Rhetoric and the Philosophy of Christianity in Clive Staples Lewis’ Works: A Case of Mere Christianity (Published)

This study discussed rhetoric and the philosophy of Christianity in Clive Staples Lewis’ Mere Christianity. It focused on how C.S. Lewis used rhetorical symbols, key terms, and clusters around them to induce his readers’ actions. The cluster criticism approach was adopted. Katz and Lazarsfeld’s 1955 Personal Influence theory explained how opinion leaders or rhetors indirectly establish the media (print) effects. The cluster criticism method analysis revealed how C.S. Lewis deliberately influenced readers using key terms and clusters.

Keywords: Christian philosophy, Clusters, Influence, Media, rhetoric, rhetorical symbols

Role of Media and ICT in Empowering Kenyan Rural Communities with Information on Development (Published)

Information is the key to democracy. Information technology measures social integration, participation and performance valuables in any development. Emerging digital techniques, new network alternatives including intelligent networks, high bandwidth communication technology and state-of-the-art software for network functions and services, are the new technology trends evident in the development of electronic communication systems. Yet most of world’s population remains untouched by this revolution. The paper discusses the need to focus on Kenyan rural communities to empower them to access information, knowledge and poverty alleviation among them by deploying the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). Analyses the factors preventing rural communities from reaping the benefits of ICT s, Kenyan initiatives to overcome the factors, ways and means of poverty alleviation and sustainable development; identifies the bottlenecks and solutions, and lessons learned. The paper will analyze the integration of media and technology in pushing development agenda. Perhaps the inclination of ICT and media as an information resource will bring enormous and diversification in developmental models.

Keywords: Development, ICT, Kenya, Media, Rural

The Role of the Media in Promoting “Elderly Women’s Right to Life” in Tanzania: An Evaluation of “Haki za Binadamu” Program at Radio SAUT (Published)

The focus of this study was to explore the roles played by media, particularly community radios in promoting the rights to life of elderly women in Tanzania. Specifically, the study evaluated the “haki za binadamu program” aired by radio SAUT FM in Nyamagana, Mwanza region. The evaluation concentrated on two areas: One, it evaluated the accessibility and listenership of the program and two it evaluated the success of the program in promoting the rights of elderly women in the district. This is a qualitative research which used purposive and snowball sampling techniques to select the respondents. A total of 27 respondents were involved in the study, they included; three police officers from the gender desk in Nyamagana police station, five local leaders, six journalists who are specialized in human rights reporting, and 13 respondents from families of elderly women who were reported to have been killed due to witchcraft accusations. In-depth interviews and focus group discussions were used to collect the data for this study. Thematic analysis was used to analysis the data gotten from the field. The findings suggest that the accessibility and listenership of haki za binadamu program in Nyamagana district was very poor. It was also found that haki za binadamu program has not played any noticeable contributions in promoting the rights to life to the elderly women in Nyamagana district.

Keywords: Evaluation, Haki za Binadamu., Media, Role, elderly women’s right to life, promoting

Community Radios the Missing Link in Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim Asset) (Published)

This paper looks at how the media and in particular radio broadcasts can impact positively on this new economic blue-print. The bias towards radio is because the distribution of newspapers in Zimbabwe is concentrated on major urban centres that are along the major highways thus alienating those in rural and farming communities who are a key component in selected two of the four clusters in ZimAsset. 

Keywords: Broadcasting, Community Radios, Media, Sustainable Socio-Economic

Media Coverage of Ebola Virus Disease in Nigeria Using Guardian and Punch Newspapers (Published)

Health issues are germane to the survival of the human race. Issues relating to health are considered very important to all strata of persons in the society irrespective of their socio-economic and political status as well as their political affiliations. It is in view of this that countries of the world take health matters particularly those on epidemics seriously because if they are left unattended to they can result in great catastrophic. It is to avoid catastrophic that countries of the world go all length to nip such problems in the bud.       Anchored on the Information, Social Responsibility and Agenda Setting Theories, this paper found  out how much attention was paid by The Guardian and Punch Newspapers on the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) especially in helping to enlighten the public of the deadly nature of the virus and the generally acceptable best practices in dealing with the EVD. The paper ascertained the extent to which media coverage helped in not only creating awareness on the epidemic but also how much coverage is been giving to the spread of Ebola. Using the content analysis method, The Guardian and The Punch newspapers were critically analyzed along the lines of their news report; feature stories, articles, opinion, advertorials as well as editorial write up in order to ascertain how well media coverage helped in stemming the tide of Ebola. It was observed that both newspapers paid close attention on the Ebola Virus Disease.

Keywords: EVD, Health Reporting, Health promotion, Media