Media, Empowerment and Democracy in East Africa (MEDIeA) is a collaborative research program between Denmark, Kenya and Tanzania. Three universities –one Danish and two East African– have teamed up for the program, started in 2009 and scheduled to end in 2015: Roskilde University (RUC) from Denmark, the University of Nairobi from Kenya, and the University of Dar es Salaam from Tanzania. The program will comprise six individual research projects with a Kenya focus and a Tanzania focus, supplemented by an International Reference Group of leading experts in media, empowerment and democracy –theorists and practitioners. Dissemination, capacity building and policy dialogue are additional components of the program.
The MEDIeA research project is hosting a concluding seminar which is taking place 7-8 May 2014 in Nairobi, Kenya. The seminar will assemble around 40 academics, media practitioners and opinion leaders in Kenya and Tanzania to discuss the research findings of the MEDIeA project.
The MEDIeA research project began in late 2009 and includes six researchers from Tanzania, Kenya and Denmark (Rose Reuben, Grace Githaiga, Datius Rweyemamu, Winnie Mitullah, Norbert Wildermuth and Thomas Tufte). Their common interests have been exploring through in-depth empirical studies how East Africans were making use of the media and communicative ecologies that were part of their everyday lives, and with particular attention given to young marginalized girls. The primary focus has been on trying to understand the altering relations between media use, citizen engagement and societal changes.
The seminar is hosted by Winnie Mitullah, director of IDS and Thomas Tufte, director of the MEDIeA project. The programme is available here.
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Media are crucial to the exercise of freedom of expression. Public opinion can only be formed if a public that engages in rational discussion is able to create and occupy a communicative space that is, ideally, free and independent of established interests and as well as, open and accessible to all citizens. The ongoing emergence and convergence of the electronic media has changed notions of the public sphere radically.
MEDIeA invites to a full-day seminar on Social media as a tool for social transformation: Encouraging Civic Engagement, Good Governance and Democratisation? – to be held in Nairobi, 17 May 2011. Participation is free, but we kindly ask you to register with Norbert Wildermuth (norbert@ruc.dk) or call +254 (0) 724 391 980) to facilitate our logistic planning.
For more information on seminar content and venue, download information sheet here. [Added 11 May 2011:] See also the full seminar programme, and the list of participants.
