The Media Program remains one of the most salient areas of work within the Alliance’s ecosystem of projects. It continues to feed innovative, low-cost/high impact projects into the Alliance’s larger repertoire of work.
Nearly two-thirds of all conflicts have a cultural, religious, or ethnic component. The Media Program is grounded in the philosophy that media have a critical role to play in increasing public understanding of such conflicts and of issues that polarize communities.
The Media Program is principally concerned with the following objectives:
1) increase access of editors, journalists and the wider public to experts commentary that helps raise the quality of analysis on cross-cultural tensions and conflicts.
To that end, the UNAOC media program has launched Global Experts (www.theglobalexperts.org) in 2008, which serves as an online resource that connects journalists to world-class experts to seek commentary and diversify opinions on issues and crises involving political, social and religious dimensions. In a 24-hour news cycle, with budgets shrinking daily and with a proliferation of online resources, finding accurate, fair, and informed sources of commentary and analysis has never been more crucial.
The UNAOC media program has also conducted a number of multimedia and video projects in cooperation with various partners on a series of issues, feature a diversity of experts’ opinions and analysis on common themes to provide a better understanding to complex issues: the importance of religion symbols; hybrid communities; positive civil society initiatives that mitigate conflicts, etc. In August 2011, a project was produced jointly by the British Council’s Our Shared Future program and the University of Missouri School of Journalism to release a video series “100 Questions about Islam” featuring short interviews of the British Council’s Our Shared Future Opinion Leaders Network and UNAOC Global Experts. Experts provided facts and commentary about Islam and the relationship between Muslims and non-Muslims in Western society.
2) create opportunities for journalists to enhance their skills through trainings with and exposure to media professionals from other parts of the world
In 2010, the UNAOC conducted a conference on Freedom of Expression in the Digital Age held in Alexandria, Egypt, in February, in partnership with the Anna Lindh Foundation and administered by ICFJ, with the support of the Alexandria Library. Meeting over a period of three days, 45 journalists participated in hands-on workshops on writing opinion pieces and using new digital tools. They engaged in vigorous debates on stereotypes, loaded language and graphic images. They also heard from a wide range of experts on everything from covering Islam in the Western media to the growing use of social networking in the Muslim world.
Prior to the conference, many reporters took part in a five-week online course on digital media that for the first time was taught in Arabic and English. Comments from the participants were translated each day, sparking lively discussions.
More recently, in October 2011, ahead of the imminent elections in Tunisia and Egypt, the UNAOC Media Program worked with The New York Times Knowledge Network and offered online adult and continuing education opportunities, to provide a six-week online course to Tunisian, Egyptian, Moroccan, French, and American journalists and journalism students.
3) provide media empowerment trainings to civil society leaders, from opinion leaders and academics to marginalized or stereotyped communities.
In addition to this, the UNAOC Media Program is increasingly playing the role of a meta-media convener and facilitator for conversations on best practices in the media industry vis-à-vis several key communities:
- managers, editors and journalists of media organizations;
- public and private funders of media activities and media development,
- those involved in pedagogy and journalism education and training.
In October 2011, leaders of major international broadcast networks met at the Dead Sea in Jordan as part of a private meeting organized by the UNAOC and the Anna Lindh Foundation under the auspices of His Majesty King Abdullah Bin Al Hussein of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. The meeting focused on dialogue and social change in the Mediterranean, the changing media landscape, and the regional reform agenda in the wake of the Arab uprisings (read more).
Partners
The UNAOC Media program works with a wide range of partners to conduct joint projects and initiatives.
British Council -Demotix – European Broadcast Union- New York Times Knowledge Network – Newsexchange – University of Missouri School of Journalism -
For more information about the Media Program, please contact Daanish Masood (daanishm@unops.org) or Stephanie Durand (stephanied@unops.org)
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