Book review of Learning to listen, Listening to Learn by Denzil D. Russell

Review of Learning to Listen Listening to Learn 1992 (experiences from a South African Radio Forum’s Research and Development Project) By Professor Denzil D Russel. Published by the Centre for Continuing Education, University of the Witwatersrand and the Department of National Health and Population Development, Pretoria.

Why I have decided to review this book

The description and analyses of the study undertaken in this project and the qualitative research, resembles my pilot project and participatory methodology.  Prof Russell's research was done over a period of two years and mine will be on a smaller scale - two to three months.  This project has its study groups among adult and youth while mine will involve grade 6 pupils.  Where these adults gave feed-back about the programmes they were exposed to, it is fascinating to see how eager they are to listen to programmes on life skills development and how many different topics they suggested.  My pilot project covers the life skills curriculum of the grade 6 learners. Learning to Listen, Listening to Learn also covers what prof Russel calls, quality of life education programmes broadcast by the SABC.

Review of Preface and Abstract and differences between my study and this one

“On their own the broadcast media are blunt instruments of informal education in the community development and change process.” (Russell, 1992: 1)

Professor Denzil D. Russell rightly argues that a casual informal educational event could be turned into a much more meaningful educational experience when target audience groups are able to discuss development education programmes.  Not only will the participants benefit, but also the broadcast planners and wider audience.

The Wits research project used 125 listening groups with as many leaders in 60 magisterial districts over a period of 2 years. (It was going to be 5 years but financial restraints shortened the project). I will be one person analyzing two listening groups in two schools over a period of 2 months.

Nine different languages were used in this project.  I will use two languages - English and Afrikaans.

Informal group discussions were held after hours in various community or school halls.  My research analyses will take place in classrooms during school hours.

One of the similarities between our projects is that the idea behind it is improving the quality of life of the participants and eventually the wider audience.

Their project used mostly adult women and youth of 18 years and older(N=1700) as participants and I will focus on grade 6 children.

Feedback received by the SABC led to improved scheduling and programme presentation.  I hope that my pilot study feed-back will also help the Children's Radio Foundation to improve their programmes.

Forums in Prof Russell's study made their own tape recordings of most forum discussions.  I will be using a Dictaphone in one of the schools I visit.

The overall long-term aim of Prof Russell's project was to develop an interactive radio forum system for South Africa.  His research report covers the period March 1990 to April 1992. A large amount of qualitative data had to be recorded, analysed and reported.  He mentions in his preface how important it was that the people in the radio forum groups had to be helped to "learn to listen".

The abstract is written  in 11 languages.

Section one:

The aim of the Radio Forum Research Project was to develop a model for interactive radio in SA .  This was supposed to be done over a five year period.  For financial reasons, the project was terminated after two years.  It took the form of establishing and maintaining interactive listening groups or forums, observing, recording and analysing the discussions of the groups.  It also monitored and adapted the administrative process.

The SABC commissioned this project to receive feedback on their informal educational broadcasts.

The Chief Directorate: Population Development (from now on referred to as the CDPD) argued that most of the population growth took place in rural areas where standars of living is low in terms of health, infant mortality rates etc.  Fertility rate decline is associated with high socio-economic standards.  They decided to concentrate on education, primary health care,  economy and teenage sexuality education.  Their Information, Educations and Communication Directorate launched its Radio Programme Project in 1989.  “Quality of life” programmes of 15 minutes long were designed for different target groups and broadcast each week in each of nine African languages. The average daily listenership for these programmes were about two million.

Prof Russell lists die aims of his radio forums research project as follows:

1.       To increase audience participation and involvement in the radio experience by creating listening/discussion groups, namely radio forums.

2.       To create a structure to establish, nurture and evaluate the forums.

3.       To identify possible improvements  that the SABC might make to its informal education programmes and provide feedback in this regard to the SABC

4.       To provide the CDPD with feedback on listener reaction to their “qualify of life” programmes and to determine perceptions on population issues within the target communities.

5.       To determine what effects the programmes-cum-forums had on forum members

6.       To seek means to enhance appropriate forum member/other listener behavior resultant on the programmes

7.       To identify and train the necessary staff and key people in the community to achieve the above objectives

8.       To contribute through this training and through the process to human resource development

9.       To develop a model for forming self-sustaining and self-forming radio forums

10.   To determine what sort of training area organizers, forum leaders and forum secretaries need to run successful forums

11.   To report in particular on listeners’ perceptions on fertility and appropriate family size.

The radio forum was the prime instrument of data collection and the project was conceived as a participatory research and development project. The final research contracts made provision for the establishment  of 20 – 30 forums in the first and pilot year and 30 forums in the second year of the project.

Prof Russell divided the development into 8 Stages.   Stage one was planning with the facilitating institution, stage two was planning with the local people (often the most influential and most difficult), stage 3 was to involve all the key people recommended by thos people in stage two, stage four was implementing the project with people from stages 1, 2, and 3. Stage 5 involved questions and clarifications, stage 6 was where people appointed their own forum leaders and secretaries, stage 7 involved people running their own forums and sending reports and feedback to the CCE (Centre for Continuing Education) and the last stage was for the CCE to send feedback to the SABC and DNH&PD  (Department of National Health and Population Development )and to forums.

The forums consisted of a listener group of between 8 and 15 youths or adults, literate or illiterate.  They listened to the programme in their mother tongue and then discussed it. The forum leader was chosen by them.  A written report of the discussion was made by the forum secretary.  Each group had their own radio provided by one of the members.  In most cases the programme was tape-recorded in advance. Later on audio tape-recordings were also made of most meetings.  Forum leaders and secretaries received some informal training.

Forums did not only take place in rural settings.  Some were also established in Soweto and on the East Rand and in townships attached to small towns.  Some areas were high-risk, often strife-torn and violent.

In the two years of the project over 125 forums were set up but not as many were maintained, due to civil strife, inadequate communication and budget restraints.  Administrative problems were also experienced as some people could not cope with the requirements of the reporting procedures – with the tapes and paperwork.

Section Two

Participatory action research was used.  It considered problems in a specific context and attempts to solve them in that context (situational).  It was collaborative in that it involved the stakeholders, researchers and target population working together.  The target population participated actively in the process and the implementation of findings.  It was also self-evaluative.

The following sources of information were used:

Completed questionnaires, written reports of forum discussions, audio recordings of sampled forum discussions and written translations, written reports from fieldworkers and area organizers, tabulations of formally established forums, computerized database of forums and meetings, financial records, quarterly reports, minutes of advisory committee meetings, report on training workshop, annual report, scripts of broadcasts (English version) and  notes from discussions with the Director of the CCE, coordinator, fieldworker administrative staff, translators, area organizers and representatives of the CDPD.

Data gathering procedures:

Talkback forms and introductory forms for the forums were adapted from  a Ghanaian rural radio forum project.  It seemed to intimidate some of the groups and was left out later on.  Often the talkback forms were not used and group leaders gave their own commentaries.  Nearly all the reports and tape-recordings required translating into English

Each forum’s factual data was recorded in a chart and regularly updated.  The chart contained the names of forums, the district, the target group, number of meetings held, language, number of members, names of leader and secretary and address and telephone number of the area organizer.

Significant statements were isolated and grouped according to a theme in order to provide feedback.  Themes included education, role and status of women, economy, housing, decision making and good parenting.  Comparisons of rural and urban attitudes regarding the topics were made.

Some of these groups were reluctant to have themselves tape recorded.  Significant statements were also not identified with a specific group as they would find it a breach of confidence.

Tape recordings of certain programme themes were chosen and only those statements relvant to the theme were extracted.  These statements were then reported linked to a specific week number, programme title and forum name.

The written reports from forum secretaties were usually more focused than transcriptions of taped forum discussions

Qualitative data basically consisted of significant statements. Transcriptions of complete taped discussions were too laborious and expenscive.  Their was no attempt to quantify the data.  Certain trends were found however – differences between youth and adults and rural and urban participants.

Section Three

 Prof Russell sums up the most important problems as being administrative because of civil and political strife, geographical spread, the fact that it was contract work, insufficient staff, communication difficulties and lack of experience and training.  This sounds a lot like the problems encountered by the Radioprimaria programme in Mexico that was reported on by Peter Spain.

The success of the forums seems to have been closely related to the existing social frameworks.  Groups operating within existing, established organizations, were mostly successful.  Those operating outside, did not survive.  Participants needed to feel that there were personal benefits for them – e.g. their needs were taken into account.  There was also a small cash incentive. The climate of peace was vital.

Prof Russell also reported on problems of poor equipment and poor reception, problems with batteries etc. – all problems that were also encountered in Radioprimaria.  Sometimes inaudible tapes were received and could not be used at all.  There were 30 unidentifiable tapes that had no labeling or introduction to link them to a specific group.  It is obvious that training of forum leaders should have been of greater importance.

A naturalistic approach to the discussion groups were encouraged.  Transport problems and non-attendance were other issues.

Broadcasts versus tape recorders:  Often groups found it difficult to get together at the exact time of the broadcast.   Pre-recordings were often more practical although the concern was that it would distance the forum from  natural radio listening practice.

The organizational hierarchy was as follows: Director of the CCE, Coordinator, Fieldworkers, Area Organisers and Forums.

A small monetary incentive was paid to the forum members.  In many cases this was used for the extra transport costs, batteries or refreshments.  Some forums saved the money to buy their own radio or tape recorder.  Many members admitted they only attended to receive the money.  Which does not have to be a problem.

Problems with programmes and broadcasts were as follows: programmes were not always broadcast at the scheduled time or it was transmitted at unsuitable times.  Programmes were fragmented by advertisements and musical inserts and there was difficulty in determining when the programme began and ended.  These problems were addressed by the SABC and subsequently improved.  Signature tunes had also been introduced afterwards.

Many requests were made for material to be presented in the form of drama – which I find very interesting, since the same requests were made by some of my grade 6 pilot group learners when they were exposed to a documentary genre.  In 1992 the SABC started the broadcast of a 52-episode drama series on population development themes.

Some forums suggested that pros and cons of a certain topic should be voiced so that the education offered should empower individuals to think for themselves.

Some older forum members complained that certain topics should not be talked about too explicitly – there should be more respect.   At some of the urban forums, members complained about “deep” Zulu or Sotho and they even preferred English to the other languages in their “pure” forms.

Practical outcomes of these focus groups included the establishment of other forums by the members themselves on topics of their own choosing and some groups invited the Family Planning Clinic Sister to speak to them.  One group arranged cookery lessons financed from the R50 received per meeting.  A Radio Forum Awareness Day was arranged by one youth forum on the East Rand.  Some approached the municipality about refuse collection, another motiveated them to unblock blocked drains and monitored people who chop down trees of leave taps open.

Section 4

This section deals with training.

Forum leaders were coached about the purpose of forums, the role of a forum leader and secretary and the skills required. They were encouraged to always start and end on time, to encourage the quiet and shy people to talk, not to interrupt people or force their ideas on them.   They should only let one person talk at a time.  They should set dates times and places of next meetings, together with the rest of the forum.  They have to make sure that the people stick to the topic.

Training tools advocated were tapes, role-play, small training workshops, documentation and brochures and ongoing monitoring.  Tapes should demonstrate a well-run meeting, a passive leader, an over-domineering leader and different models for facilitating meetings.

Duties of an area organizer were to make sure that the forums met at least once a week, they had to supply the leader with tapes and batteries, they had to collect reports and tapes from the forum secretaries, compile monthly reports on activities in the forums and be in touch with Wits University by phoning or writing.

Administrative and report-writing skills were important for area organizers

Section five

In this section, Prof. Russell looks at his objectives and discusses whether it has been achieved or not.

He feels that his broad aim of providing guidelines for a nationwide system of radio forums has been achieved.  He proceeds to take every objective (from 1 to 11) and explain how each of them has been achieved.  It is interesting that he came to the same conclusion as Peter Spain in Radioprimaria concerning the importance of technical support and administrative requirements.  Communication between the field workers and administration proved to be vital.  Training of forum leaders should not be neglected.  Advanced schedules of programmes should also  be available.

Forums should always be given feed-back concerning their suggestions, even if it is to say that these suggestions were unpractical and could not be implemented.  Silence is not an option.

Some of the themes forum members suggested to the SABC included programmes that teach cooking skills and how to look after their families, programmes that would make them more vigilant about dangerous diseases, programmes on budgeting, on individual freedom in decision making, rape in townships, drugs in the city and Hillbrow, first aid, physical fitness, contraceptives, mens's attitudes to women etc.

Some suggestions for further research:
Prof. Russell suggests that listener response to the drama format as compared to other formats (documentary?) should be explored.  This also cropped up in my research.

He also suggested that listening forums should be monitored over a long period of time to detect changes in attitudes.

Groups with trained leaders and untrained leaders could be compared.

There could be script analyses to see to what extent the translated script has changed from the English version.

He concludes with the following statement: "There is no doubt that radio in particular is vitally important for mass distance education.  There is also no doubt that discussion groups can play an important role in reinforcing the message of radio programmes.  If people are to learn to control and change the world in which they live, they need to learn through dialogue and participation."

I wanted to know if there was any follow-up to this research of almost 20 years ago and typed "University of Witwatersrand Centre for Continuing Education Radio Forum Research Project" into google.  This is the only connection to a radio research project that came up from the following website: http://www.expressimpress.org/

Radio, convergence and development in Southern Africa

15/03/2011 # 9:22 am # In Press - research # One Comment

A new regional research project in the Department of Media Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand investigates the way in which the Internet and mobile phones are changing the face of radio in Southern Africa.
Southern African countries are still caught up in a complex web of social, political, and economic challenges. While the independence of South Africa in 1994 symbolised the end of colonialism in the region, the twenty-first century has been largely characterised by the intertwined challenges of development and democratisation. Decolonisation was not an end in itself but a means to developing participatory democracy and development systems that are not only characterised by popular participation, but also stronger notions of citizenship and human rights.
As the most widespread medium in Southern Africa, radio has the potential of galvanising the development and democratisation processes by becoming a participatory platform for citizens, an engine for progressive social change, and a watchdog against the abuse of resources by those in power. Radio in Southern Africa is slowly being transformed in terms of its form, content, distribution, and consumption by new information and communication technologies (ICTs) such as the Internet and mobile phones which have rapidly gained ground in the region in the past decade. New digital opportunities are emerging in the way radio is produced and disseminated, and it is argued that ICTs have offered citizens more opportunities to participate in radio content production.
A new regional research project within the Department of Media Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand will investigate how public, private, and community radio stations in Southern Africa are using ICTs to promote bottom-up, interactive, and participatory communication. Specific areas of investigation include, among others, how radio stations and audiences use mobile phones in terms of texting, voice calls, mobile radio, online audio streaming, podcasts, blogs and chat forums.
The project researches these issues in four specific case studies in the region: Malawi (Dr Last Moyo), South Africa (Dr Dina Ligaga and Dr Sarah Chiumbu), Zambia (Dr Wendy Willems) and Zimbabwe (Dr Dumisani Moyo and Dr Last Moyo). It is led by Dr Last Moyo and is part of a larger project on radio, convergence and development in Africa coordinated by the Centre for Media and Transitional Societies (CMTS) at Carleton University in Canada and funded by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) in Canada.
Some of the research findings will be published in a special journal issue of Telematics and Informatics on ‘Radio and new participatory journalisms around the world: Understanding convergence in news cultures’. The guest editor, Dr Last Moyo, is currently inviting interested scholars to submit abstracts for additional contributions by 30 April 2011. A full call for papers is available for download here.