Sunday News
By Sunday News Reporter
21 July 2013
“COMMUNICATION is culture and culture is communication,†these words were said by famous communications theorist, media critic and a journalism instructor at the University of Illinois and later Columbia University, Mr James Carey.
The turn of the century has also witnessed a subsequent revolution in the communication sector; gone are the days of the normal conventional means of communication but there has been the introduction of the internet which has brought with it terms such as social networking and the social media.
Someone once said that social media is like a drug. You get hooked on it and then it consumes you, gives you reason to return to it and eventually makes you dysfunctional as you struggle to meet deadlines or even have imagined “insomnia†caused by the desire to chat and follow friends in the world of social media.
In this age of smart phones, people are being distracted from their mainstream work. If one can spend five minutes in every 30 minutes to check chats on his or her cellphone or computer, this translates to at least 80 minutes of an eight-hour working day – meaning one would have wasted more than 80 minutes of the time they are expected to be productive.
Social media has by and large become a part of our everyday living with the youth being the most affected.
Schoolchildren have now been introduced to the famed search engines such as wikipedia and google, to an extent that even during lessons you find them “googling†their assignments.
Parents and educationists have also raised concern over the time children spend on the social networks.
Interaction has moved from being face to face and has gone beyond borders due to these social networks.
It is no surprise to get a four-year-old talking of Facebook, Whatsapp, Twitter or Mixit. Educationists have further raised concern over a tendency to allow schoolchildren to have their mobile phones during lessons, with the main bone of contention being the fact that these children end up abusing the facility by viewing x-rated sites while in some cases they are said to be using the gadget right in the middle of lessons thereby interfering the learning process.
Dr Michael Carr-Gregg, a leading Australian psychologist, called parents who allow young children to use mobile phones “insaneâ€.
Dr Carr-Gregg, a University of Melbourne professor of paediatrics, is worried about the power of mobile phones to distract and overexcite.
According to a survey conducted by Dr Carr-Gregg, 40 percent of children with mobile phones are sleep deprived on school nights, as peer pressure has made it normal for children of 6 and 7 to stay up until the early hours texting friends.
His evidence, revealed in a series of Australian academic seminars, suggests that millions of children are allowed mobile phones in their bedrooms, creating a generation of overtired “zombiesâ€.
Other new research have linked sleep deprivation in children with hyperactivity symptoms and hormone imbalances that increase the risk of obesity and diabetes.
According to another research done in America by Daniel Flannery, 89 percent of the youths send or read email, 84 percent go to websites about movies, TV shows, music groups or sports, 81 percent play online games 76 percent go online to get information about current events and 57 percent go online to get information about college.
The research states that social media promotes lower academic achievement grades, lower attachment to school and shorter attachment spans.
Just last year the nation raised alarm over the drop in the country’s overall pass rate in Ordinary and Advanced Level examinations. Could we thus lay the blame squarely on the children’s dependency on social media and the internet.
Unlike past generations that had neither cellphones nor televisions, let alone DStv, this current generation has to manoeuvre its way around all these distractions and still achieve greatness in the work it conducts.
Global experts have, however, on the other hand, praised technological advancement for being on the cutting edge, connecting the globe, creating a small village and enhancing our capacity and speed to share information across the length and breadth of the world.
It should, therefore, be noted that the media not only serves as a source of information but also provides a source of entertainment. Media sources have relentlessly worked on creating appealing images that entice the youth to their content. Although these may be informative, the youths have been coerced into consuming more time reading or browsing for such information.
Recent advancements in computers and mobile phones have led to ease of access of the internet via advanced wireless devices. Whereas this creates a tech-savvy generation, the content provided by some media houses may be uncensored and entails violent acts, obscene scenes and vulgar language.
Education, Sports, Arts and Culture Minister Senator David Coltart said social media had played a crucial role in the education system where it has become a source of delivering messages in schools.
He, however, said youths were spending more time on social sites and less on their studies and there was now a need for laws to be put in place to ensure that the youths are distanced from such.
“The danger of the social media is that it can be so addictive and in this day and time I think it is important that youths are distanced from the internet especially at schools.
“I really think it would have been proper if some policies or laws were implemented so that we protect our children from over reliance on these social networks. The idea is let’s use the social media or the internet but let us not over use it,†said Minister Coltart.
Information scientist Dr Lawton Hikwa, however, noted that the social media was not a new phenomenon, he said it was one of the forms of public communication that had been invented with the rise of technological advancement.
Dr Hikwa said the social media had not just become a communication tool but an interactive tool that could be used in delivering messages in the learning process.
“I understand students are no longer doing much of reading books but referring to information on search engines like Google or Amazon.com, but then at the end of the day when they download the information they just don’t paste it like that; they have to read through it thoroughly.
“At the end of the day, it might be accurate to say yes it is affecting society but then it has been a helping tool as well. Students can engage in discussions through these and at the same time download stuff that can be of much importance,†said Dr Hikwa.
Veteran educationist and Zanu-PF secretary for education Dr Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said while it was acceptable that we were living in a global village it should be appreciated that the social media and the internet at large were now playing a more involved role in people’s interactions.
He said it was promoting cultural imperialism, which saw the youth taking up a Western culture at the expense of their own culture.
“While I fully agree that the internet helps to a certain extent, the basic communication process, our children are no longer using it for this function but use it for self-aggrandisement and other immoral activities which impact negatively on the whole education process.
“As parents we should see to it that while we allow our children to spend more time on these social networks, they should also have an appreciation of their own culture and know the sacrifices made by their forefathers to fight this Western infiltration,†said Dr Ndlovu.
He said it was well known that communication technology also played a role in the developing of a child especially with the rising technological era.
“I am not saying deprive the children of the gadgets completely because whether we like it or not they have a huge impact on the growth of the child. We don’t want to produce a generation that is technophobic considering that nowadays you find a five year old freely using the computer or any of these technological gadgets.
“What I’m simply saying is that let’s not interfere with teaching curriculum because we end up depriving our children of a fundamental right, this being that of education,†said Dr Ndlovu.
So at the end of the day social media is quickly evolving in front of us and it is almost impossible to reject and hide from this new form of media. Not only is it an important part of socialisation within peer groups but now it is used to market and motivate people to become a part of a larger community.
It is thus our duty to see how we make use of it and ensure that it does not affect our lives, work or even schooling activities.