Pocoyo which finally make them change their mind. On reaching Elli’s place, Ellli avenges them by asking them to sing aloud the praise anthem “Elli’s Biscuits are the best.” Despite following the rules, Elli does not clearly approve them to have the snacks which leave Pocoyo and Pato sad and disappointed. They go back to their toy world. However, once again Elli is confronted with the question ‘are your friends more important or the party rules?’ Elli realizes her mistake and once again with all warmth invites Pocoyo and Pato to the tea party which they gleefully accept. Once again the message is clear. For Elli, no party can be fun in the absence of her true friends. In both the episodes described above, togetherness and unity is the only solution for quest of true joy. Review of Episode- Horse In another episode, Pocoyo while reading a book s confronted with horse – a creature which is unknown to him. The narrator on realizing that he does not know anything about the horse, exposes him to a large portrait of the four legged animal. The display is accompanied with the basic description about the animal (that it eats grass, runs fast and produces the neigh sound). Horses can also be used for rides. When asked if Pocoyo can imagine himself on a horse, he successfully does but his desire to be on a horse seat becomes immense. He orally starts ruminating about the creature. When Elli and Pato discover Pocoyo’s new obsession, they begin to avoid him but all their efforts to escape go in vain. Pocoyo is so obsessed that he starts sketching and coloring horses everywhere. Horse is a totally different animal and he realizes this when he compares them to Lula, his dog friend. Realizing the insane obsession of Pocoyo, Elli and Pato make the effort. They transform themselves into a make-belief horse by camouflaging themselves under the horse costume. On realizing that it is not a true horse, Pocoyo gets furious and frantically shouts at both his friends. However, Pocoyo realizes how helpful his friends were in fulfilling his wish. He apologizes to both of them and in the end demands the Elli-Pato horse ride. The above review also shows that Pocoyo is a perfect form of edutainment genre. It educates children about a specific four legged creature, its significant features. Besides, it underlines the importance of not just true efforts for sake of friendship but importance of politeness with near and dear ones, apology and gratitude. Friends should always be appreciated for their help and should not be taken for granted. Discussion Involvement in prosocial or anti-social behavior can be the result of constant exposure to negative characters or negative content of the cartoon films. In other words, prosocial /anti- social behavior is a learnt phenomena. This is famously postulated by Bandura’s social learning theory which claims that people particularly children learn or pick up helping and

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aggressive acts by observational strategy called imitation (Bandura, 1965). Prosocial behavior which is the cornerstone of good friendship is known to begin as early as before two years of age. It ranges from providing comfort to others in distress, participating in household tasks, and helping adults by bringing or pointing to out-of-reach objects (Liszkowski, Carpenter, Striano, & Tomasello, 2006; Warneken & Tomasello, 2006, 2007; Rheingold, 1982; Zahn-Waxler, Radke-Yarrow, Wagner, & Chapman, 1992) to sharing and at times even sacrificing their own cherished possessions (Hay, 2006; Hay & Cook, 2007; Smiley, 2001). The Pocoyo series, presents its characters often engaged in the aforementioned activities. From the author’s perspective, the series can be considered as a necessary gentle respite from the contemporary violent on screen animated characters and is a good source of providing moral values enhancing prosocial behavior among small children. It also beautifully addresses the importance of emotional intelligence (i.e. ability to understand and manage one’s own and others’ emotions) required for an everlasting friendship. The popularity of Pocoyo series in terms of children’s interest and parents preference, can be best understood from reviews of parents on the popular rating website commonsensemedia.org. Public Response – what parents have to say? The last segment of this observational study makes an attempt to provide first hand information to the readers, about the uniqueness of this series on the basis of public reviews from online portal Commonsense Media. Commonsense media is the online platform which provides reviews of children movies and books along with viewers’ feedback. The proceeding section provides the reviews of mostly parents and caretakers of children belonging to the age group 1-4 years, Compilation of positive reviews for Pocoyo series (Source: commonsensemedia.org) “Show for children 1-2 I have a friend who's child is about to turn 4 and he can't communicate or feed himself and can barely go to the bathroom on his own. All my friend shows her kid is this show. I sat down and watched it and saw that it is a show directed mostly towards children 1-2 because the plots and animation are so simple and there really isn't much dialogue, which kids need in order to learn how to talk and communicate”. “Simple is a good thing for a 2year This show is simple, full of color, and teaches about being friends. We discovered this on a trip and I was thrilled to find it on Amazon Prime. My son asks to watch it and laughs the whole way through. We're right at the point where he's transitioning from parallel play to cooperative play, so I think this backs up what he's learning in daycare -- to be friendly, take turns, e.g. don't be a brat. Pocoyo learns how his behavior affects his friends; the narrator helps guide him on what he should do. Educational programming does not need to ba all letters and numbers, particularly if they're only 2 years old. I love that he's seeing another perspective on what is and isn't good behavior. Note: it will likely bore the pants of any child 4+.” “Hooray for Pocoyo!! My child loves Pocoyo! I love the simplistic style of the show. It's simply the characters against a white screen. I think it helps to keep the child's attentions actually. As for the content, while Pocoyo can act like a brat he always comes around with some guidance from the narrator. Overall it's a positive message. While the show is not educational, it is great to teach kids about emotions and what to do with them”. “One of the best positive shows for toddlers It's hard to find a children's show these days that not laced with cynicism, sarcasm or adult humor. If you are looking for a truly sweet, cute show that won't offend, Pocoyo is one of the best. Pocoyo is computer animated and the characters are in bright cheerful colors against a white background. Pocoyo is a small child, so his vocabulary is limited. The other characters(a pink elephant, a duck, a dog and a bird) don't speak word so most of the advanced vocabulary is provided by the narrator. The shows are made up of several short episodes that focus on topics, like sharing, making new friends, overcoming fears, etc. It's not a ABC/123 kind of show, so you won't get much of that here. All the same, it is a very fun and humorous show to watch with the kids. It really gets and holds their attention, and you don't have to worry about the content”.

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“A+ for Pocoyo! I love this show, and my girls (2 & 3.5 years) do too. It's their favorite show to watch - and one of the few I will happily sit and watch with them”. “an adorable little boy discovering the world and how to engage within it “Our family loves Pocoyo. He is a typical preschool age boy who is naturally adventuresome and curious but also needs to learn how to be respectful, patient, and aware of others around him. The short episodes often have a lesson that is relevant and easy for us to discuss with our son. It is also very visually appealing”. “nice little show for little kids My daughter loves pocoyo! It has some good messages and can keep the attention of a small child”. “Good Show friendship and kindness” “A very simple show A very simple show. It asks for interaction from the child, and is short, which is nice, but was to simple for to hold the 3 year old's attention even for a few minutes. While there are positive messages, real life presents better opportunities to teach these lessens”. “Autistic boy of 14 enjoys it I help take care of an autistic boy of 14. Granted its for little children but it holds his attention, it helps to teach him impulse control and positive behaviors in an appealing way. I have to tell you it holds my interest as well and I'm a male in my 50's”. “Great for all ages I LOVE Pocoyo! I know you're thinking "isnt she a little too old for that," and yes, but we started watching it in class and he's soooo adorably cute and is always thinking about his friends before he thinks about himself”. From the above cited reviews, the Pocoyo series seem to garner appreciation for the values it promotes. As per the reviews, this anime is rated to be high on its simplicity and attention capturing potential due to following attributes : •

quality of content most appropriate for pre-schoolers,

•

simple but appealing visuals

•

limited dialogue with effective background narration.

From the perspective of value education, the series seem to be successfully capable in inculcating the following values: •

Patience

•

Sharing

•

Politeness

•

Togetherness and unity

Conclusion Being a 3D creation, the attractive toy-like soft and tangible appearances of the aforementioned characters and their living environment indeed simplify the implicit (general awareness) and explicit functions (impart values) of this edutainment series. The episodes discussed in this review successfully validate the message which the series’ official website carries:

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“The children, who are watching cartoons of Pocoyo, will be educated in values at the same time they enjoy many hours of entertainment and fun to learn. The Cartoons will help them to grow and develop. Kids’ videos of Pocoyo will help parents to answer many of the questions that children face in the first years of life. So that, watching video cartoons is a great plan as the basis of learning.” (http://www.pocoyo.com/en). . References Anderson, C. A., & Carnagey, N. L. (2004).Violent evil and the general aggression model: The social psychology of good and evil. New York: Guilford Press, pp. 168–192. Bandura, A (1965): 'Influence of Models' Reinforcement Contingencies on the Acquisition of Imitative Responses', Journal of Personality and Social Psychology1: 589-95. Hay, D.F. (2006).Yours and mine: Toddlers' talk about possessions with familiar peers. British Journal of Developmental Psychology. 24(1):39–52. Hay, D.F., & Cook, K.V.(2007). The transformation of prosocial behavior from infancy to childhood. In: Brownell, C.A,., &Kopp CB, editors. Socioemotional development in the toddler years: Transitions and transformations. New York, NY: Guilford Press; pp. 100–131. Isa, W.M.W., Amin, M.A.M., Rozaimee, A., W.M.R.W. Idris., Rahim, N., and Samaden, I.S. (2015). Conceptual framework of edutainment animated series for children: a pious story, ARPN Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, 10, 3. Kremar, M., & Hight, A., (2007). The development of aggressive mental models in youngchildren. Media Psychology, 250–269. Liszkowski U., Carpenter M., Striano T., & Tomasello, M. (2006).. 12-and 18-Month-Olds Point to Provide Information for Others. Journal of Cognition and Development. 2006;7(2):173–187. Rheingold, H.L.(1982). Little children's participation in the work of adults, a nascent prosocial behavior. Child Development. 53(1):114–125. Rideout, V., Hamel, H.E. (2006).Kaiser family foundation, The Media Family: Elec tronic Media in the Lives of infants, Toddlers, Preschoolers and their Parents, Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, Menlo Park, California. Sallehuddin, I.S.B, (2011). The perceived impact of anime on schoolchildren’s aggressive behaviour Proceeding at the LANCOMM International Conference. 19-20 October, Putrajaya. Smiley, P.A., (2001).Intention understanding and parter-sensitive behaviors in young children's peer interactions. Social Development. 10(3):330–354. Warneken, F., Tomasello, M.(2006), Altruistic Helping in Human Infants and Young Chimpanzees. Science. 311(5765), 1301–1303. Warneken, F., Tomasello, M. (2007). Helping and cooperation at 14 months of age. Infancy. 11(3):271–294. Zahn-Waxler C., Radke-Yarrow M., Wagner E,, Chapman M.(1992). Development of concern for others. Developmental Psychology. 28(1):126–136. Zin N. A. M., Nasir N. Y. M. and Ghazali M. (2010). Promoting Socio-Cultural Values Through Storytelling Using Animation and Game-Based Edutainment Software. Convergence & Hybrid Information Technologies, pp. 426.

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Brands on Stage: A Study on Brand Activation Business over an Intellectual Property in an Event Dr. Archana Amity University, India, Abstract A large part of the work day of an event manager goes by in managing events for brands. We also call these ‘Corporate Events’ or the ‘Brand Activation Business’. They form a chunk of the revenues of most live event agencies. Several large and mid-size agencies depend primarily and sometimes even entirely, on corporate business. Most often, brands commission agencies to conceptualize and manage events. Product/service/idea launches, stakeholder conferences, employee engagement events, incentive tours are typically events that fall in this genre. Undoubtedly, there are many upsides to such commissioned corporate events. To begin with, they offer a chance to work with a variety of big global brands and help shape some part of their story. Secondly, they are a godsend for the risk-averse. The industry norm is that brands pay an upfront advance of about 50 percent as soon as the creative idea and execution plan are finalized. Agencies, in turn, have similar contracts with their suppliers and artists, so that they have to pay up only when they receive money themselves from the client (brand marketers). Keywords: brand, events, IP, idea, risk.

Introduction The Live Events industry is a young, dynamic, fun place to be. Energy, creativity, sleepless nights and stressful situations are all a part of the aura that surrounds this industry. But the sad truth is that no one outside of it has any access or understanding of the more intricate aspects of this large and promising industry. This is a dynamic industry. Change is welcomed, if not celebrated! Critics of the industry, who complain about the unorganized nature of the sector, have to concede, that it is for the very same reason that events have among the shortest turn-around time for projects. It is possible, and does often happen, that an agency gets a brief and is expected to execute the event in well less than a week! Having said that, while the possibility of a quick turn-around is an advantage that has seen many marketers through a crisis, it is not the desirable way of functioning. Well planned, large scale events may take as much as a year to plan and execute to perfection.

Live Events industry Events are experiences. The Live Events industry creates Experiences for Communities. Any planned experience created for a group of people is an event. We have events that are branded and others that are social. Here is the whole, happy universe of events. Brand marketers too have realized that events and activations offer a multi-sensory experience of the brand offering for the consumer like no other medium can. At a time when consumers crave engagement every moment of their waking life, the opportunities for brands to engage them with relevant experiences are immense. The question that faces us now is not whether the future of events is bright. That the Live Events industry is growing and will continue to do so exponentially is a foregone conclusion. The question is, that in an environment that is so conducive, how is it that only a handful of agencies have managed to break through the clutter. One certain way to stand out in the space of commissioned events is by upgrading skills and service levels to keep up with the times. Here is a look at how perspectives have changed in today’s brand conversation universe. For example, it is not enough to be a compliant and amicable service person anymore. What an event manager of today needs to be, is someone who not only understands the brand, but is aware of the competitive scenario and can have a meaningful conversation with brand managers and even add to their knowledge base with inputs on experiential campaigns in that space. Again, it is not enough to have the latest technology that the industry has to offer, but have an opinion on the best way to use the technology to make a connect with the consumer. Event Industry size in India Reports vary on the size of the industry in India, but it is currently somewhere between INR 3500-4000 crore (Goldblat, Joe. 2009). This is just the organized part of the industry. The unorganized events sector is believed to be as big as

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the organized half. With this, it is a believe that we are still barely scratching the surface. These broad categories can be broken down further to a lot more specific types, but the purpose of this section is to understand what truly lies at the heart of events, and this representation suffices for that purpose. A more methodical division of the types of events follows. Branded events can be broadly classified into three categories. •

Commissioned or managed events

•

IP events

•

Experiential Marketing Campaigns or Brand Activations

Commissioned or managed events: In this kind of event, the concept, designs and all other creative output and content that can be classified as ‘Intellectual Property’, are the property of the client to be used by them in future without any further payout to the agency. Commissioned events are the ‘bread and butter’ of almost all agencies. In fact, for a large number of agencies it is the ONLY category they are in. The reasons are obvious. It requires no personal investment on behalf of the agencies or their proprietors. An advance is obtained from the commissioning brand (client) and that is usually good enough to get the project off the ground. The understanding with all suppliers is that the balance will be paid to them on successful completion of the project and as soon as the client pays up, which is usually within a month or two.

IP events are those where the IP or Intellectual Property either wholly or partially belongs to the agency. This format of events is usually annual (or at any rate, periodic) and involves relatively more risk than commissioned events because it takes a few years to break even and then start becoming a profitable venture. But once it does establish itself, its proven to be a more sustainable form of business. Sunburn, NH7 Weekender, IIFA and Mahindra Blues are some of the well-known examples.

Experiential Marketing Campaigns or Brand Activations are events carried out at a location where the target consumer usually ‘hangs out’. The event goes to the consumer at a time and location where they are expected to be receptive to the brand message. The events are typically small with the interaction with each consumer restricted to under five minutes. These events are usually either mobile or held at different locations. Social media has changed the face of event management forever! If ‘likes’ were a currency, event managers would be millionaires. I mean imagine two consecutive news feeds on your Facebook timeline; one has your IIM (A) neighbor being awarded on stage in a business platform. In the other, your event manager cousin is standing between Buddy Guy and Nikki Hill at the Mahindra Blues festival event with the entire front row of business leaders staring in awe and ready to give their right arm to trade places with him. From rubbing shoulders with stars to trips abroad and experiences that money can’t buy, the industry has its perks. Ask any youngster in an event agency what the best perk of the job is, and they’ll tell you it’s the chance to travel the world on the client’s account. This also works the other way around, as an increasing number of foreigners now want to travel to India for reasons other than to ride on an elephant or see the proverbial snake charmer! That brings us to the question; ‘what does contemporary India have, to offer the world?’ A decade or so ago the only answers would be Ayurveda, Yoga or the Kama Sutra. Today, perspectives have changed. India does not necessarily need to dig into history, culture and convention to wow the world. Instead she has many more modern, exciting derivatives like the cricket IPL, Bollywood entertainment and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s Art of Living. The genesis of these now globally famous brands is traditional, but the final product for the world to see, gives a contemporary relevance to the traditional. As India continues to create modern brands that shine on the world stage, inspiration will continue to be drawn from the nation’s heritage. Live entertainment is fundamental to India and a part of the

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heritage that goes back several millennia. And for this very reason, it makes for the perfect platform to take India to the world. The creation of IP events and other innovations like event destinations are long-term ideas. Often a high initial investment is required alongside tremendous vision and understanding of where industries and the country’s administration is headed. As a consequence, these events and properties cannot be counted on to put food on the table or pay salaries in the immediate term. Corporate or commissioned shows are very honestly, the bread and butter of the events industry. The vision of corporate events can well be long term, especially in case of annual events, but the biggest advantage is little or no investment and immediate payment. According to the E&Y-EEMA white paper, there were about 32 full service event agencies registered with the EEMA (Entertainment and Event Management Association) in 2012 with an average of 55 employees each. The same source says the unorganized sector is about double that of the organized half. The unorganized sector is much more fragmented and individuals handle far lesser chunks of business. That already makes the number of event managers (at least) more than double. Conclusion Pool of Talent:India has the largest student population in the world, 315 million! Of this, a small fraction have chosen to specialize in the relatively new field of events. There are approximately 2000 fresh event graduates every single year. And then there are people like me, who chose a career in events after doing a degree in Communication Management. The actual numbers are more like this: there are about 220 Post Graduate media and communication courses with roughly 50 students in each course. That makes it 11,000 graduates every year. All these fresh minds find a place in agencies or in-house positions in corporate and media houses (Pernecky, T. Ed.2010). This is a dynamic industry. Change is welcomed, if not celebrated! Critics of the industry who complain about the unorganized nature of the sector, have to concede, that it is for the very same reason that events have among the shortest turn-around time for projects. It is possible, and does often happen that an agency gets a brief and is expected to execute the event in well less than a week! Having said that, while the possibility of a quick turn-around is an advantage that has seen many marketers through a crisis, it is not the desirable way of functioning. Well planned, large scale events may take as much as a year to plan and execute to perfection. Of what keeps him going, he says “(in events) No two days are alike. You work with the most diverse set of people one day you are talking to a lyricist and a singer and a musician. The next day you are talking to a dancer, a light man and a technology projectionist...diversity of conversation in events is unmatched”. While talking to all these people, an event manager’s mind needs to constantly be at work. The way knowledge has been democratized, everyone has access to artists and talent. There was a time when artist managers kept their access to stars and talent a closely guarded secret. Now, anyone with the time and inclination can figure out a way of directly getting in touch with performers or their secretaries. In this scenario, application trumps availability. It is how the act is played out and integrated in the fabric of the event, rather than the mere performance that makes the difference. The jury is still out on whether communication graduates or specialized events graduates make better event industry fresher’s, but most insiders feel that event graduates only have an edge if their institute has very closely liaised with the industry, not just in terms of the occasional guest lecture, but in designing the actual curriculum as well. Definitions apart, I hear there will soon be more brands than there are words in the English language. This ever-increasing pie and practically non-existent entry barrier to entrepreneurship in this industry encourages the disproportionate mushrooming of event agencies every year. One of the top reasons for employee attrition in agencies is that employees who have got experience to want to turn entrepreneur and start their own small outfits with almost no initial investment. It’s a virtual battlefield out there in the corporate events space. There was a time when the battle was fought mostly on pricing, but like everything else,

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connectivity and global exposure has driven brand expectations sky-high. Creativity, quality execution and cutting edge technology have all got to be aced if an agency wants to be on top of the game. References Bowdin, Glenn; Johnny Allen, William O'Toole, Rob Harris, Ian McDonnell. (2009) Events Management (Events Management S.) ISBN 0-7506-6533-5 Goldblat, Joe. (2009) Twenty-First Century Global Event Management (The Wiley Event Management Series) ISBN 0471-39687-7 Pernecky, T. (2010). Approaches and methods in event studies. London, UK: Routledge. Pernecky, T., & Moufakkir, O. (2014). Ideological, social and cultural aspects of events. Wallingford, UK: CABI. Pernecky, T., & Lueck, M. (2013). Events, society and sustainability critical and contemporary approaches. London, UK: Routledge.

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Facebook as Platform for News Dissemination, Possibilities of Research on Facebook in Indian Context Sushobhan Patankar Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communication, India Abstract It is a well-established fact that the internet is emerging as a medium in India, through wired and wireless access to the Internet more and more individuals are accessing the Internet. The emergence of web 2.0 technologies has enabled content providers to provide content in several Indian languages. The Internet with Web 2.0 technological capabilities has enabled Internet users to access the internet in their own language. Another feature of this development of the internet is growing the popularity of Social Networking Sites (SNS). Social Networking Sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat etc. are popular in India. As on May' 2016 Facebook has 195 Million Indian users which are largest globally even ahead of United States of America (Statista.Com). The Popularity of Facebook in India has been tapped by marketers, political parties, and media. In this context, it would be interesting to understand how Facebook can be a platform to study. Researcher intends to focus on the usage of Facebook as a platform for news dissemination. This study intends to explore various theoretical, methodological approaches to study, Facebook content shared by Indian News Channels and audience engagement with respect to Facebook content. Keywords: Social Networking sites, Facebook, News Sharing, Dissemination, TV news

Introduction On 8th November 2016 in the evening at 8PM, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi in an address to the nation declared that Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 currency notes seized to be legal tender. This televised address watched by millions of viewers on Television. However, this news spread through social media platforms like Twitter & Facebook within no time. Internet messaging app such as “WhatsApp” played an important role in the rapid dissemination of this information through length and breadth of India. Within a couple of hours, many Indians knew about government’s decision and long ques outside several ATMs to withdraw money is an evidence of how internet turned out to be an effective medium of dissemination of information. This one news story and it’s almost instant dissemination over the internet is a good testimony to the fact that the Internet has now a well-established medium of information dissemination in India. As per data of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) as on March 2016, there are total 342.65 million internet subscribers out of which 20.44 million are wired internet subscribers whereas 322.21 million subscribers access the internet through wireless mode that is either on WiFi or on smartphones. In urban India, there are 58 internet subscribers per 100 population and over 12 subscribers per 100 population. These numbers show either through wired or wireless internet in rural and urban India the internet is getting established as a popular medium. The growth in wireless internet users can also be attributed to the availability of affordable smartphones and the internet connectivity has been made easier,efficient, and affordable with the development of wireless internet technologies from 2G to3G to 4G. Today over 342 million Indian internet subscribers are using various internet platforms for a variety of functions like shopping, banking, information seeking,entertainment, communication, and several other purposes. One of the usages of the internet is accessing social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat etc. Amongst all the social networking sites, on Facebook, as on May 2016 with over 195 million users (Statista Inc, 2016), India has a maximum number of Facebook users. This number is can be a point to the popularity of the Facebook as most favored social networking site of India. There are several factors behind Facebook becoming most popular social networking site in amongst Indian internet users ,some of the reasons are already mentioned like growth of internet and smartphones, Facebook becoming most favored social networking site can be explained with the help of following two points 1.

Facebook lite: This android app was launched on 5th June 2015 to give Facebook users faster experience on slower

mobile networks. It is a lite version of the actual Facebook app, it consumes less data and , and loads quickly.

2.

Language Support: Facebook supports 12 Indian languages i.e Indians can read and write 12 Indian languages on

Facebook. (Choudhary, 2016)

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Facebook’s popularity in India has caught the attention of various private & government organizations, advertisers, Celebrities and Television channels. They are using Facebook to communicate and to reach out to their viewers, readers, fans and consumers. The very nature of Facebook allows private & government organizations, advertisers, Celebrities and Television channels to personally connect with viewers, readers, fans, and consumers. Facebook lets users react, share, and comment on posts, these affordances of Facebook creates an opportunity to private & government organizations, advertisers, Celebrities and Television channels to understand feedback and views of consumers, fans, and audience. Facebook today has created a new space which is an amalgamation of the private and public sphere. This space is unique in its nature. The posts which emanate from various private & government organizations, advertisers, Celebrities and Television channels appear in interpersonal space of a user. Unlike a public platform, users may react differently in such unique spaces and therefore analysis of nature of posts, user reactions, the extent of engagement can produce interesting results. Focus of this paper is the use of Facebook as a way to disseminate news by Indian Television News channels. Since 2006 many of the of the Indian news channels created their Facebook fan pages. Facebook pages are for brands, businesses, organizations and public figures to create a presence on Facebook, people who like a page get an update on their news feed (Facebook, 2016). Through these Fan pages, news channels disseminate their news stories in the form of Facebook posts. The news channels Facebook posts contains photographs, links to the story on the news channels web page, videos. On these posts users can register their reactions, they can share a news post with their friends in the friend list and/or they can express their views on news posts in the comments tab can also read other users comments and comment on other users comments as well. As on 14th November 2016, India’s top English and Hindi News channels Times Now and Aaj Tak has 4,738,829 (Facebook, 2016) and 15,174,989 (Facebook, 2016) “likes” respectively, which means over 4.7 million Facebook users are getting Facebook posts by Times Now and over 10.5 Million users are receiving Facebook posts by AajTak on their Facebook newsfeed. Another interesting aspect of Facebook as news dissemination platform is that since the beginning of the year 2013 till the end of the year 2015 average Facebook posts on AajTak Facebook page (Error!

Reference source not found.) has steadily increased similarly in the case of India’s top English news channel Times now, number of Facebook posts (Error! Reference source not found.) has steadily increased since beginning of the year 2013 till end of the year 2015. These trends are visible in regional Television news channels as well. ABP Majha is a top Marathi news channel since 2013 until the end of 2015 there is steady rise in the number of average daily posts has increased steadily (Error! Reference source not found.) In such a scenario where Facebook is getting popular amongst Indian internet subscribers, more and more brands, businesses, organizations and public figures will be using Facebook to reach out to their consumers, customers, fans and viewers. It will be an interesting to explore following aspects of Facebook with respect to news channels in India. 1.

Nature of Facebook posts

2.

Trends observed in Facebook use over a period of time.

3.

Comparative study of the use of Facebook by news channels of different languages.

4.

Study of users engagement with Facebook posts.

5.

Exploring correlation between nature of the post and user engagement.

6.

Remidiatization strategies of News channels for dissemination over Facebook.

7.

Influence of Facebook user engagement ( reactions,shares, and comments) on news agenda of a News Channel

8.

Influence of social media on news consumption habits of readers and viewers.

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These and many other aspects which are critical in understanding Facebook as the platform for News dissemination. This paper focusses on A. Theoretical perspectives on Facebook use as a platform for News dissemination. B. Discusses probable methodologies. C. Discusses the significance of such a study. Literature review News sharing by news organizations on Facebook this phenomenon has many aspects related to it and those are a.

Facebook as a platform for news dissemination

b.

News Sharing

c.

Content

d.

Facebook in Indian context Facebook as platform for news dissemination: As of third quarter of 2016 Facebook had 1.79 billion monthly

active users (Statista, 2016), as mentioned earlier 195 million Indians are on Facebook. These numbers establish the fact that Facebook is a Popular Social networking site globally and in India. Facebook was established in the year 2004 and since then researchers are exploring various aspects of Facebook and its influence over society. Facebook has evolved over a period of time. During last 12 year from a network of Friends, Facebook has evolved as a platform to share all kind information (Kenny Olmstead, 2010). Facebook and other social networking sites’ development indicates that networked media are slowly taking over broadcast media. People use Facebook for a variety of purposes for building social relations, entertainment, seeking information about others, Facebook applications like games, quizzes, and also for getting information about events happening around the world.(Kwon, Angelo, & Mcleod, 2013, pp. 35–43), along-with consumption Facebook influences an individual’s participation in civic and political action.(Only, 2012, pp. 319–336). As a platform Facebook is unique in nature, it is argued that Facebook and other social networking sites are a recalibrated platforms of three spheres viz. private, public, and market spheres and they are evolving as new spaces of communication (Dijck, 2012, p. 165,166). Presently Social networking sites are not very important as a news provider, but their ubiquity and user involvement makes social networking sites ideal platform for news sharing(Schaudt & Carpenter, 2009, p. 115). Unlike conventional media outlets provide a different experience of news consumption, people can actively engage with the news content, they can share it, like it and comment on it(Choi, 2016, p. 2). Peoples engagement with the news content on Facebook can insights into people choice of news and extent of their engagement with the different type of news content. Today in India Television, Print news is facing competition from New media, in-order to stay in the competition as argued by Manuel Castells it is important for power holders in this case media outlets to enter into a battle of horizontal networks(Castells, 2007: 259). With over 1.79 billion users worldwide Facebook has more audience than any single news outlets, this aspect makes a study of Facebook interesting and significant. News sharing: Sharing is one of the important aspects of Facebook, wherein users share information like status updates, photographs, videos, and other material with friends on their friends list. Researchers at Pew research center in 2011 argued that if searching for news is the most important development of the last decade, sharing news may be among the most important of the next (Olmstead, Mitchell, & Rosenstiel, n.d., p. 10).News sharing is a complicated process, it covers activities related to news reading and distribution and news sharing is an important part of news consumption. (Choi, 2016, p. 14), sharing process has an economic value attached to it. (Lampinen, 2015, p. 1), according to some studies related to news sharing on Facebook which indicate that sharing as the activity is dictated by physiological arousal(Berger, 2011, p. 892). A simple process of sharing on Facebook has several angles associated with it, sharing is instrumental is the dissemination of content, hence understanding dynamics behind sharing on Facebook is an important aspect of Facebook research.

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Content: As mentioned earlier people use Facebook for a variety of reasons, posts on Facebook can influence their actions and reactions, considering these aspects of Facebook’s influence; Individuals, brands, and organizations can use Facebook for seeking impact through their messages (Kwon et al., 2013, p. 39). Messages and text used for conventional media outlets may not be suitable for a platform like Facebook. On Facebook, users consume news content along with a variety of information, in such a situation challenge is to draw the attention of users towards the content. This objective can be achieved by finding ways to surface content in the context. (boyd, 2009) further, some studies suggest that information has to be adapted and individualized to the needs of the users(Wittel, 2001, p. 55). These inquiries into the content of Facebook posts show that on Facebook content sharing by the users is influenced by the form and context of content.Study of content is important because the growth of Facebook is driven by young people hence Facebook content needs adaptations as per the requirements of the audience. While researching dissemination of content on Facebook, understanding properties and features of content is a critical aspect of research. Facebook in Indian context: The Internet is spreading in India very rapidly, as on March 2016; there are total 342.65 million internet subscribers out of which 322 million subscribers’ access internet through wireless mode. The rapid growth of smartphones will increase internet connectivity even further. This growth also will result in more Indian accessing Facebook, already with over 195 million users Indians are the largest community on the Facebook (Statista Inc, 2016). As per India’s ministry of Information and Broadcasting’s annual report of 2015-16, there are about 847 private television channels out of which 438 are in the news category. (Publications Division Ministry of Information and Broadcasting), whereas as on 31st March 2015, there are over 14,900 registered newspapers in India (OFFICE OF THE REGISTRAR OF NEWSPAPERS FOR INDIA, 2016). News media scenario in India shows that Public sphere in India includes traditional media, and now network media is emerging rapidly i.e. many-to-many communication through social networking sites (Belair-gagnon & Agur, 2014, p. 1062). In the Indian context since 2013, social media is emerging and providing a narrative space for smaller groups.(Belair-gagnon & Agur, 2014, p. 1071). These trends show that communication networks will play a role in India’s public sphere(Belair-gagnon & Agur, 2014, p. 1071). As network media or social media is growing simultaneously with traditional media in India, it is important to know several aspects which are driving the growth of social media in the country, what are the different aspects of this growth?what's the nature of the users? what sort of content is posted on Facebook? These and many such inquiries would help in understanding how influential Social media platforms are in Indian society. Discussion As discussed in the earlier sections of this paper, there are various aspects related to research on Facebook but researcher will restrict oneself to the dissemination of news via Facebook. The researcher has looked at a number of Facebook posts, posted by News channels since 1st January 2013 till 31st December 2015. Using “Netvizz” API, the researcher has retrieved Facebook posts, posted by three news channels viz. “Times Now”, “Aaj Tak” and “ABP Majha” Marathi News Channel from Maharashtra. These channels were chosen for data collection because these channels are topranked channels in terms of ratings in respective language news genre. Each of these channels has a significant number of “likes” for their Facebook page, as mentioned earlier people who like a page get updates from liked page on their timeline. As on 25th November 2016, Aaj Tak has over 15 million likes, ABP Majha has 2.7 million likes and Times Now has over 4.7million likes. A look at the increase in a number of Facebook posts by Times Now(Figure 1), Aaj Tak(Figure 2) and ABP Majha (Figure 3Error! Reference source not found.) over a period of three years indicates that during this period number of Facebook post have almost doubled. Television news channels across three different languages are increasingly taking social media route for the dissemination of content and engaging the audience on social media as well. There are other features of this data, amongst these three news channels “Aaj Tak” is most active news channel on Facebook, in the year 2015 on an average Aaj Tak has posted 294 posts

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every day. Aaj Tak is far ahead of Times Now(23 Posts) and ABP Majha (117 Posts). These findings indicate that in the Indian context Facebook is emerging as a platform for news dissemination, a comprehensive inquiry into this trend can provide interesting insight. To understand the use of Facebook by news channels, it can be studied through three different approaches Content, Context, and Engagement. Content: A news channel’s Facebook posts appear with personal feeds like status updates, photographs of friends and acquaintances on Newsfeed of a Facebook user. In such a scenario drawing the attention of a user towards News content is a challenge. Text, Pictures, Video clips, and elements used in the Facebook post play a crucial role in attracting a Facebook user’s attention toward news content appearing on his/her News feed. A qualitative study of Facebook posts can give vital information about what strategies News channels apply. Some of the theories like News value theory and News Framing theory can explain how Facebook posts are constructed, framed or what sort of discursive practices are employed to derive users’ attention towards Facebook posts and to increase users’ engagement through “likes”, “shares” and comments”. Further, a quantitative study of the evolution of content of Facebook posts with respect to various elements like the picture, links, video clips over a period of time can present insights into the development of Facebook as the platform for news dissemination. Context: News channels are using Facebook to connect with their viewers and engage them in increasing visibility. A study of the context of content shared on Facebook is a critical part of understanding the application of Facebook for news dissemination. A quantitative analysis of Facebook posts related to News types i.e. Political, Sports, Crime, Entertainment, Business; Human Interest etc. can be valuable in understanding what type of news stories are posted mostly on Facebook, such an analysis can also provide useful information related to audience engagement i.e. “likes”, “shares” and comments” associated with different types of news stories. Qualitatively a discourse analysis of news posts in the context of different types of news issues will help in understanding how news discourse is constructed by news channels on Facebook. Engagement: A Facebook Post engagement is defined as “The total number of actions that people take involving your ads (or all posts, in some cases).” (Center, 2016). A user’s action involves “Likes and/or “shares” and/or “comments”. Engagement data can be helpful in various ways. A. Analysing users’ engagement with respect to types of news posts i.e. what type of news stories draw the amount of engagement from the Facebook users, understanding trends in users’ engagement with respect to Facebook posts. For example, The Government of India recently demonitised Rs. 500/- and Rs. 1000/- notes, several news stories are posted by news channels in this context, some stories are in the context of political development, some stories are related to people’s hardships and reactions, some stories are related to the impact of this decision on business and economy and some stories are related to crime. Depending on the context, Facebook users may engage differently with different contexts, further, kind of engagement may vary depending on the context of the news story. An analysis of users’ engagement can be useful in understanding context and users engagement associated with it. B. Facebook gives an opportunity to users to send comments on Facebook posts; a qualitative study of comments on news posts is also an interesting aspect of study related to Facebook posts. An analysis of comments can indicate perception of users, discussions associated with a news story. Such an analysis can be useful in knowing what type of story evokes what sort of reactions from the Facebook users. Conclusion It is evident from the data since 2013 till 2015 that Facebook is emerging as a platform for news dissemination. As internet subscription in India is increasing every day, more number of people will be accessing various types of Social networking sites. Indians will be using Social networking sites not for recreational and enhancing social connections but for

53



informational use as-well. In such a scenario in the Indian context understanding dynamics of informational use of social media can be helpful to the industry and the Facebook users. References Belair-gagnon, V., & Agur, C. (2014). Reconstructing the Indian public sphere : Newswork and social media in the Delhi gang rape case. http://doi.org/10.1177/1464884913513430 Berger, J. (2011). Arousal Increases Social Transmission of Information. http://doi.org/10.1177/0956797611413294 Boyd, D. (2009, 11 17). Streams of Content, Limited Attention: The Flow of Information through Social Media. Streams of Content, Limited Attention: The Flow of Information through Social Media. New York NY. Choi, J. (2016). News Internalizing and Externalizing : The Dimensions of News Sharing on Online Social Networking Sites, 1–20. http://doi.org/10.1177/1077699016628812 Center, H. (2016, 11 28). Facebook.com. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/business/help/735720159834389 Choudhary, V. (2016, 10 22). Livemint. Retrieved from Livemint website: http://www.livemint.com/Consumer/a7qEcEpWTKuRnP2riRgPRI/Facebook-says-India-user-growth-faster-thanrest-of-the-worl.html Dijck,

J. Van. (2012). Facebook as http://doi.org/10.1177/1527476411415291

Facebook. (2016, 11 14). @aajtak https://www.facebook.com/pg/aajtak/likes/

a

on

Tool

for

Facebbok.

Producing

Sociality

Retrieved

and

from

Connectivity.

Facebook

website:

Facebook. (2016, 11 14). Facebook. Retrieved from www.facebook.com: https://www.facebook.com/pg/aajtak/likes/ Facebook. (2016, 11 06). Facebook India. Retrieved https://www.facebook.com/help/282489752085908/?helpref=hc_fnav

from

Facebook

Website:

Kenny Olmstead, A. M. (2010). Navigating News Online:Where People Go, How They Get There and What Lures Them Away. Pew Research Center . OFFICE OF THE REGISTRAR OF NEWSPAPERS FOR INDIA. (2016, 11 25). Retrieved from OFFICE OF THE REGISTRAR OF NEWSPAPERS FOR INDIA: rni.nic.in Kwon, M., Angelo, J. D., & Mcleod, D. M. (2013). Facebook Use and Social Capital : To Bond , To Bridge , or to Escape. http://doi.org/10.1177/0270467613496767 Lampinen, A. (2015). Deceptively Simple : http://doi.org/10.1177/2056305115578135

Unpacking

the

Notion

of

“

Sharing

.”

Olmstead, B. K., Mitchell, A., & Rosenstiel, T. (n.d.). Navigating News Online : Where People Go , How They Get There and What Lures Them Away, 1–30. Only, E. (2012). Social Media Use for News and Individuals ’ Social Capital , Civic Engagement and Political, 17, 319– 336. http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2012.01574.x Publications Division Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, G. o. (n.d.). Annual Report 2016-5-16 Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Statista. (2016, 11 18). Retrieved from Statista Website: https://www.statista.com/statistics/264810/number-of-monthlyactive-facebook-users-worldwide/ Statista Inc. (2016, November 05). Retrieved from www.statista.com: https://www.statista.com/statistics/268136/top-15countries-based-on-number-of-facebook-users/

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Schaudt, S., & Carpenter, S. (2009). The News That’s Fit to Click: An Analysis of Online News Values and Preferences Present in the Most-viewed Stories on azcentral.com. Southwestern Mass Communication Journal, (Spring), 17– 26. Wittel, A. (2001). Toward a Network Sociality. http://doi.org/10.1177/026327601018006003

Theory,

Culture

&

Society,

18(6),

51–76.

Appendix Year Posts 2013 111.89 2014 161.65 2015 294.78 Table 1: Average daily posts on Aajtak Facebook page Year

Posts

2013 2014 2015

13.63561644 17.16712329 23.97534247

Table 2: Average daily posts on Timesnow Facebook page Year Posts 2013 47.47945 2014 91.13151 2015 117.3781 Table 3: Average daily posts on ABP Majha Facebook page

Times Now Facebook posts 70 60 50 40

posts

30

Linear (posts)

20 10 0 1/1/2013

1/1/2014

1/1/2015 Figure 1

55



Aaj Tak Facebook posts 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 1/1/2013

posts Linear (posts)

1/1/2014

1/1/2015 Figure 2

ABP Majha Facebook posts 600 500 400 300

posts

200

Linear (posts)

100 0 1/1/2013

1/1/2014

1/1/2015 Figure 3

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Interpreting the Representational Meanings of a Movie from a Subaltern Perspective: A case Study of Kabali Shiva Thrishul Punyamurthy St. Joseph’s Degree and PG College, Hyderbad Abstract This paper focuses on how film is used as a tool to disseminate an ideology. The film Kabali hit the screens in July, 2016 across the world. The presence of superstar Rajinikanth and widespread promotion of the movie had built greater expectations for all the Rajini fans in the world. This film had symbolically represented the problems, issues and everyday struggles of the subaltern classes. It used the film as a narration to explain the subordinated classes that they must be very cautious of the ‘cultural invasion’ and the necessity of education. It signifies the necessity of an egalitarian society with anti-Gandhian philosophy and the necessity of annihilating caste. The photographic images, cultural symbols and Icons represented in the movie are drawn from the ‘equal-rights movements’ across the world. This movie is an attempt by the subaltern classes to legitimize their spaces in the mainstream media. I will explain how semiotics is structurally used in this movie to spread the idea of the subaltern classes. Keywords: visual communication, subaltern, visual culture, Representation, Identity

Introduction Film is one of the major means of communication to reach to a wider audience. Of all the ‘media’, the cinema plays the best role to convey the message to its viewers with its audio-visual and representational qualities. Either to critique a social system or to praise a cultural system, the cinema can always do wonders in spearheading the change. The cinema acts as an alternative public sphere providing space for multiple sections of the society to represent and assert one’s identities. People imitate, imagine and compare themselves with the characters playing in the celluloid. The visual narrative of the cinema represents the people’s choices, lives and their identities. Against all odds of the dominant forms of production and reception, the film Kabali has got many subaltern representative meanings that are to be closely viewed and observed and deciphered. This socially-specific cinema is representing the lives of the suppressed people across the world and not in a ‘dominant reading’ perspective but totally from a subaltern perspective. It is a tool hitting against the Indian oppressive social system that was directed by the very victim of it. The choice of selecting the images, shots, frames, the constructs, locations, diversity of characters and dialogues reflects the cultural and embodied lives of the marginalized communities. My paper focuses on interpreting the film with a subaltern cultural perspective. This cinema, because of its huge promotion and for the presence of Rajnikanth, a star known and favorite to many people across the world, is supposed to be interpreted very thoroughly since he had played the role of a ‘Dalit1’ leader and as a savior of the low-caste communities. The ideological modes of production depicted in the movie and the symbolic representations it has been carrying are very close to the contemporary political ‘Bahujan movement2’ and their struggle for the path to power3. I will explain how this cinema is used as a symbolic vehicle to provoke the un-guided masses towards an egalitarian system of society. My method of collection of the data is through conducting informal interviews and group discussions with Dalit rights activists, cinema critics and active cinema viewers, and Ambedkarite students’ groups. Methodology A semiotic analysis is used in this study. I interpret the characters in the movie and their relationship status with the other characters. I take chance to interpret the culture of the subaltern, the food practices, self-respect and loyalty that were reflected in the movie. I studied them as modes of representation and explain the identity they are carrying. I conducted semi-structured interviews or non-standardized interviews with those people who are active members of the 1

A person belonging to the community of ex-untouchables or scheduled castes in India who are socially placed at the lower most levels of the historical hierarchies. 2 The political movement of all the subaltern communities towards achieving the political power along with social change in India. 3 The arrivals of Ambedkarite parties, like BSP, in India and the establishment of Ambedkarite student groups in central Universities. Ex:Bahujan Students’ Front and Ambedkar Students Association.

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Bahujan movement. My method of enquiry is explorative since my objective is to know whether the film is used to represent the political movement of the marginalized communities. My sampling is convenient sampling so as to focus on particular characters, frames and scenes in the movie that are of interest which will enable me to get answers to my research questions.

Objectives •

To find out whether the movie is representing the marginalized communities socio-political movement.

•

To identify the representative picturization tools of the marginalized sections.

•

To understand the portrayal of the Bahujan culture in the movie.

The film title ‘Kabali’ opens up with a backdrop of the carved image of all the working class people performing their indentured labor. The title acts as a sign, in the form of a pictorial representation, of the movie, which communicates to the audience saying that the movie is about the subaltern people, their experienced lives and their cultural practices their contestation with the new forms of discrimination and their socio-economic struggle towards political power. This sign, as a Representative image, stands as an essential part of the process by which meaning is produced and exchanged between members of a culture which represent things’ (Hall, 1997). The term ‘Kabali’, in films, has been used for a lower class, lower caste Dalit goon or some comedy character, from the very origin of Tamil Cinema. But, this film broke that stereotype that he is no longer that kind of a goon who would bend his back like a slave and obey the orders but, as a new ‘Kabali’ who strikes back. Ideology of the movie As Eco points out that the ‘Film, as a text, can say more than one supposes, they can always say something new, precisely because signs are the starting point of a process of interpretation which leads to an infinite series of progressive consequences’. ‘Texts are more or less open to multiple interpretations. (Eco, Umberto 1981) . Film disseminates ideology, (Carroll, 1985). The director of the movie, Pa.Ranjith who himself is highly motivated and inspired by the academic writings and teachings of the subaltern scholars, activists and intellectuals, used the medium of film to disseminate the ideology of these organic intellectuals4. These socio-cultural leaders have waged a war against the atrocities, inhuman treatment, multiple discriminations and forced economic deprivation on Bahujans5 (the subaltern class) in India. They propagated for an egalitarian society with the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity along with justice. They also denied all kinds of Brahmanic cultural practices that were imposed over the Bahujans6. The film selectively follows the three fundamental principles of Dr.B.R.Ambedkar, one of the key leaders of the anti-caste struggle in India, summarized the essence of this movement in the following three words – Educate, Agitate and Organize. The symbolic deployment of the chappal7 in the hero introduction scene conveys the meaning that the role played by the protagonist is about a Dalit’s life8..Historically, footwear is culturally connected to the Dalits since they

4

Dr.Ambedkar, Jyothirao Phule, Periyar, Savithribai Phule, Gadge baba, Ayyankali. All these subaltern social scientists have extensively worked for the rights, equal share of resources and dignity of the subaltern classes through various means. 5 A major portion of people who do not have extended access to power, polity and wealth and people who are economically poor and socially backward. 6 Of anything that is related to the cruel cultural practices of a Brahman community who are the centre for the Hindu religion and its practices. 7 footwear

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occupy a major share in the invention of footwear. The Dalit communities across India were/are the makers of the footwear in India. As Kancha Ilaiah points out that he science behind the manufacturing of the chappal is rarely visited and the scientific temper of Dalits was relegated to the mere menial job. ‘If the vast and varied spread of the shoe-making Dalit communities across India and the available information about the shoe in ancient India is an Indication, India was the most advanced country in the world in leather technology’ (Ilaiah, 2009). Chappal in this scene acts a tool of resistance and as an assertion of Dalit identity against the delegitimization of chappal by the Indian priestcraft by ascribing notions of impurity on leather tanners. The hegemonic Brahmanical priestly class labeled the shoe making communities as ‘untouchables’ and considered the shoe making process as anti-spiritual and thus were the scientific energies of Dalits never were given social support. The protagonist is an ardent reader of the Dalit-Bahujan literature. The book titled ‘My Father Balaiah’ is seen in the movie, which is being read by the protagonist. This book explains about the life experiences of three generations of a Dalit family. The atrocities, the social isolation, the caste order punishment, the cultural practices of Dalits were portrayed in the book. This visualization represents the necessity for the subaltern to know the subaltern history. As Marcus Garvey says - ‘A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots (Garvey, 2004). Subalternity Represented The word ‘subaltern’ can be traced back to the beginning of the twentieth century by Antonio Gramsci, an Italian Marxist. It meant the people of ‘inferior rank’, the disadvantaged, the deprived, the lower classes, exploited, weak, or someone who has no political and economic power and are subjected to the hegemony of the ruling classes that denies the basic rights of participation in the making of local history and culture as active individuals of the same nation. The subaltern becomes defined in descriptive terms, according to a particular marginalized subject position in any given cultural or social context (Loui, 2012). The Class is an economic status where as caste in India is a social status. Most o the lower classes in India are the lower castes. The original subaltern are those productive labors who form the major chunk of the population and they are the Dalit-Bahujans. This film is from the perspective of that productive labor, the original subaltern, who are the very victim of the brutal discriminatory caste system. It denotes the true identies of their lives as a unique piece signifying the culture, history, socio-economic position, and their contestations with the hegemonic Brahmanic systems of filmic representations through cleverly organized film narrative. In Gayathri Chakravarthy Spivak’s terms – ‘the task of an intellectual is to pave way for the subaltern groups and let them freely speak for themselves’ (Spivak, 1988). Interpreting the Characters The signified meaning to the character portrayed by the protagonist is of Kanshiram’s9. The protégé of the protoganist can be signified to the real life role of Dr.B.R.Ambedkar. Both these characters play a key role in the movie as leaders of the old generation and modern era respectively, towards achieving an emancipatory political power. The powerful personality, extra-ordinary oratory and motivating character of the protégé admires the protagonist towards fighting for the

8

In India, there is a social system called caste system where people are divided into four hierachial categories according to their birth and must perform their caste profession without moving out of the that closed circle which is a Brahmanical religious forced imposition. The fifth one is the community of people who are forcefully placed away from the village and are ordered to do all menial jobs and are called as un-touchables. Dr.B.R.Ambedkar had named that community of people as ‘scheduled castes’ and now they are being called as ‘dalits’ which was connotated as a respectful word. 9 The founder of the third largest national party named Bahujan Samaj Party in India. He is the crusader of the broader Bahujan political movement.

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community. Their speeches in the movie represent the oratory skills of Dr. B.R Amedkar and Kanshiram that have a huge impact on the lives of the subaltern people. Few lines from the Speech: ‘The labor of the productive castes was sipped and benefitted by the non-productive castes and the laborers were thrown away like filthy inanimate objects’. The fight against this is not for an individual person nor for an individual family, but for the community and for the people’ Both of them organize all the victims of the system and drives them towards education and political power. The protagonist carries forward the morals and ideology of his Predecessor, protégé. He follows the formula of ‘Educate, Agitate and Organize’ that was formulated by Dr.B.R.Ambedkar. The only difference between Dr.B.R.Ambedkar and Kanshiram is that the former is an academic coupled with activism whereas the later is only a political activist. Kanshiram is more like a pragmatic person who was very successful in implementing the ideology of Dr.Ambekdar10. The character beside protaganist in the film was portrayed by a muslim named Amir. He is the friend and advisor of kabali. This convivial relationship between the ‘dalit’ and the ‘muslim’ portrays the historical cultural connectedness between the two communities. Both the dalits and muslims are treated as secondary grade citizens in India stereotyping them as villains and terrorists (Punyani, 2015). This film marked both these stereotyped identities as saviors of the toiled masses. The Bahujan women possess the ability to physically work hard and are highly adaptable to the socio-economic changes (Ilaiah, 2009). The wife of the protagonist occupies a major role in suggesting and advising him at every position. She suggests an anti-Gandhian philosophy to the protagonist teaching him the necessity of situational violence. Dr. B.R.Ambedkar, an eminent scholar and pioneer of the socio-political movements during colonial period, criticizes the Gandhian ideas as ‘seasonal politicism’ and were never helpful for the turmoiling subordinated castes in India11 (Ambedkar, 1945).

She keeps on guiding, advising and warning him at all possible levels. Unlike the Savarna style depiction of

‘speech-less’ ‘house-wife’ who participates in so called divinely activities of ‘husband-worship’, the wife in this movie is represented as a key decision maker on par with the husband. She shares her equal space, and at occasional situations stays ahead of the protagonist. She actively participates in a tiny revolution against the unequal wages along with the protagonist. The movie had successfully portrayed the subaltern women’s due role towards their political and social enlightenment. Representing the Bahujan Culture ‘The phenomenal conceptions and cosmovisions of the subaltern classes were simply rated as ‘folklore’ and as ‘primitive beliefs’ but not as a true and strict “culture” (Aguirre Rojas, 2005). Ginzburg, an Italian Historian who is the proponent of micro-history, criticized these aristocratic and descendant visions of visual culture. The film denies and resists the aristocratic assumption that only the dominant classes are able to produce the culture. The film portrays the cultural practices of the marginalized communities unlike the Brahmanic style of worshipping god. The food practices of the DalitBahujans were represented at a dining scene in the Aamir’s house. The characters discuss about the meat eating practices, pointing to mutton (meat of a goat) telling it as tasty. But, the mutton in a Muslim household is beef (meat of a cow). Historically, both the Muslims and Dalits share this common food practice as part of their friendly relationship. In another scene, the protagonist and his wife goes to the temple for a small offering to the god. The entire place is closely connected to the cultural practices of the Dalit-Bahujans. Here, unlike the Savarna style depiction of the temple in a so-called ‘pure’ place with a serene and calm atmosphere, the director showcases the original culture of the Bahujans where there are animal sacrifices and huge sounds and drum beats. And the god is not the racist god of the Brahmanical culture, but the egalitarian 10

Kanshiram mobilized the people in Uttar Pradesh and established a party called Bahujan Samaj Party and led the Dalit-Bahujans towards achieving the political power. 11 Gandhi is a staunch believer of diabolic caste system who emphasizes and glorifies the necessity of social hierarchies which favors the top notched Brahmins, Baniyas (tradesmen).

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gypsy god Madurai Veeran12. The stark differences between ‘Bahujan culture’ and ‘Brahmin culture’ is highlighted and portrayed in the movie. The subordinated masses identify their own culture as powerful with their own perceptions and constructions and regard those practices as ‘aboriginal’ and the Brahmins culture as non-aboriginal. ‘The Bahujan castes see these rites as being an important proof of the supposedly fundamental difference between them and Brahmins’ (Kapadia, 1996). ‘They are seen as a demonstration of the truth of ‘aboriginal’ religiosity as against Brahmin religious ethos’ (Kapadia, 1996). The film gave a warning of cultural invasion by the Brahmanical forces in particular scenes. The practice of ‘culture kill’ is in existence where the Savarna forces imperialize the Bahujan cultures13. ‘The cultural invasion is always an act of violence against the persons of invaded culture who lose their originality or face the threat of losing it’ (Freire, 1970). The dominant constructed notion of the ‘fair skin’ as beauty was deconstructed in the movie with particular symbolic referents. ‘Over and over again in many movies, in brutal caricatures, physical attributes of dark skinned people were associated with negative character traits and low social positions (Craig, Maxine Leeds, 2002). These racist ideologies created social hierarchies based on visible physical differences. Against the hegemonic dominant representation of white skin color as heroic and lovable, the movie emphasizes the beauty of being black. The wife says to the dark skinned husband - ‘I love to apply your skin color to my whole body’, explaining the heights of love she’s got towards him and his ‘black’ skin tone. This movie expresses the self presentation and newly expressed appreciation of dark skin. It is an attempt of movement from Black self hatred- to Black self- love. The film had deconstructed the socially constructed multiple stereotypes at various levels. The subaltern people who speak in ‘rough tone’ are basically stereotyped as unfriendly, deceptive and violent in nature. Breaking this stereotype, the film represented them as vehicles of truth and loyalty. Apart from this representation, the film also speaks about the ‘male gaze’ and on how female bodies are subjected to voyeuristic look. As Laura Mulvey points out that “the determining male gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure, which is styled accordingly. In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness” (Mulvey, 1975). To break this sexualized gaze, the woman in the movie warns the male for his ‘male gaze’ to look at the female ‘face’ and not the sexualized body.

Symbols of Resistance, Liberation and Power The images of Buddha, Dr.B.R.Ambedkar, MalcomX, Che Guevera, Nelson Mandela, Chinua Achebe were dexterously used in the movie, adorning the walls. All these personalities are the icons of the human rights who fought against the oppression and tyranny of the social and political systems at various geographic locations in the world. The significance of placing those icons is a suggestion to the Bahujans to take to the cause of humanity and raise voice against all forms of discrimination. There is a huge symbolism of connectivity between ‘Black culture’ and the ‘Bahujan culture’. The subordinate caste leaders of India like Buddha, Phule, Dr.B.R.Ambedkar and the subordinate class leaders of Africa and America like Malcom X, Che Guevera, Nelson Mandela, Marti Luther King Jr, Chinua Achebe were portrayed in the movie signifying that the ‘theories of oppression’ across the world are similar. It attempted to deconstruct the dominant social construction of images by placing the images of these personalities in the movie. The usage of the luxury sofas in many

12

The warrior and protector of Madurai. A temple town in Tamil Nadu. Replacing of gypsy goddess with the ‘Durga’ in subaltern village deities is an example of cultural imperialism. Goddes Durga is a brahmanical construction where as the gypsy goddess are the peoples leaders and saviors. …. 13

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scenes is a symbolic representation of power where the protagonist always occupies it. Each time, the Kabali character occupying that luxury sofa shows the ‘occupy power’ attitude of the subaltern. In one of the songs, bodily representation of Michael Jackson’s personality is portrayed in the movie. Micheal Jackson, a black pop-singer, used the ‘cultural vehicle of communication’ of ‘song and dance’ to transform the world. Ray Pratt says, ‘Body is the site for the assimilation and communication of information’ (Pratt, 1990). Jackson’s own body articulates a message of resistance, agency, and tolerance. His expressive cries encode a history of oppression, resistance, and the desire for freedom towards building a unified community on a global scale. His famous song ‘All I wanna say is that they don’t really care about us’ has a great signifying linkage to the atrocities on Blacks to the atrocities on Dalits in India (Ramaiah, 2011). He used the medium of ‘song’ as resistance to represent the problems of the ‘Blacks’ and as a tool for fighting against racism. In relation to this, the Director of this film used the medium of ‘movie’ as a tool to articulate the problems of Bahujans and method of resisting it. The film speaks about the adaptability of the subaltern classes. Despite of their poverty and low economic status, they struggle hard to educate, get decent jobs and move towards sophisticated living conditions. The adaptability is that they are capable of performing physical sweating labor in the inhuman conditions and are quite skilled to work in the luxurious air-conditioned halls. The protagonist, a plantation laborer in the initial stages of the movie becomes a ‘big-shot’ in the whole country and proudly says that he is capable of doing both ‘class’ work and ‘mass work’. The symbolic meaning of the protagonist wearing a three piece suit refers the dressing style of Dr.B.R.Ambedkar. Dressing in suits is a mark of dissent and a code of self-formation through clothing. It is a statement of resistance against the subaltern nature of existence. It is deployed to upset the denotation of power, status and social location. It acts as a tool of resistance against the Brahmanical oppressive attitude. It conveys the meaning that the low social positioning of the lower castes must be transformed to respectable and dignified conditions. It is an attempt to gain equal respect, dignity and friendly treatment. It represents an identity of self-respect and also an anti-Gandhian philosophical attitude14. In the climax scene, the protagonist says that he may be not from a ruler clan, but that he was born to rule. And then he says, “if it is a problem for you if I progress, then I will definitely progress more than you, I will get educated, I will wear coat and suit, I will sit with my legs crossed before you, stylishly”. All these dialogues are in reference to a certain caste based parties who consider themselves as ruler clans who accuse the dalit boys of dressing stylishly, wearing jeans pants and coolers, and who reportedly are the reason for the increase of caste killings in India15. Conclusion Challenging the established idioms of the cinema it de-established the conventional sign systems that have been constructed in cinema for long. It is extension of the subltern social life, which is marked by the realities of caste and its hierarchical nature. This cinema has evolved particular modes of representing configurations of caste, class, and gender. And it comes as no surprise that only a few castes and occupational categories are represented. Dalits and some other subaltern groups have become invisible under this exercise of cultural hegemony. But, kabaali could successfully break that chain and represented the organic lives of the subaltern sections. Kabali is more like a lesson. He is talking to the DalitBahujans who were split into many castes who are fighting amongst themselves without any of them progressing further at all. He shows what would happen if someone rises to be a leader from the oppressed community and, how he would be back-stabbed by his own men. The climax is more like a lesson or a plea asking them to unite and organize, keeping in mind the possible danger. Through this film, Ranjith calls out for that unity. 14

Gandhi presents himself half-naked. Major caste atrocities had taken place in many parts of India killing dalits in numbers. Karamchedu, laximpeta, khairlanji, bathanitola etc. http://www.isidelhi.org.in/hrnews/HR_THEMATIC_ISSUES/Dalits/Dalits-2015.pdf 15

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References Aguirre Rojas, Carlos Antonio (2005). Hegemonic Cultures and Subaltern Cultures: Between Dialogue and Conflict. Review (Fernand Braudel Center), Vol. 28, No. 2, Discussions of Knowledge (2005),pp. 187-210. Ambedkar, B.R. (1945). What Congress and Gandhi have done to Untouchables. Carroll, Noel. (1985). The Power of Movies. The MIT Press on behalf of American Academy of Arts & Sciences, 114 (4), 79-103. Craig, Maxine Leeds. (2002). Ain’t I a Beauty Queen? Black Women, Beauty, and the Politics of Race. Oxford University Press. Eco, Umberto. 1981. The Theory of signs and the role of the reader, The Bulletin of the Mid-west Modern Language Association, 14 (1), 35-45. Freire, Paulo. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Continuum International Publishing Group Inc. Garvey, Marcus. (2004). Selected Writings and Speeches of Marcus Garvey. Dover Publications. Hall, Stuart. (1997). Representation: cultural representation and signifying practices. Sage Publications. Ilaiah, Kancha. (2009). Post Hindu India: A discourse on Dalit-Bahujan socio-spiritual and scientific revolution. Sage Publications. Kapadia, Karin. (1996). Dancing the Goddess: Possession and Class in Tamil South India. Modern Asian Studies, 30 (2), 423-445. Loui, El Habib. (2012). Retracing the concept of the subaltern from Gramsci to Spivak: Historical developments and new applications. African Journal of History and Culture, 4(1), 4-8. Pratt, Ray. (1990). Rhythm and Resistance: Explorations in the Political Uses of Popular Music. New York, Westport, CT, and London, Praeger. Puniyani, Ram. (2015). Deconstructing Terrorist Violence: Faith as a Mask. Sage Publications. Ramaiah, A. (2011). Growing crimes against Dalits in India despite special laws: Relevance of Ambedkar’s demand for ‘separate settlement. Journal of Law and Conflict Resolution, 3(9), 151-168, November 2011. Sahoo, Abhijith. (2014). Subaltern Studies :A New Trend in Writing History. Odisha Review. November 2014. Spivak, GS. (1988). “Can the Subaltern Speak?” In Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg (eds.). Urbana/Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

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New Media and Governance: Issues in Democracy and the Transiting Public Sphere in India Bibu V N Mahatma Gandhi University, India Abstract This paper intends to contextualize the changes occurring in governance and democratic practices around the world as a result of rise of the new information and communication technologies (ICTs). The rise of the new media clearly poses interesting opportunities and dilemmas for modern governments as well as political actors outside the formal structures of power. How well these structures and groups adapt and respond to these new challenges may hold significant consequences for their continuing relevance and ability to function in society. Keywords: ICT, new media, public sphere, democracy, governance

Introduction The communication scenario around the world is changing fast. The arrival of new technologies, sophisticated devices and novel concepts has given pace to the process of information flow. Along with the technological advancement, mass media also had also changed a lot in terms of both format and content. Internet enabled communication platforms and the resultant media convergence have evoked debates on new media, democracy, nation-state, citizenship, new age governance and the very role and function of media. Moreover, the politics of globalization which altered the power and functions of the nationstate is also evident before us in many forms. In the midst of this setting, it is relevant to think about the role of media in a democratic space and also the challenging role of the state to govern this new breed of citizen. This paper intends to contextualize the changes occurring in governance and democratic practices around the world as a result of rise of the new information and communication technologies (ICTs). The rise of the new media clearly poses interesting opportunities and dilemmas for modern governments as well as political actors outside the formal structures of power. How well these structures and groups adapt and respond to these new challenges may hold significant consequences for their continuing relevance and ability to function in society. The role played by media in a democracy is complex and varied. At its best, the media operates as an additional check and balance on government, promotes an atmosphere of answerability. It also provides a public forum for debate, and encourages an informed and educated citizenry. Through this, media take part in a crucial manner in the formation and maintenance of public sphere in a society. A public sphere can be seen as a space distinct from both the state and the market. It is that domain of our social life in which such thing as public opinion is formed. It echoes the concepts of freedom in a democratic society and freedom from commoditization of life. It is a widely accepted notion that the media both strengthens and benefits democracy. But the irresponsible functioning of the mainstream or dominant media can harm the very essence of democracy and can lead to a tainted public sphere. Such a scene can bring media to act as a mouthpiece for a particular interest group—such as the government or large corporations. Eventually, media fails in its role to defend democratic governance by undermining it.

Media and society Mass media plays a crucial role in shaping and reflecting public opinion, connecting the world to individuals and reproducing the self-image of society. Mass media generates information from a network of relations and influences the public in large. The socio- cultural and political attitudes and preferences of the operating society is thus formed and sustained to a greater level by the mass media. The consequences and ramifications of the mass media relate not merely to the way newsworthy events are perceived, but also to a multitude of cultural and political influences that operate through the media. As discussed in the landmark report on communication, ‘Many Voices One World’, ‘the task of mass communication has become ever more complex and subtle – to contribute to the liberation of mankind from want, oppression and fear and to unite it in community and communion, solidarity and understanding’ (Mc Bride, 1982). The creation, maintenance and

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development of the community towards a liberating horizon have been the greatest challenge faced by the mass media at all times. Mainstream media was constantly failing in this due to various pressures and interventions from the environment. The evolution and development of new media poses great opportunities in strengthening this community participation. “Of all the promises and prognoses made about old and new media, perhaps the most compelling has been the possibility of regenerating community through mediated forms of communication” (Jankowski, 2006). This rebirth of community platform is the greatest feature of new media communication.

State and the media The state or the governing class is connected to the citizens through mass media. They are the major channel through which the governors and the governed communicate in their mutual attempts to influence and persuade. The state has a major role in the control, organization and the dissemination of information. State is the power centre which lays down conditions in the communication flow. Mc Bride Commission Report on communication and media illustrates the role of state in the information and communication flow in the following major areas; a.

legislation regulating rights and responsibilities in various fields of communication;

b.

the inclusion of resources for communication in overall planning;

c.

regulation of conditions governing media ownership and communication activities;

d.

attribution of facilities (e.g. Distribution of frequencies) for telecommunications and other technologies;

e.

control of communication channel and carriers;

f.

direct public ownership of media and other means of communication;

g.

direct involvement in various communication activities by creating national, regional and local public bodies;

h.

measures aiming to prevent the spread of distorted views and the abuse of communication practices;

i.

limitation of important content and messages etc.

The above list clearly establishes the leading edge of the state over any other institutions in activities related to the process of communication. They undeniably have the most serious responsibilities in communication. There are ideological, political, economic, legal and moral reasons behind this enhanced presence of the state in mass media activities. These are the foundations through which the governance patterns in respective regimes getting flourished. Media have been the greatest ever luring mechanism or propagandist machine through which the ruling class sustained their dominance over the mass. The pervasiveness of mass media has been utilized efficiently by the power block to both advance their visions and to suppress any sign of dissent. “Initially because of the spread of literacy and subsequently because of advances in communications technology, the media – and particularly Television in today’s world – have increasingly become the principal source of political information for the mass public as political discussion within, and information flows through, family, community, and other intermediary organizations have declined in frequency and importance” (Mughan, 2000). Thus, any other social institution has less say in matters pertaining to public life of the citizenry. The offline or traditional media, which includes both print and broadcast media, has great historical back up. Both had their own glorious past in terms of community development and developmental communication. But the changes happened in the global media scene as a result of the globalization and the market-oriented liberalization politics have created a paradigm shift in the way traditional media looked upon the issues related to democracy and community and national development. Also, questions about the unprecedented foreign investment in media, monopolistic practices, concentration of ownership, homogenization of content etc are also being raised in the current context of media proliferation.

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Control over the media content from the government will not go in line with the aspects of individual rights, notably the right to dissent and debate. Even in countries with democratic state mechanism, we can see instances of regulation in view of curbing the spreading of information and opinions that they consider harmful.

Media and Democracy: Indian Scene Today, when considering Indian democracy, we can find the degradation done to the public domain, which once was envisaged as democratic and pro-developmental. The reflections of the newly formulated governance and media policies in the wake of the LPG (Liberalization, Privatization, Globalization) era is clearly visible now. Rapid corporatization of the media sector, foreign investment, new age content prioritization and massive commercialization of the media activities created ripples in the democratic framework of the media. Corporate sector, which owns the major media ventures here, maintained a media policy suited for their supremacy. We have enough examples before us which indicates their unholy relationship and the unethical lobbying in the state in matters related to the licensing and attribution of facilities. The process of media globalization made the public sphere to shrink fast. The central features of the media globalization includes larger cross-border flows of media outputs, growth of trans-national media conglomerates, centralization of media control and intensification of commercialization. It is not good for a democratic developing country where news as well as the media content is not giving the audience a chance of effective intervention in the issues of public concern and scrutiny. Democracy demands a system of constant interaction with all the people, accessibility at all levels, a public ethos, which allows conflicting ideas to contend and which provides for full participation in reaching consensus on socio-cultural, economic and political goals. The media in a democratic society should facilitate this process by providing a space for public debate. This space, the public sphere is an integral outcome of the public opinion. For a clear and efficient conception of democracy, an efficient public communication network is an essential element. Moreover, people should have free access to the knowledge and information they require, they should be able to discuss matters of public interest with their equals in order to influence actions taken.

Evolution of New Media “New Media are new technologies for representation and communication based on the paradigm of computation – reducing things to their logical ‘equivalents’, enabling information to be easily transmitted, compared and transformed” (Levinson, 2001). New media describes any digital media production that is interactive and digitally distributed. Two fundamental features that distinguish ‘New Media’ from the preceded media forms, much of which still exists are: 1.

Transmission and accessibility – emphasis on the integration of multimedia platforms and the use of new media through

Internet as the major channel. 2.

Interactivity – the most defining quality of the new media which makes it as the ‘future media’.

Internet-enabled technologies like websites, video-audio streaming, chat rooms, various social networking and online community platforms, virtual reality environments, mobile phone technology, internet telephony etc. comes under the category of new media. An important promise of New Media is the "democratization" of the creation, publishing, distribution and consumption of media content. The digital technology which enables the content to be digitized to bits which makes this as a dynamic platform of content production which can be done in real time. It was only in the late 1980s, the primary appearance of networked environment and computer-aided design happened. The reliance was much on the traditional media systems till that time. Eventually, with the advent of digital technology and personal computer industry, widespread use of new media technologies became a reality. Web-enabled

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electronic accessories like mobile phones, laptops, tab PCs, and various interactive devices made new media as a commendable experience of our times. The last twenty-five years have seen the rapid transformation into media which are predicated upon the use of digital computers, such as the Internet and computer games. All other media forms were also transiting during this period by incorporating new media or the new media-enabled features. Noted scientist Russel Newman commented on the blurring inter-personal, mass communication differentiation in this new media age. He also pointed out that the public and private communication has never ever before been intermeshed like this. Newman argues that New Media will alter the meaning of geographic distance. It will also allow for a huge increase in the volume of communication. Qualities like the massive speed of communication, capacity to overlap and interconnect other forms of communication that were previously separate were regarded by Newman as the groundbreaking features of this futuristic medium.

New Media and democracy The democratic framework of the new media makes it as an appropriate medium for a democratic society. As discussed earlier, democracy should give space for public debate and discussion on issues concerning public life. New media technologies, especially the most powerful and popular one, Internet is blessed with a number of news groups, discussion lists and websites for debating social, political and cultural issues. The rapid growth of Internet around the globe shows the potential of the media. As it is characterized by open communication, de-centralization of authority, freedom of share and data reusability, it can evoke different planes of radical discourse on democracy. For the last five years, there has been a considerable increase in the Internet population in India. Various websites and blogs are gaining popularity and playing a major role in recapturing the forum of discussion on various issues. Other than these, there is a considerable growth in the number of online initiatives like quasi-public service sites, specialized search engines, social event calendars, social networking sites and various new media services like podcasts, videocasts and RSS feeds etc. popular social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Orkut, Myspace etc. are very popular nowadays in the social communication sector. We can see the proliferation in the number of websites handling information on environment, social development, social mobilization, literacy, citizen journalism and various issues concerning a pluralistic society. Online encyclopedias like Wikipedia are revolutionizing the information flow.

Public Sphere The notion of the ‘public sphere’ was conceptualized prominently by the German scholar Jurgen Habermas (Habermas, 1962). The concept of ‘bourgeois public sphere’ was established from the end of the 17th century. It was situated as it were between the private sphere and the sphere of the public authorities. Private citizens could come and comment on different issues pertaining state and governance here. In later centuries, media played a vital role in defining the public sphere. According to Habermas, the decline of the public sphere was seen by the end of the 19th century. And he insists that then existed ‘public sphere’ was highly class linked and hence it was out of reach for all commoners. Habermas further elucidates the notions on public sphere as follows; 1.

The public sphere requires a ‘forum’ that is accessible to as many people as possible and where at large variety of social

experiences can be expressed and exchanged. 2.

In the public sphere, the various arguments and views are confronted through rational discussion. This implies that

rational political choice is possible only if the public sphere first offers a clear insight into the possible alternatives from which one can choose. At the same time, media should offer the widest possible range of interpretation frames so that the citizen is also aware of what he did not choose (Murdock, 1992) 3.

Systematically and critically checking on government policies is the primary task of this public sphere.

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Habermas presents the most comprehensive piece of work on the subject of the public sphere in relation to state power, distinguishing it from other theories of democratization that link it only to markets and nation-states, due to his account of the emergence of a communicative space in which democratic practices evolve. As seeing ‘public sphere’ as the inevitable ingredient of democracy, each government in a democratic set up should ideally affiliate its communication and broadcasting systems to strengthen the public forum of discourse. But when analyzing the actual scene, we can see the communication system and the political reality prevailing in many ‘democratic states’ like India, are not contributing to the strengthening of the public sphere but to control it. The Habermasian notion of a free and fair forum of public debate is still has conceptual existence. Indian media, now predominantly owned and operated by private sector, are less interested in the resurgence of the public sphere. Government media which had its focus much on development themes went bar behind this all-encompassing private capital. E-governance initiatives and various community radio ventures can bee seen as efforts from the government to free communication from the consumerist, market-driven modes and to help generate an enhanced sense of ‘publicness’. New Media and Public Sphere The four dimensions central to the Habermasian public sphere namely, a.

Equality of access

b.

Diversity of opinions

c.

Reciprocity and

d.

Quality of participation In order to analyze the potential of new media in terms of public sphere, noted scientist Schneider carried out an

online experiment by collecting 46,000 responses from an online community on abortion. He then analyzed the responses on the basis of the above parameters. Except the last point of the dimensions, i.e. the quality of participants, Schneider found the results as acceptable and rewarding. His experiment showed that online communities exhibit high degree of reciprocity, diversity of opinions and greater access. While quality of participation and the level of interaction is still an issue to be discussed and probed, new media opens wider horizons of participatory, democratic communication. Serious concerns over the evolutionary public sphere have been addressed by the scholars over the time. According to Ingrid Volkmer, “public sphere” is defined as a process through which public communication becomes restructured and partly disembodied from national political and cultural institutions. This trend of the globalized public sphere is not only as a geographical expansion form a nation to worldwide, but also changes the relationship between the public, the media and state (Volkmer, 1999). Howard Rheingold (2000) describes these globalised societies as self-defined networks, which resemble what we do in real life. "People in virtual communities use words on screens to exchange pleasantries and argue, engage in intellectual discourse, conduct commerce, make plans, brainstorm, gossip, feud, fall in love, create a little high art and a lot of idle talk" (Rheingold, 2000). For Sherry Turkle “making the computer into a second self, finding a soul in the machine, can substitute for human relationships" (Holmes 2005: 184). New media has the ability to connect like-minded others worldwide. All this shows that new media has the power to connect people from different spheres of life and has got the ability to free the opinions that are confined within the restrictions imposed by various social institutions.

New Media and Governance New Media has been used extensively by social movements to educate, organize, share cultural products of movements, communicate, coalition build, and more. The Zapatista Army of National Liberation of Chiapas, Mexico, were the first major movement to make widely recognized and effective use of New Media for communiqués and organizing in 1994. (Wikipedia on New Media, 2011).

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Apart from the wide urban user base, Indian new media communication as part of the e-governance initiatives by the central and state governments is revolving around some promising e-governance plans. Considering the Indian scene, thr Government of India had started e-governance initiatives with a conception to launch the new media communication as a Government to Citizen Communication plan (G2C). The spirit behind G2C services will encompass all the services that the Government is delivering to its citizens. Services like Transport, Medicine and Education are examples of e-governance sectors. It is important to note now that there are a number of aspects like the policies, infrastructure, Human resources; Technology, infrastructure etc. will be required for the successful operation of e-Governance. Concept of E-Government is the transformation of public sector’s internal and external relationship through Internet-enabled operations, information and communication technology in order to optimize government service delivery and governance.

Governmental perspectives on e –governance Use of New media or e-governance practices provides support to the government in its major function – decision making. The information and the resultant decision is thus communicated to the mass using the new media/ electronic platforms. Also the largest repositories of information and data associated with each government could be easily stored and managed by the electronic governance. Government always had access to the best available technology of the day to manage its affairs and e-government provides some of the latest and best available technology. Moreover, e-governance provides an important tool to cop up with the information explosion that is happening in this drastically changing information and communication landscape.

India’s National E-Governance Plan (NEGP) NEGP is a new media based plan which has its inception in 2003 as part of the 10th National Plan. Aiming to provide electronic services to citizens, NEGP was conceptualized to include all state governments and various stand alone mission mode projects (MMPs) and various activities. The Information Technology Audit report of eSeva lists down some major services as part of the nation-wide e-governance programmes as: 1. Transport-Registration of Motor Vehicles, issuing driving licenses etc. 2. Health Care- Linking various Hospitals Tele-Medicine etc. 3. Education-Linking various educational Institutions, distance learning etc. 4. Employment-Online Registration for unemployed, computerization of day to day activities of employment exchange etc. 5. Municipal- Bill deposition, Issue of Certificates - Birth / Death / Land records etc. 6. Food and Civil Supply- Issue and Renewal of Ration Cards 7. Revenue-Registration of Property, Land records computerization & Transfer of Properties, Stamp Duty Payments. According to the report, e-governance is conceptualized in the following levels; Level1: Information (availability and dissemination) Level 2: Interaction (Citizen to department and vice versa) Level3: Transaction (Citizen to department and vice versa. The first level of the project is where the application can provide an interface to citizen for information access and the user can access and download information. The second level of the project is where the application can provide interactivity with the user and allows the user to communicate with the department and answer queries of the user examples is e-choupal, where the citizens can get information about the weather, type of crops to be grown and current rate on the yields and crop. The third level of the application is where the citizens and the government department can carry out transactions. The examples of successful third level projects are e-Seva, Railway ticketing System etc. Also 4 different stages of governance is laid down by the government as

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1. Phase 1: Information Technology framework 2. Phase 2: Digitization 3. Phase 3: Citizen Access 4. Phase 4: Content Development It is evident from the above listed initiatives that the power of new media or electronic media based on computer technologies and networks have immense potential in the dissemination of information. Here also, apart from the free data flow, improved administrative mechanism, questions on the citizenship and the resultant public sphere are still valid. It is argued that the newly installed e-projects are majorly focusing on the information provision leaving behind options to improve the public sphere and the democratic forum of discourse. The research findings on the Telecentre experiments as part of the e-governance plan done by Ms. Vineeta Dixit of NeGP Programme Management Unit, Department of Information Technology clearly substantiates the lacks and flaws in the current e-governance system in relation to the public sphere. Dixit’s research was on the ‘Drishtee Telecentre Initiative’, an e-governance project to develop e-governance modules for Madhya Pradesh’s Internet project - “Gyandoot.”

Later,

Drishtee signed an agreement with the administration of a small but prosperous and developed district in the Indian state of Haryana – Sirsa too. A Telecentre is typically a building or a room with computers, a telephone line, Internet connection and other office automation equipments such as photocopier and fax. It is a common meeting place where people are exposed to tools, skills, attitudes and values of ICTs (Fuchs, 1998); provide public access to ICTs for personal, social, educational and economic development (Harris, 1999); offer a range of services and vary in their location and business models (Proenza et al., 2001). Roman & Colle (2001) identify five basic purposes of a Telecentre – to provide access to rural areas, to reduce marginalization, to facilitate dialogue between communities and policy makers, to encourage participation in decision making and finally to gain information and resources. The research had its focus to check whether the Telecenter experiment is contributing any kind of extension to the public sphere. The paper concluded that while Telecentres create opportunities to extend the public sphere, it is unlikely that any major transformation in the system is will result as a consequence of this extension because the current use of ICTs concentrates primarily on information provision, and not linkages that improve the quality of democratic discourse.

Major Challenges in e-governance in strengthening public sphere As described earlier, the change should begin from the level where the e-governance programmes installation. Unfortunately, most of the e-governance projects are still functioning in the first level of the plan; i.e. the information dissemination. Chances of discourse and two-way communication are absent here. The concept of public sphere underpins the idea of a space where citizens are able to deliberate in a democratic process and the importance of public sphere lies in its conception of public discourse or communicative action that has the potential to link the state, market and the citizen. (Dixit, 2007). Major challenges could be narrated as follows; 1.

A public forum free from market and state.

_ When commercial factors and the state authorities determines

connectivity, free forum is a challenge. 2.

Community orientation – apart from the information needs, majority of the operating community are not oriented

towards the need of a strong public sphere and a resulting democracy 3.

Resource availability – constant deliverance and availability of resources is yet another challenge in creating active

participation 4.

Complexity in connecting the technology with the much more complex social spheres of India

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5.

Transparency in implementing the projects

6.

Existing disconnect between the urban and rural public spheres.

7.

Challenging population figures which needs an urgent boost in terms of computer literacy

8.

Attitude from the fellow media in showcasing issues related to new media- e-governance projects

9.

Issues related to the cultural, socio-political diversities existing in the subcontinent

It is evident that the potential of new media in e-governance is immense. In order to unite various citizen groups and promote free forums of discourse, the political and the central and state government machineries should promote the concepts on radical democracy. Government should give ample space for the spreading of concepts related to the democratization through the strengthening of the public sphere. A public sphere which is free from the market and the governmental pressures can offer better chances of democratic discourse. . References Bronner, Stephen Eric and Douglas Kellner, Critical Theory and Society. A Reader, New York: Routledge Calhoun, Craig. (1992), Habermas and Public Sphere, Cambridge: The MIT Press Carey, J. (1989), Communication as Culture, London: Routledge Castells, Manuel, (1996) Rise of the Network Society, The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture volume 1, Massachusetts, Blackwell Publishing David M, Ramussen. (1990). Reading Habermas, Oxford: Blackwell Dixit, Vineeta. (2007). Habermasian Public Sphere and the Tele centre Discourse in Governance, New Delhi: Computer Society of India Durham, M & Kellner, Douglas (2001) Media and Cultural Studies Keyworks, Malden, Ma and Oxford, UK, Blackwell Publishing Gouldner, Alwyn W. (1976), The Dialectic of Ideology and Technology, New York: Seabury Habermas, J.(1989). The Structural transformation of the Public Sphere, Cambridge: Polity Herman, Edward S and Mc Chensney, Robert W. (1998), The Global Media, New Missionaries of Capitalism, New Delhi: Madhyam Hoggart, R. (2004), Mass Media in a Mass Society, New York: Continuum Jankowski, Nicholas. (2006). Creating Community with Media: History, Theories and Scientific Investigations. The Hand Book of New Media, ed. Leah A. Lievrouw, Sonia Livingstone, 63-64, 66-67. London, California and New Delhi: SAGE Publications Kellner, Douglas. (1995), Media Culture, London and New York: Routledge Levinson, P. (2001). Digital Mcluhan; A Guide to the Information Millenium. London: Routledge Mac Bride, Sean. (1982). Many Voices One World, UNESCO Publishing Manovich, Lev (2001) 'The Language of New Media', Cambridge and London: MIT Press

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Mughan, Anthony and Richard Gunther. (2000). The Media in Democratic and Nondemocratic Regimes: A Multilevel Perspective. Democracy and the Media: A Comparative Perspective, ed. Anthony Mughan, Richard Gunther, 23. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Oliver Boyd-Berrett. (1997), Conceptualizing the Public Sphere. Approaches to Media: A Reader, New York: Arnold Robert, C Holub. (1991), Jurgen Habermas – Critic in the Public Sphere, London: Routledge Volkmer, Ingrid (1999) News in the Global Sphere. A Study of CNN and its impact on Global Communication, Luton: University of Luton Press. Wise, R. (2000), Multimedia, A Critical Introduction, London: Routledge

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Guidelines for Contributors The editorial board of Amity Journal of Media and Mass Communication studies, Rajasthan would like to invite research papers / articles from scholars for the next issue of Amity Journal of Media and mass Communication Studies, AUR, Jaipur. The journal aims at publishing original , research based papers and articles on topics such as Digital Media Vs traditional media , scope and challenges of online media, role of digital media in brand promotion, media and democracy, media and ethics , role of media in governance, media vis-à-vis laws and regulation, media and corporate social responsibility, digital media as a tool of advertising ,technology and media , contemporary cinema, issues in public relations and corporate communication, gender and media, current advertising practices in the Indian and global context. The journal is published to disseminate the latest information in the field of media research and media development. The Journal is interested in research which: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Formulates and explores new conceptual models. Reports relevant survey research findings. Integrates or synthesizes different field of understanding. Tests work- related hypothesis of practical significance. Evaluates the results of field experiments and case studies. Summarizes and evaluates areas of new understanding. Presents new insights into major issues within the media and communication.

Submissions will be evaluated with respect to the following criteria: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

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Guidelines for Full Paper submission The Manuscripts should be based on original work and should not have been published elsewhere in any form, abridged or otherwise. The Authors should submit their full paper as a word file. The paper should be mailed to the editor at [email protected], [email protected] All papers accepted by the editorial committee will be considered for publication in the Journal.

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