PAGBABAGO
(Part I)
Dr. Florangel Rosario-Braid
Let me share highlights of the recent “conversation” via Zoom on the above topic, where Dr. Crispin Maslog, professor of journalism, author of some 30 or more books on communication and related issues on public affairs, and I were invited to reflect on our experiences over the past six decades. Sponsored by PACMRI (Philippine Association for Communication and Media Research Inc.) and PACE (Philippine Association of Communication Educators), Cris and I shared memories of how our careers intersected and the valuable lessons that we learned.
After relating his journey as a pioneer in journalism starting as early as his high school days to undergraduate studies in journalism and philosophy at the University of Santo Tomas and later, masters and doctoral degrees in journalism from the University of Minnesota, after a stint with the Agence France Presse. At Silliman University where he was founding director of the School of Journalism and Communication, he focused on the training of community journalists. Later, at UP Los Baños, in between his teaching and research, he published his first books on communication and history of Philippine media which are now basic readings in communication schools. After retirement, he became visiting professor at the University of North Dakota, Nanyang Technological College, and later, consultant at the Asian Institute of Journalism where he was consultant of several research projects. Today, he is still busy writing books, and planning conferences and research programs as Chair of the AMIC, the first and only regional communication research organization.
I started my narrative by sharing a story of how I narrowly skipped death from a shrapnel that grazed my ear, when as an 11 year old child, I tried to retrieve a book during a shelling in my hometown Dagupan by MacArthur’s forces during the liberation. I cited this to show my early passion – thirst for knowledge and information.
Later, and I started by saying that the first of the six decades of my professional life – as teacher of English literature, program director at the Philippine Broadcasting System, and coordinator at the ETV Center where I worked with the pioneering initiative in educational television for secondary schools, I engaged with the media arts – producing, directing and acting on stage plays, radio and TV, and exchange in cultural programs with media counterparts in Southeast Asia. I then wanted to become a TV documentary specialist. A masters degree in TV-Radio fulfilled this purpose.
But cross-cultural exposure to the outside world was a strong force that made me decide to pursue a doctoral program in communication research, and which later led to my taking up a joint teaching-research appointment at the University of Hawaii and the East-West Center. Again, added exposure not only to Hawaii’s ethnic population but to that of various Asian countries where I carried out population communication research and cross-cultural research. And being able to work with other disciplines – demography, resource management, culture. As well as interact with fellow researchers all over Asia. This and the next two years in Sri Lanka as UNESCO adviser on a communication strategy on population, I would describe as “being at the right time and the right place.” Because at that time, population research was the “flavor of the decade.” Sri Lanka was challenging as it provided opportunities to demonstrate effectiveness of inter-sector coordination especially since messages on family planning and population needed more extra care in its design and dissemination as they can arouse ethnic and political sensitivities. Added to these is that at that time, the country was in a state of local conflict between the two ethnic groups.
Cris, describes the coincidences in our encounters as “tadhana” or destiny. He narrates: The first was at Silliman. He had just arrived as I was about to return to Syracuse U after a two year teaching stint. The second time was when he attended a conference in Hawaii during my five year-stint. The next decade was as exciting and we were fortunate to be there while these communication problems were emerging. One was the demands of the East for a “new communication order” or “two-way flow of information” between the producing countries of the West and the receiving countries of the East. This concern and the need for new policies, threats to freedom and democracy, ownership, were taken up by the Sean MacBride Commission which produced the Report which became the “bible” of communication. (To be continued)
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