About the Guest Editor

Prof. Dr. Farish Ullah Yousafzai has been holding senior position in the field of Media and Communication Studies. He has the privilege of working on several key positions like Dean and Chairman.

Currently, he is working as Director, Social Sciences in the University of Gujrat, Pakistan. He has a vast experience of teaching at post graduate level. He is in teaching profession for the last 27 years.

He completed his post-doctorate fellowship in the area of health communication from WKW School of Communication, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore in 2006-2007. He is author of many books and his research articles have been published in many national and international journals.

His book “Social Communication Campaigns: A Study of the Effects Process” has been translated into three European languages—French, German, and Russian. He has also attended different seminars and workshops around the globe.

Note from Guest Editor

It is an honor and great privilege for me to welcome you in the Global Media Journal Pakistan’s issue Spring 2013. Research articles included in this edition have been written by the teachers and research scholars of different international Universities. These articles have been written with in-depth scholastic ability. Hoped this issue will be interesting and adding up new frontiers to the existing knowledge on Mass Media and society. Brief overview of the articles published in the journal is as below.

150 Years of Modern Public Relations Practices in Nigeria has been written by Dr. Olutayo Otubanjo and Olusanmi Amujo. Both of the writers are teaching in a public sector University in Nigeria. The paper traces the history and development of modern public relations practices in Nigeria over a hundred and fifty (150) year period, 1859 to 2009.This objective is achieved via a conceptual review of existing academic and professional literatures concerning Nigerian media history, public relations management, business studies and mass communication studies. This study dispels the notion that modern public relations practices began in Nigeria with the creation of a public information unit by the United African Company (then a British multinational) in 1949. The study presents evidence indicating that modern public relations practices actually began with the establishment of the first newspaper in 1859 by the late Henry Townsend (a British missionary). Findings from the study also indicate the dominance of four important periods in the development of modern public relations practices in Nigeria. These include public relations broadcasting era, political propaganda era, public information era and the professionalization era.

Tănase Tasenţe and Nicoleta Ciacu have worked on Social Media and Political Communication. Case study – the Parliamentary Parties in Romania. The research conducted by them aims to examine the extent to which parliamentary parties from Romania are using Social Media to promote their image and political messages, but also the level of participation of supporters in social networks. Another objective of this paper aims to identify similarities between the hypothetical percentages of supporters of political parties in Social Media, electoral percentages of accessing the Romanian Parliament and the current political configuration of the Romanian Parliament. The research is focused on comparative analysis of the "de facto" representation of the parliamentary parties in the Romanian community and the degree of representation in social networks. From this study it is evident that there are similarities between the degrees of support for parties in the real world, relative to the virtual environment.

Information and Communication Technology and E-Learning Education in Nigeria: A Paradigm Shift written by Adegbija, Mosiforeba Victoria throws light on how change have been brought in education by making use of ICT. The problems of securing admission into higher education and the inflexibility in conventional universities that made individuals to opt for correspondence courses in time past have intensified because of the current population explosion problems in developing world as a whole. As a result, there is an increase in demand for a more flexible and cost effective means of education through e-education, e-learning or open and distance learning. This has brought a paradigm shift on how people generally view the significance of e-learning for higher education in Nigeria. Though e-learning is powered by Information and communication technology (ICT) resources, there are challenges in the implementation of ICT for e-learning despite their advantages in education. It was recommended that the integration of simple, accessible, and mobile technologies should be pursued as solutions to the full implementation of effective and result-oriented e-learning education in the Nigeria educational system.

Toward the Impacts of Indian Drama Serials on Bangladeshi Social System: An Overview of People’s Perception has been written by Md. Abdullah Al Helal. This study focues on how Indian dramas have affected Bangladeshi social system. Study reveals that Indian television serials provoke sexual behavior, instigate pre and extra martial affair, educate criminal activity, originate eve teasing, and nurture conflict between family members. Study also disclosed that these daily soaps impose Hinduism culture on every sphere of living of Bangladeshi people.

PR and the Media: Friends or Foes? has been written by Vineet Kaul who is Vineet Kaul who is a research fellow in Communication & Media Studies and is currently studying his PhD at DA-IICT University, India. The purpose of this paper is to describe media perceptions of public relations and to explore the reasons behind their incestuous relationship with a view to identifying what public relations practitioners can do to improve the perceptions and build a better working relationship given the key nature of the public relations-media relationship.

Investigating Students’ Views on E-Assessment: A Case Study of University Of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria is the joint venture of Adegbija M.V., George, Abayomi O. & Bola, Olaniyi Oladimej.This study investigates the views of students on e-assessment used by the University of Ilorin, Nigeria. The findings show that all the students involved in the study do not prefer on-line registration of their courses, most of them disagree that females consider e-assessment stressful and there was a significant difference between the views of male and female students on e-assessment in the University of Ilorin. It is recommended among others that the University should assist students by creating more cyber cafes on the campus so that the students can register with fewer difficulties, provide more computers and the need to help the students to be more computer literate.

Media and ethical disconnect in India-Introspecting its status has been written by Pranjali Dighe and Sunny Wadhwaniya. The purpose of this paper is to explore the effects of New Media on the ethical practices and life-styles of people in India, hence upon the culture, as against pro-active participation of the democratic citizenry in social, economic and political strata. The paper also intends to measure the penetration, impact and the adverse effects of New Media on the large rural populace making them Out-of-Reach from the mainstream.

At the end, there is a book review titled The Songs of Freedom: Exploring Shaikh Ayaz’s geniuses. This review has been written by Mubarak Ali Lashari.

We are pleased to warmly welcome your queries and suggestions for improving the Global Media Journal Pakistan Edition. Your knowledge contribution for journal will be highly appreciated.

Prof. Dr. Farish Ullah Yousafzai

AIOU

2013-04-05

Saba

Allama Iqbal Open University Islamabad, Pakistan