SJC Research Seminar - Peering into the Kava Bowl, Again - Perspectives on Pacific Islands Journalism

Dr Mark Hayes presents. Everyone is welcome. Details below: 

Summary:

While Australia is the local Superpower in the South West Pacific, like it or not, local knowledge and experience with the Pacific among Australian journalists is woeful. Only a handful of journalists make the Pacific their 'patch' while others parachute into Regional countries, usually to report disasters, civil unrest, or tourism opportunities.
Often very badly.

As the only Australian journalism academic to focus on the Pacific, its complex media and journalism environments, and the contexts in which Pacific journalists operate, Dr Mark Hayes presents a current overview and update of the state of Pacific Islands journalism.

His presentation will range from tiny Tuvalu, on the very front lines of global warming where Radio Australia is broadcast locally via shortwave, to Papua New Guinea, with its complex challenges daily confronted by local journalists, Tonga, with its first genuinely democratic elections looming but overshadowed by a terrible ferry disaster, Samoa, recovering from last year's devastating tsunami in which journalists were among the first responders, and Fiji, where the leading newspaper is facing either closure or forced sale, and the military regime controls the media and deploys severe censorship.

And four UQ SJC journalism students have now undertaken work experience or Professional Placements with Islands media in Vanuatu and Samoa. How these opportunities were developed, and the student's experiences will be discussed.

Dr Hayes will also discuss the splintering of the Pacific Islands News Association and the formation of the Pacific Media Association. He's been a close observer of PINA since 2000, attended every PINA conference since 2003, and was in Samoa at the meeting which resulted in moves to establish the Pacific Media Association in May, 2010.

He will also touch on the state of Pacific Islands journalism training and education.

What's really going on in the Pacific media will be analysed and critiqued from the point of view of the Islanders but also deploying relevant Palagi (Westerner, outsider) media and social theory.

Throughout, Dr Hayes will illustrate his presentation with original pictures and his first hand experiences of travelling to Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Samoa, Tonga, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, and Papua New Guinea to experience and research the local media environments.