Media

Question 1

New media and the arab sprinq

Answer 1

Satellite television arguably more important than social media. The modern standard Arabic language. Satellite tv was not control by the state. Go the masses of people out on the street. Facebook great for organising and initially getting people out but satellite following that. Egypt couldn’t cut the satellite feed but shut the internet. 5000 small scale labour protests against pay, rising cost of living before revolution.
Various opposition groups like the ultras associated with football teams http://www.playthegame.org/news/news-articles/2011/how-football-fuelled-the-arab-spring/

Question 2

Football

Answer 2

( While popular demonstrations were taking place in Cairo’s Tahrir Square earlier this year, Dorsey said, the masses and the youth organizations of the Moslem brotherhood were joined by a third group – Cairo’s soccer fans, who had agreed an unprecedented truce in order to express their opposition to the autocrats in elite positions of political power – which to many mirrored the situation in Egyptian football.

Many grassroots supporters, Dorsey added, were unenthusiastic about last month’s appointment of former US national coach Bob Bradley as the head of the Egyptian National Team. This team is still seen by numerous Egyptian supporters as “Mubarak’s team”, he said, and many fans “couldn’t care less” about Bradley’s appointment)

Question 3

Social Media

Answer 3

Social media is a tool. It is used by people. Arab uprisings the courage of thousands coming out onto the street. Doesn’t mean it wouldn’t happen without social media.

Question 4

What is mass media?

Answer 4

(def) a form of communication that is designed to reach many people (Merriam-Webster)

Question 5

Printed media (books, newspapers, magazines, journals) Electronic media: one-to-many vs. any-to-any(

Answer 5

(I write a book and get it printed, then it can be read my many. One – many) (electronic media c an be one to many or any to any.

Question 6

Cassette tapw

Answer 6

Cassette tapesignificantly decreased barrier to entry. Had bands and muslim preachers releasing to cassette tapes. Could maxed mix tapes. Record the sermon and give to other people. Cds increased barrier to entry at first but not now. Also speed electronic media. Sort of one to many but decrease barrier to entry

Question 7

Television

Answer 7

Television then satellite television one to many high cost

Question 8

Radio

Answer 8

one to many - significant in the middle east particularly passers era

Question 9

nasser and radio

Answer 9

Voice of the Arabs or Sawt al-Arab (Arabic: صوت العرب‎)‎ (621 kHz on Mediumwave to Egypt, 9965 kHz on Shortwave to the Middle East, the rest of Europe and North America) was one of the first and most prominent Egyptian transnational Arabic-language radio services. Based in Cairo, the service became known as the main medium through which former Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser spread his messages on Arab unity and revolutions across the Arab world. Despite its unmatched popularity in most of the 1950s and 1960s, the service no longer commands a large audience and does not play a significant role in domestic Egyptian or regional politics.[1]

Question 10

Internet: email and webpages, then social media one to many or any to any.

Answer 10

For example social media. Blogs, publish own websites etc,also lowering barrier to entry but you have a difficulty in finding information. Bbc significant advantage as large platform. As search engines got better and people used more, ability of blogs to get into search results. Weakens mainstream platforms. Social media takes it further.

Question 11

print press

Answer 11

Printing in the middle east from 1798 – printing press napoleaon

Question 12

National radio and television (from the 1930s), then satellite television

Answer 12

(from the 1990s) These wwere used to put out fatwas, sermons texts etc. one to many. Again. Centred on the expert.

Question 13

Transmission of Islamic knowledge

before the 20th century)

Answer 13

Person-to-person chains of transmission for core texts (Quran, hadith) and the books interpreting them
Texts involved but main mode of transmission was oral (spoken) and aural (heard) instead of written

Question 14

ulama handwritten to printed

Answer 14

When there was transition from handwritten to printed texts the ulama worried that meaning would be misinterpreted and would fix the meaning of texts but also it would, be read by people who had not been trained in how to read them.

Question 15

islam and media

Answer 15

Print media
+ expanded literacy
= changes in Islam

Like al-Banna called for reform of ulama. They turned islam into an ideology to support their vision of social and political change. Adapted Islamic practice to fit new style of education. Islam no longer an all encompassing way of life

Question 16

global media

Answer 16

LOOK AT KHALED TELEVANGELIST, BIN LADEN MBA, QUTB, TARIQ RAMADAN MUSLIM INTELLECTUAL PRIMARY DEGREES IN SOMETHING OTHER THAN LITERATURE. THESE INDIVIDUALS CHANGED THE USE OF MEDIA. BECAUSE OF THE USE OF GLOBAL MEDIA A LOSS OF SPECIFICITY OF ISLAMIC INTERPRETATION.

Question 17

Increased connectivity:

Answer 17

• Scholars can reach beyond their location

- Local practices, teaching, interpretation is impacted by global trends

Question 18

islamic authority

Answer 18

Interpretations are fixed regardless of place and time

- No longer about person-to-person connection and knowledge of a specific context

Question 19

change in practice like fatwas etc

Answer 19

PERSON TO PERSON PRACTICE. LEADS TO UNCERTAINTY OF WHAT A SCHOLAR OR JUDGE MIGHT SAY IN A GIV EN SITUATIO N. WITH THE USE OF MASS MEDIA BY SCHOLARS BEEN TAKEN AWAY

Question 20

new media fatwas

Answer 20

But now the growth of so-called new media fatwas has upset Egypt’s religious establishment, which fears an erosion of its authority to people without solid theological credentials.

Others applaud the increasing diversity of opinion and believe it is critical to updating Islamic theology and helping Muslims cope with modern life.

Question 21

who used to issue fatwas

Answer 21

Traditionally, fatwas were been issued by a mufti, a scholar such as Ali Gomaa, Egypt’s chief Sunni Muslim authority, known as the Grand Mufti. Gomaa heads Dar al-Iftaa, or the House of Fatwas; it and Al-Azhar University are Egypt’s most important institutions for issuing fatwas and have influence with Sunnis everywhere.

Question 22

web and fatwas

Answer 22

Numerous websites issue online fatwas in response to personal questions, including IslamOnline.net, Fatwa-Online.com and Ask-Imam.com. These sites are similar to ones that have sprung up in the West allowing people to seek opinions from rabbis or ministers.

Question 23

Fatwas also are issued by satellite television programs and over the telephone,

Answer 23

forcing traditional organizations like Dar al-Iftaa into a race to keep up. Gomaa’s media adviser, Ibrahim Negm, said the institution has doubled the number of fatwas it issues daily through a year-old telephone hotline, and it is now developing a website to answer queries.

Negm said modern communications have helped fuel a growth in fatwas by making it much easier for people to solicit religious opinions. The some 1,000 fatwas that Dar al-Iftaa pumps out every day are more than six times the number it issued per year a century ago.

Question 24

Print culture affected the transmission of ideas and knowledge in the Middle East in several ways….

Answer 24

Those unable to access traditional perches of authority could popularize their ideas through print-related entrepreneurship. Jamal al-Din al-Afghani’s formal theological training was not extensive enough for him to earn any formal credentials, and if he had it might have narrowed rather than expanded his potential audience on account of his Shi‘ism.[20] Nonetheless, he was able to become the father of the broad movement of Islamic reformism because of print publications. Such publications were able to reach the illiterate as well as the literate, as the educated read them aloud to an audience in coffeehouses and other venues.[21] This marked a practice of communication in which oral dissemination served to extend the reach of written texts, with education rather than intellectual trustworthiness as the basis of authority. The ready availability of printed Qur’ans and commentaries also helped sustain a movement among Sunnis toward greater acceptance of ijtihad, which depended on direct access to those texts.[22] Furthermore, as Albert Hourani notes, al-Afghani displayed a sense of the umma that would have been difficult to maintain before his era in that, “The centre of attention is no longer Islam as a religion, it is rather Islam as a civilization.”[23] Cole termed him a “Muslim nationalist” suggesting a receptivity within society to new horizontally circumscribed identities often associated with rituals of print.[24]

Question 25

Muhammad ‘Abduh

Answer 25

compared newspapers to mosque preachers, an indication of the close association of print with oral forms of idea transmission in popular perception in the late 19th century.[25] Other associates of al-Afghani actively called upon mosque preachers to disseminate news during their sermons.[26] Some satirical political publications even used Egyptian Colloquial Arabic, making them even more accessible to the less educated public.[27]

Question 26

radio began in Egypt during the 1920’s,

Answer 26

This was the environment in which radio first became an important component of the Arab media landscape. Although radio began in Egypt during the 1920’s, Gamal Abdel Nasser developed it both as a means of nationalization and to broadcast the regime’s perspectives on contemporary issues throughout the Arab world. Other nationalist regimes, such as Iraq and Syria, soon followed.[33] More traditionalist regimes, such as Jordan, failed to compete with the nationalist broadcasts.[34] Marc Lynch characterizes Egypt’s Voice of the Arabs as featuring, “little rational argument, and much invective and fierce rhetoric.”[35] Research on the reception of these perspectives by listeners, however, remains badly needed. Listening seems often to have taken place in groups, such as in coffeehouses.[36] In a striking interview recorded by Madawi al-Rasheed, a former ARAMCO worker from Najd recalls listening to radio broadcasts on significant regional issues with other workers from around the Arab world in 1953. The worker said that all he wanted to buy for himself with his wages was a radio to listen to those broadcasts.[37]

Question 27

1990’s with the rise of satellite television.

Answer 27

Previous Arab television stations were driven by the same political concerns as radio, and sought to either promote a political agenda or counter one by providing alternative programming.[43] The new satellite stations, however, although linked to ruling families from the Arabian Peninsula, were driven in whole or part by commercial considerations.[44] Although difficult to measure, consumer demand played an increased role in determining content, making public opinion important in the competitive satellite TV market.[45] Lynch has highlighted al-Jazeera in particular as a key component of “a genuine public sphere, characterized by self-conscious, open, and contentious political argument before a vast but discrete audience” which shaped “not only public attitudes but also conceptions of political identity and the strategies of all political actors.”[46] The unidirectional character of mass media during the 20th century has been somewhat revised by open call-in shows in real time. Anyone who has frequented coffeehouses in the Arab world can also testify that people often watch in public groups, as well as through home satellite dishes. At the same time, practical controls limit the ability of any given individual to participate in the discussions and broadcast their voice to the community.

Question 28

In the second half of the 20th century, an important alternative to state-regulated media developed in the form of audio cassettes.

Answer 28

In the Iranian context, Annabelle Sreberny-Mohammadi and Ali Mohammadi have famously studied how cassettes played a role in the 1979 revolution.[47] Many cassettes are produced cheaply by individuals and disseminated through personal networks below the radar of state censorship. Flagg Miller has examined the role of cassette poetry in Yemen, where it is marshaled in both disputes among tribes and popular dissatisfaction with the government.[48] Far more common, however, are cassettes tied to discourses related to Islam. One Yemeni shop included both live and studio oral performances on spiritual and political topics, as well as songs, discussions and scripted dialogues.[49] Hirschkind quotes Egyptians who say that cassette sermons are a superior form of informative media to that run under the aegis of the state.[50] Once again, listening is frequently communal and gives rise to discussion and debate over the issues raised.[51]