US Foreign Policy towards South Asia (2011-2012): Framing of Pakistani Press

This study provides a detailed quantitative and qualitative analysis of the coverage of Pakistani press regarding US policy towards South Asia in the context of war on terror from January 2011 to December 2012. All unsigned editorials appeared in The News and Dawn examined by applying content analysis method containing themes related to US policy towards Pakistan such as: Drone attacks and USAID to Pakistan; US policy towards Afghanistan and US policy towards India. The study maintains that both Dawn & The News were critical to US policy towards Pakistan regarding Drone Attacks but the tone of The News was intense in nature. Moreover, the Dawn supported US policy to provide USAID to Pakistan, while The News was critical to it. On US policy towards India, The News supported the US policy to maintain friendly relations with India despite of Kashmir issue. On US policy towards Afghanistan, The News framed a negative picture of US while Dawn adopted a balance stance. The pattern of coverage supports the argument that the press and foreign policy relationship is issue-specific and it also has linked with media organization‟s policy. This study also asserts that on foreign policy issues press framing is not necessarily influenced by country‟s defined foreign policy objectives

Role of Media in Strengthening Democracy in Pakistan: Journalists’ Perception

The study analyzes the perception of Journalists’ regarding role of Pakistani media in strengthening democracy. It was also aimed to identify the factors which undermined the role of media in strengthening democracy. In this study survey was conducted from 82 print and electronic media journalists of Pakistan. For qualitative purpose 5 senior journalists associated with print and electronic media of Pakistan were interviewed to have insights in the role of media in strengthening democracy in the country. This study concludes that Pakistani media is not playing a significant role in strengthening democracy in the country. It also reveals that Journalists’ are satisfied with media’s role in creating awareness and providing information to public and act as a watchdog to government policies. In addition, majority respondents are not pleased with media’s role as an agenda setter for upholding the principles of democracy and offering as civic forum for the people of Pakistan. Moreover, it also indicates that there is no difference between the perception of senior and junior journalists’ regarding media’s role in strengthening democracy in Pakistan. In addition study also reveals that there is no difference found between the senior and juniors, and high and low salaried journalists’ regarding ownership influence on their work routines and professionalism. Therefore, this study busted the myth that the senior and high salaried journalists’ are less influenced by the ownershi

Indo-Pakistan Trade Relations: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Daily Dawn.

This paper focuses on the role of discourse indicating socio-political and economic situation of bilateral relations between India and Pakistan. It gives an analysis of 37 articles published in Dawn regarding bilateral trade ties between India and Pakistan over the period of 2 years i.e. june2011 to June 2013. This study is an overview of Dawn’s perspective regarding the changing ties between two nations on the basis of increasing interaction in business sector. Further, the nature of relationship is explained with help of revealed themes and characterization of the words and grammatical features. The article concludes that shift in bilateral relations of two countries is visible in context of increasing trade ties on parallel basi

Transvaluing of English: ESL in Learning and Technical Virtuosity of Journalism and Communication Students in Intellectual Ambiance of Pakistani Universities

In this study two recognized public: Punjab University; Lahore College for Women University and two private universities: University of Management and Technology and University of Central Punjab have been investigated to observe the role of English as (L2) in Pakistan. A sample of 800 professional and nonprofessional media students has been analyzed under communication accommodation theory (Giles, H. 1971) regarding career development in journalism and communication studies departments. Questionnaire Instrument (α = .702) with 37indicators has scrutinized ESL and academic and professional competencies by multiple linear regression to find out their relationship. Findings have shown that selected alma maters bespoke positive significance regarding ESL’s impact in students’ instrumental and non-instrumental obligations. Moreover, J & CS students of PU and LCWU are more inclined towards ESL’s role in leverage, adoption, observance, expressiveness, liaison and individuality performance categories through ICTs and e-learning as compared to the students of UMT and UCP.  

Exploring Media Exposure and Perception of Married Urban Women about their Empowerment in Lahore, Pakistan: A Qualitative Study

Media is considered an effective tool for the socialization of women. It has become an integral part of society and also responsible in bringing outer world into home through its variety of contents. This research was an effort to explore that how women belong to diverse socio-economic background understand and interpret their empowerment. For data collection purpose qualitative research methodology was used. Seven focus groups were conducted to know the perception of women about their rights. Each group has seven participants (women) aged 18-49 years. Emergent themes derived from the qualitative data were align with few of previous studies that women get information from media about their rights but practically there is no visible change in their actions after media exposure. This research concluded that women empowerment is greatly affected by mindset of society. Though media exposure has its role in bringing awareness among women to their empowerment yet media needs to play a very crucial role in changing mindset of men towards women

Media and Conflict Resolution: Toward building a Relationship Model

The role of media has been immensely increasing in shaping and reshaping the nature of conflicts especially from the second half of the last century. The advent of 24/7 news coverage, advancement in satellite communication, rise of war reporting and peace journalism, and ever increasing role of media in shaping up social, cultural, political and diplomatic discourse has made it an important player in various types of conflicts. Media’s role in conflict resolution is largely dependent upon organizational interests and ideology. This study proposes a Media-Conflict Resolution Model (MCR) that describes the media role in conflict resolution process as (1) an escalation agent, (2) a de-escalation agent and (3) as a mirror, and relates it to media relations with the conflicting parties and consequently the media position/stance either as watchdog, lapdog or neutral. Moreover, this model also discusses influence of global media on local media regarding conflict resolution and prevention

Media Representation of Women, Children and Minority Rights: Pakistani Public Response

This paper focuses on the media impact on the discourse of women, childrenand minority rights within the context of Pakistan while also studying the difference in response generated by Males and females consumers with asample of 455 adults taken from different private and public institutes ofPakistan. Correlational research design was employed for this research anddata was collected through indigenous questionnaire. Pearson Product Moment Correlation was used to find out the relationship between the study variables. Moreover, Multiple Hierarchical regression analysis was conducted to study whether the promotion of women, children and minority rights was predicted by Media. Also moderating effect of gender was studied by conducted a SEM using path analysis through AMOS. The findings of the study revealed that awareness about women, children and minority rights was significantly predicted by mass media, controlling for the effects of demographic variables. Moreover, the results of the moderation analysis revealed the significant interaction effect of gender and media with minority. The findings highlighted that Pakistani media effectively performs its responsibilities by better providing factual information for citizens and empowerment for the disenfranchised among other roles. So, that the media consumers in Pakistan have to platforms that enable various segments of society to voice their political concerns and demands