Logged on, tuned out.

In the tech-savvy world we live in today, mass media has become an inseparable part of our lives. Or rather, we are all dependent on mass media for surveillance (to get information), correlation (to analyse and evaluate), cultural transmission (education and socialisation of receivers, getting news updates of the happenings around the world) and entertainment (for enjoyment and gratification purposes).

By definition, mass communication is a form of communication through which institutional sources address relatively large, heterogenous and anonymous audiences physically separated from one another. *Source: COM 101 lecture notes

There are basically 3 main types of mass media, namely print media, electronic media and new age media. Some examples of print media are newspapers, magazines and brochure while television and radio falls under the electronic media. New-age media which are currently increasingly employed, includes mobile phones, computers and the internet.

Flipping through the newspaper, an article with an eye-catching title, "Logged on, tuned out" made me read on. *Source: The Straits Times, life!arts, 22nd October 2009 (Pg.C6)

This article talks about how we, the people of today are so plugged into e-Wap, WiFi, Skype as well as other internet applications that we seemed to have logged out of the real life. Apart from the internet, the writter brought up an analogy of how train commuters scan their eyes over MRT ads and the other commuters' newspaper headlines. This shows us how mass media has greatly affected many lives in our present days, so much that it does not seem to leave our sight even when we on mobile. Powerful effects theory seemed to be adopted in this context, with the mass media being an influential source. Take for example, a scenario whereby the radio broadcast about a bomb in Singapore. Under the influence of mass media, I believe the people will respond to this and take the necessary precautions. One other theory is the limited effects theory where the audiences are active and have the ability to resist the messages portrayed by the media. In other words, to have his or her freedom of choose, to believe or not to believe what the media says. How influential the media is depends on the experiences the readers have, whether they are aware of a certain issue or not.

Based on the cultivation theory, the influence by the media is actually a gradual one. For instance, the facebook networking site that is probably the most commonly visited site today. When the facebook site first started, it is not really known and users are minority. As it gradually prevails, facebook became so popular, almost everyone has an account now.

The globalisation of mass media is taking place so vast that broadcast systems are expanding and new communication technologies (NCT) are adopted. Under the predominance of NCT, the new-age media is able to overcome barriers of time, space and limited resources. To support this fact, the writter of the article mentioned, "We hang out in cafes not so much to chat but to whip out our Blackberries to surf and work in the name of inhabiting mobile offices..." and how other important information is communicated via text message or e-mail on our own time. It shows that time and distance is no longer a factor affecting the effectiveness of communication.

Personally, I have to admit that mass media is indeed very much a part of my life today. Being in touch with mass media, I read the newspapers for news updates, search the internet for information and research, watch the television for news, television programmes and advertisements as well as the radio for entertainment.

Is the mass media such a great influence in your life as well?

Do share your views! ((:

Collectivist alike, Culture unlike.

According Geert Hofstede,

"Culture is the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from another...includes systems of values and values are among the building blocks of culture."

Different countries around the world adopt their own cultures that make them unique from the rest. As I thought about the different countries I visited and their respective cultures, I found Myanmar of which i visited 9 years ago, an interesting country to share about.

Myanmar (formerly called Burma) is known to the world as the Golden Land. This is so because Myanmars love gold and as a result of that, gold is basically found everywhere in Myanmar from the pagoda to the monasteries as well as the accessories of nobles. In short, everywhere you turn to in Myanmar, everything seemed golden. It was an eye-opening sight for me!

In terms of cultural aspects, Myanmar is primarily Buddhist-dominated which is why temples are essential there. A particular lesson that left a deep impression in me was the fact that every boy of Buddhism in the country has to enter the monastery for a short period of time before the age of twenty. In a traditional country like Myanmar, the monastery is the centre of cultural life. I remembered being brought to visit the monastery to have a feel of what their monkhood is all about (as shown in the picture below taken when I was there).

From the visit, I learnt that these boys learn the scriptures, chant prayers, had plain meals, go around collecting alms and many more. Through this experience of monkhood, it acts as a medium for these young boys to understand what the poor goes through so that they will learn to show empathy to them. Being a collectivist country, every boy in the country obeys and conforms to these regulations set by the government. This portrays the characteristics of a collectivist society, specifically conformity, readiness to be influenced by others as well as high interdependence. In addition to that, time orientation plays a role in the culture of monkhood as well, where the monks were taught that time is monochronic and they are required to be punctual for all their monastery lessons.

In contray to that, Singapore has a totally different culture from that even though we are also a collectivist country. Because of the multi-racial and multi-religion society that we live in, we are not made to conform to a particular religion, rather we have our own freedom of choice of which religion we want to believe in. However, slightly similiar to that of Myanmar would be our Singapore's National Service where under the enlistment act, all eighteen year olds males have to serve the nation for two years. This is to create a sense of belonging to the country and the need to protect and love our nation. Just like how the Myanmar boys conform to the compulsory monkhood, these Singaporean males conform to serve their National Service.

Apart from that, the Myanmars believe strongly in their religion so much so that they have a Golden Rock in their country which is now part of their tourist atttraction. What they believe about this rock is that it brings good fortune to whoever who pastes the gold stickers on it. As a result of this belief, this rock is completely covered in golden in our present days. Due to the overwhelming reponse to it, the Golden Rock is beginning to be tilted to an angle which many said it will soon fall off the cliff.

Some photos taken when my family visited the Golden Rock:

So if you are interested and do not wish to miss the golden opportunity to this golden sight, visit Myanmar! (:

What's your call on culture? Are you a individualist or a collectivist? Tell me more about it! (:

Team achieves more than one's own effort.

"The key elements in the art of working together are how to deal with change, how to deal with conflict, and how to reach our potential; the needs of the team are best met when we meet the needs of individuals persons." - Max DePree

Source: http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking+News/Sport/Story/STIStory_439633.html http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking2BNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_440827.html

Upon reading the recent breaking news of former Singapore football player, Dollah Kassim who collapsed during the Veterans' match, I was taken aback just as fans of the Singapore football veterans did, though I was not very much a fan of them.

As reported, the 60-year-old soccer star collapsed by the sidelines of the field after being substituted ten minutes into the game. He was said to have suffered a heart attack and his heart stopped for almost ten minutes. This well-known soccer figure of the past is currently in a coma, fighting for his life in the hospital and worried fans (both in Singapore and Malaysia) are praying fervently for his recovery. Dollah Kassim was one of the 15 soccer players who were known to be the heroes of the malaysia cup after winning the cup title in 1977. From boys who played as a childhood activity, they blossomed into Singapore soccer stars in history.

They can be represented as a group since they became interdependent on one another upon interaction and are known to the public as a collcective identity - The Heroes of the Malaysia Cup. Being made up by 15 individuals of different characters and thinking, they learnt to bond together as one so as to represent Singapore in such leagues.

According to William Schutz, a group is established to meet the inidividual member's personal needs such as the need for inclusion, control as well as affection. In a game of soccer where it is not based solely on individual efforts, rather, teamwork is the main focus in order for players to score goals. There are many challenges that come in group communication since it involves the thinkings of different individuals of the group. Conflicts might result due to different in individual needs and mindsets. For example, since the group of Singapore Veterans are made up of players of different races and cultures, we need to accept one another's differences. Hence, what makes a group communication an effective one would be to strike a balance between the group and the individuals of the group.

Bruce Tuckman's Five-Stage Model teaches us more about the flow of group development. From forming to storming where conflicts start to occur, to norming where disagreements are ironed out followed by the performing of the task which in this case, the soccer match. Lastly, it is good to adjourn and do a peer evaluation on one another so that everyone knows their strengths and weaknesses as observed by their fellow team-mates. It was probably the success of having a teamwork in the team that led them to winning the title and finally to be well-respected even until today.

Personally, I feel the importance of effective group communication in the world we live in these days. We are all individuals surrounded by other individuals, more often than not,we are required to form into groups. Be it at school or at work, where we have classmates and colleagues respectively, we have to be careful not to blend the friendship together as this particular group might be of different interests than the other. Thus, different groups of friends can be formed at different stages of your life. In order to achieve effective communication as mentioned by Max Depree in the quote at the start, we should learn to deal with change and conflict and reach for our potential do that the needs of the team are best met when the needs of the individuals are met.

Do you agree on that? Do drop your comments! (: (and let's keep Dollah Kassim in prayers!)

Affair survival, Marriage revival.

I was reading the magazine, Simply Her (Oct 2009 issue) when i chanced upon this article on a real life encounter.

In the article, a lady, Grace (not her real name) shared about how she was able to forgive her husband, Peter despite him cheating on her several times. First, he had an affair with his married colleague which she eventually forgave him after he denied it and quit his job. Upon starting his own business thereafter, he had frequent late nights out which she suspected that something was up. Even when she was pregnant, he did not seem to care and it finally got her to engage a PI to follow him. She found out 2 years later that he was still having the affair with his ex-colleague. However, despite all these, she still forgave him and gave their marriage a second chance.

Upon reading this article, it made me ponder about interpersonal communication, a quantitative approach whereby a series of exchanges between two person slowly progressed into a point where they become a part of a unit which means to say a couple.

Communication in relationships is an interesting topic to venture in since it is part of our daily lives. In the case of this article, the couple seemed to be at the relational dissolution stage whereby different hurdles start to appear in the marriage to threaten the relationship. Betrayal like what Peter had committed is only one out of the many such hurdles. Like most girls, betrayal would probably be the top on the list of what I cannot accept in a relationship. In my view, betrayal can cause trust to be lost almost immediately and finding back that trust will be a challenge.

It is definitely not easy for Grace to overcome her own emotions to forgive her husband and put her trust in the marriage once again. Thankfully for her, the marriage began going on the right track after that. When being interviewed on how she was able to do this, she mentioned that she did not push the blame to her husband but questioned herself on whether she was doing her best as a wife. She said, “Instead of complaining all the time, I focused on all the good things I had going for me. I tried my hardest to be a nicer person – less confrontational and argumentative.” This is something that perhaps we as ladies should learn since we are the ones who are more sensitive than guys. In most relationships, the ladies would probably be the ones complaining, I have to admit that I too fall under this category. Hence, if we were to focus on the good things rather than the bad, we will probably have a better interpersonal communication?

The green portion of the article talks about the view of counsellors on such situations, whether or not the marriage is worth saving after an affair. From the interview of one counsellors, she said this, “The couple needs to be transparent and open with each other when they decide whether they’re still committed to the marriage.”

True enough, without openness and transparency, it is hard to maintain the relationship as conflicts will then happen quite often. In addition, she mentioned that the building of trust and stay vigilant is the most important thing to protect the marriage from failing again. In such relational problems, it is really subjective to different individuals. Some are able to be like Grace, accept what went wrong, forgive and move on to building a better relationship while some choose to end it and move on to finding and forming a new relationship.

I personally feel that it is only right that we know what communication in relationship is all about, from the relational formation and development to the relationship maintenance process. It is only when we understand that we learn how to battle relational dissolution. Relational dissolution is not something that we can easily prevent and it is not a bad thing, it is about how we work on it and make the better out of it!

Since it is such a subjective issue, it will be interesting to know what different individuals actually think of this, so do share your views here! (:

Gender race.

Watching advertisements have always been my favourite since I was young as it is where I get my mind at work in exploring and concluding the underlying meaning behind them.

Every advertisement makes use of different ways to get the message across to their targeted audience. In order to catch the attention of the audience, the advertisement has to be creative and impactful so as to make the audience want to go on watching.
Non-verbal communication is one of the most effective methods commonly engaged in advertisements.

One of the advertisements that keeps me constantly thinking is the Nike Commercial, Men vs. Women.



Non-verbal communication makes use of non-verbal behaviours intentionally sent and perceived where the audience recognise as having a consensual meaning. This Nike commercial promotes the Nike products by the use of a race between the two genders. It is illustrated by how women can actually challenge themselves to win the men in the race even though they are not as physically fit as men.There are many different types of non-verbal communications of which I feel, this commercial has made use of most of them especially the body language and facial expressions.

The start of the advertisement shows a scene whereby the woman chanced upon the challenge and decided to join it. Application of body movement (kinesics) is first used when the guy acted nonchalant about the race, perhaps to show he knows he is physically tougher than girls?

Since the advertisement focuses on a race, time and distance play a part, hence, chronemics and proxemics are used and action scenes where the women and men are running and all clothed in Nike apparels. This makes use of objectics of where objects are used to portray the message, in this case the Nike apparels. A particular scene in the lift shows a distinct facial expressions of the way the women stared at the man, a way to prove they can perform as good as men. To further emphasize on their products, the Nike shoes is intentionally zoomed in. I thought that it is a good way to bring the focus back to promoting Nike.

We can consider haptics being used by how they delayed one another by pulling the ear-piece off from guy of which since physical touch is involved. More kinesics are applied when the guys gave high-fives as they ran past each other, and how a guy made use of hand gestures to provoke the girl (at 0:44 of the video). A blend of kinesics, eye contact (oculesics) as well as physical appearance are used at the gym scene where the woman attempted to provoke the guy by splasing the water at him and the guy reacted back with a facial expression by rolling his eyes. In addition, the scene of which the woman smiling to herself after overtaking the man, made use of this combination of non-verbal communication as well.

As the advertisement proceeds, it shows the different treatments in both genders. For example, how the lady threw the guy's shoes and the part where the guy who ran past just took the glass of water that was supposedly meant for the female customer. A tinge of humour was also employed when the lady changed "Go Men" to "Go Women". Furthermore, the advertisement featured famous sport celebrities like Roger Federer and Fernando Torres so as to create impact to it.

I personally like the parts where they show the increase in distance each time each gender catches up with one another as well as how the advertisement ended in a simple way with "nikeplus.com". In just a short advertisement like this, it is able to keep us thinking and relating to what it is all about. This is how amazing non-verbal communication can be, isn't it?

The real Miss Singapore.

With just a few words uttered by the newly crowned Miss Singapore, Ris Low on RazorTV video, it has sparked off an uproar among Singaporeans.

This resulted in two different views observed.
The video shown on RazorTV had received many comments filled with criticism while the newspaper article last Sunday spoke in defence of Ris Low.

Just by watching the video, we made our own perceptions where we select, organise, make our own interpretation and give our personal meaning to it. Some mocked at her way of speaking and condemmed her while others branded her as a poor example of a young educated person and deemed her unfit to represent Singapore at the Miss World finals. But for the majority of us, it could be a misinterpretation that we do not realise is actually reflecting us as Singaporeans.

With the initial thought like most others, I have to admit that I too felt that she would be a disgrace if she were to represent Singapore with that standard of English. She mispronounced words like "preens" for prints, "rad" for red, "hospitaterlity" for hospitality and many others which i thought was a bad reflection on our country.
However, upon reading the article where the heads of the Speak Good English Movement came to her defence, I began to change my views about this whole issue.
* Source: The Sunday Times, Lifestyle, 13th September 2009 (pg.4)
In the article, the heads of the Speak Good English Movement defended Ris Low by bringing up a point, that Singaporeans are not speaking good english so who are we to condemn her? To support this stand, Ms Jennifer Yin, head secretariat of the movement said this, "Lots of Singaporeans speak this way. She is not unusual." Doesn't this statement makes us ponder and reflect on ourselves or the people around us. There are indeed many people out there who are using Singlish much more than English. It makes me wonder if the Speak Good English campaign is actually effective and we should as Singaporeans start working on our own way of speaking.

Singapore, being a multi-racial country, we used to have a communication barrier among races where each has their own language. In order for us to communicate between races, different languages have been mixed up for us to get the message across, so much so that it became the language we created - Singlish. Unknowingly, Singlish has become a culture in our sunny island.

Although Singlish is easily understood in our country, it would be a barrier when we communicate beyond Singapore because of the cultural differences among countries. Miss World is a beauty paegent which involves participants from all over the world. Hence, Singlish would not be understood it might even back-fire with the thought of it as bad English. A difference in culture affects the way we interpret.

Language, being a tool for direct communication is used to convey different meanings and it reflects us users. We evaluate a person by the way they speak just like how most evaluated Ris Low as a bad representative of Singapore. In addition, there are many language-based barriers to communication such as bypassing which leads us to misunderstanding due to misinterpretation. To further complicate communication, Ris Low uses slangs and jargons which make this barrier a harder one to overcome. With all these reasons stated, we should all look forward to constantly improve ourselves and forbid from using slangs and jargons. Once we are able to feel comfortable with language, we would then not have to feel afraid to be judged as a bad example.

The reason why I decided to name this post this way is because of what an English teacher mentioned. She said, " It's good that she has become Miss Singapore World. Her language abilities are representative of the population." Yes, we might all feel offended but if we were to look at the bigger picture of Singapore, this is indeed where our language actually lies. Thus, we should admit to this and try to do something about it.

Personally, I see myself sitting on the fence of this issue. Although I still feel that Ris Low is not good enough to represent Singapore in the Miss World finals, I feel that we should not condemn her as well. Different individuals have different way of speaking and language capacity. Perhaps that is just the way she talks? However, if she really has to represent our country, I feel that there is a need for her to attend English workshops so as to improve and brush up on her language skills. In this way, she would not be seen as a bad reflection of Singapore.

What about you?
Do you stand in the side of criticism or the side of defence?
It is something we should all think about.

Blinded by games, shadowed from reality.

As I thought through on what I should write about for the first post of this e-port folio, the news that came to light only recently of a case that happened a year ago seems to be the one that I felt most disturbed about.
* Source: http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking2BNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_426680.html
It talks about how a group of eight teenage boys made a suicide pact in the belief that they would be resurrected as slayers to save the world. This started off with one of the boys who was claimed to be a medium convincing his friends that the world was coming to an end and that they needed to offer themselves as a sacrifice in order to save the world. As I went on reading the article, I read about how these boys were engaged in weekly rituals where they looked up to the medium as an influential and their respected leader. Perhaps this was the reason why they agreed to the pact even at the expense of their lives. However, six of them came to their senses just in time upon the gruesome sight of the first pair of the group who jumped groaning in pain.

It made me ponder on this shocking case, on how scary it can actually be when one gets over-influenced by their surroundings, totally unaware of the consequences it can bring about.
I continued following on this case, wanting to understand more about what was concluded about the case and what actually led them into believing it.

Just this morning, I read another article in relation to this case and it brought me into another level of analysis. This particular article brings the attention to how these teenage boys could have been over-addicted to online games that caused them to be shadowed from the reality of life. I realised that this is pragmatic perspective, something that I had just learnt during my lecture this week.
*Source: The New Paper, Saturday 12th September 2009 (Page 14)
Pragmatic perspective is a communication that consists of a system of interlocking, interdependent behaviours that become patterned over time, which in this case, how online games became an addiction for these teenagers. Due to this prolonged gaming lifestyle, they have developed the inability to differentiate the virtual world from reality. In this virtual world, they forged strong friendships where they team up to slay demons and become really bonded.

Social constructionist perspective could also be brought into this context where the online games become a culture for these teenagers. In their groups, they start to create their collective representations of reality using what is provided by their culture.

Teenagers being interviewed in the article mentioned how communication plays the vital role in the online games and that most of them communicated daily to keep in touch, ask for advice and so on.
As a result of this, they seemed to be easily influenced by their virtual peers. One of them even mentioned how his online friends influenced his decision to apply to a polytechnic instead of junior college. This could be further evident by what a teenager who was interviewed said, "But if my group of friends who are like brothers to me all believe that and tell me that every day, I may eventually agree with them even though it sounds ridiculous." This could be the reason why the boys were convinced by their leader of the group.

Very often, our judgement comes from what we hear from others and it influences us. We exist within our society and perceive ourselves through the communication practices of our cultures. However, these preceptions can sometimes be deceptive. Therefore, i personally feel that we should be individuals who create communication and not allow communication to create us especially in scenarios like this.