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Cynthetiq · 10-20-2004, 09:25 AM

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http://www.kuenselonline.com/print.php?sid=4618

19 October 2004 - FEATURE

Five years of cable television

In June 1999 Bhutan switched on the TV, the last country in the world to do so. Today, most Bhutanese are riding the signals - excited, exhilarated, confused, and often depressed.

And it is rapidly changing Bhutanese society, according to a media impact study done in 2003. To begin with, the study conducted by a private Bhutanese consultancy firm, Mediacom Consultancy, states that television was introduced in Bhutan with minimal preparation. Bhutan Broadcasting Service (BBS) television was still in its infancy when cable or satellite television was let in with a digital roar three months after BBS TV went on air. BBS TV, after five years of its launch, is making moves to expand coverage beyond Thimphu and improve content.

What resulted was a wave of channels with indiscriminate foreign content, so Bhutanese youth became the vulnerable target of global culture.

"With the introduction of global television Bhutanese found themselves with a choice of up to 45 channels," says Siok Sian Pek, who led the 2003 media impact study. "This chaotic and unregulated introduction of cable TV is not unlike the experience in South Asia and other developing countries but the impact will be far greater in Bhutan, a small and vulnerable society with limited resources and difficult terrain."

The study found out that impact was already perceptible in all sections of the society, while it was strongest in the urban segment.

The study of a Kuenselonline poll in 2000 and 2003 showed that TV had drastically changed a third of the respondents' lives. About 31.5 percent of the respondents to the poll said that their life style had completely changed after the introduction of cable TV, up from 2000 poll figure of 22.16 percent.

Families were also experiencing internal tensions because of differing interests which led to some families installing more than one TV set so that family members could watch the programmes of their choice. More and more families were spending less time together with men often complaining that their wives were so hooked on Indian serials that they started neglecting their household chores.

The report asserts that TV was undeniably influencing the values of urban population "importing influences from the outside world". "TV has changed social behaviour in the sense that public interaction - holding hands, kissing - has become more acceptable," the report states. "People claim TV has broadened the minds and attitudes of society."

Most popular channels in Bhutanese homes were from Rupert Murdoch's Star network like the Star TV, Zee TV and Sony TV packages broadcast from India. This resulted in Bhutanese viewers becoming more familiar with the lives of middle class society in India. Global statistics shows that the Star network reaches more than 300 million people across Asia and the Middle East.

Teachers in urban schools complained that students watched TV late into the night (another informal survey found out that Bhutanese children watched 12 hours of TV on average per week) and were "less focused in class, obsessed with TV characters and picking up language and mannerisms from Hindi and western films". "Programmes like World Wrestling Entertainment has spawned a small cult in Bhutanese children who developed new heroes like The Rock, Stone Cold, Gold Berg, and Brock Lesnar. Several schools claim that they have advised parents to restrict children from viewing WWE," the report says.

A headmistress from one of the Bumthang schools related to the study team an incident when one of the students suffered a broken hand when his friend "
threw him WWE-style".

Bhutanese languages have also become the victim of foreign media. The youth were learning more Hindi and English. Dzongkha was being increasingly sidelined with more youth believing that speaking English commanded more self-esteem and gave them an air of superiority. The switch to foreign languages was most observable during parties.

"When we meet we want to speak English because we have become ashamed of speaking Dzongkha," one youth interviewed by the study group confided. "We have a concept that those who don't speak English are conservative, old fashioned and orthodox people. Even among ourselves we are not very comfortable speaking total Dzongkha."

The study found varying views on the cultural influence of TV on Bhutanese society. While some sections voiced their concern that the Bhutanese society was leaning more towards western culture by the day, there were other optimistic segments that said that despite the deluge of foreign cultural products, Bhutanese would maintain their own culture. The cultural influence, however, was found to be already in. For example, more youth including sections of adults were increasingly donning western outfits and more people were getting fashion ideas from TV.

The study particularly found out that Thimphu youth were greatly influenced by what they claimed "modern" culture. They found western life styles and music appealing.

Advertisements mattered more to the Bhutanese today than they did five years ago. The cultural power of marketing and advertising today was immensely challenging the indigenous culture.

Parents, whom the study team talked to, had contrasting opinions as well.
Most believed that TV had positive influences on children. It boosted their confidence, gave exposure, and helped them become better informed. Parents also promised their children more time with TV if they did well in examinations. About
56 percent of the parents who responded to the study said they did not restrict children's choices compared to 44 percent who responded otherwise. While 50 percent believed TV helped their children learn, 40 percent thought it was more entertainment. Some parents believed TV kept their children occupied.

One upbeat Thimphu parent, Phuntsho Dorji, agrees that TV is making Bhutan a more consumerist society. He says that the biggest positive impact TV made was on sports. "Bhutanese people also have more access to information than ever before which I think is a good thing," he says. "Hindi serials are popular with women because they are based on strong family values no matter how bad the programme may be to some of us. Housewives do adjust evening dinner not to miss their favourite serial."

Another Thimphu civil servant adds that as an oral based society Bhutanese are more tuned to watching TV where "people just listen instead of active participation in the programme by having to read or write". "My son and his cousin'
s heroes are Batman, Spiderman and the like. They were my childhood heroes too because I read about them in comics," he says.

There are others, however, who strongly feel that TV is diluting the in built Bhutanese society that has always prided itself on its rich culture and tradition. "There has been an unprecedented influx of foreign elements in such a short time," says Ugyen Tshering, a civil servant. "But the more disturbing thing is that we have been readily assimilating these western low cultural products, without even questioning them. There is danger in such a terrifying hunger.
"

Bhutan observers from abroad also see TV as assailing the society faster than ever before. Most say youth have been the most vulnerable target. People like Dr. David Walsh, the president of the National Institute on Media and Family in Minneapolis, USA, warn that Bhutanese should work with an increased sense of urgency to protect children from the "violence and smut" of media. "Now that Bhutan has entered the electronic age, it needs to face the challenges this new age presents," he says. "The clash between 'TV values' and community values occurs everywhere television is available. Allowing your children to watch whatever they want whenever they want to watch it is like allowing a total stranger into your home. No sane parent would ever do that. The key is to set guidelines about how much and what can be watched."

Western media scholars say that the rapid growth of global music and movies with universal appeal for the young has led to a new generation and culture gap. The young population of the world today, the scholars say, have more in common with each other than with their older parents, teachers and relatives. As the media report shows more and more young people and adolescents in Bhutan dress and behave in a manner often resented by the older generation. "The real issue is that modernisation can be seen as a contradiction to culture and tradition," says Siok Sian Pek. "The underlying risk here is that if tradition is seen as opposing modernisation, the youth can reject tradition."

Several parents Kuensel talked to share this fear of impending "underlying risk". This rejection looks imminent some parents say adding that what worries them most is their children suddenly "acting strange, becoming strange" which they interpret as "slow sidelining of Bhutanese values, attitudes and aspirations by the young".

Is Bhutan then on the way to what has been often referred to as "cultural imperialism"? "The fear of negative influences from foreign media content spurred by cultural concerns is the key element of cultural imperialism," says professor Stig Arne Norhstedt of Orebro University, Sweden, who has authored numerous books on global media studies. "The presence of strong foreign broadcast media in a country like Bhutan and people's willingness to internalise the imported foreign content will certainly weaken the development of the indigenous media like the BBS TV. This is bound to have a severe cultural influence in the long run."

Bhutan certainly lacks the expertise and resources to establish a vibrant and competent domestic communication system that can authentically reflect its history, needs, concerns, values, and culture. The dominance of foreign channels in Bhutanese households proves that it is far cheaper for the service providers to import foreign TV products than to domestically produce them.

Bhutan escaped the mercantile colonialism of 1700 to 1950 when powerful industrialised nations colonised countries around the world for cheap raw materials and labour. Bhutan, however, has undeniably become a helpless victim of media colonialism. And media colonialism, experts warn, could have worse effects than the mercantile colonialism.

In a 2002 university radio programme, Bhutan Wired, the professor and dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley, Orville Schell, says that if there is equilibrium that need to be maintained in a good life, Bhutan is one of the last places that has a chance to engineer that equilibrium in an intelligent way. But for the present Professor Schell certainly seems as confused as most Bhutanese when he says, "I am not sure, you know, all of these cable channels being lofted over the mountains and into these once-sylvan, quiet, peaceful valleys is the way to effect it."

By Gopilal Acharya in Orebro University, Sweden gopiacharya@kuensel.com.bt

This article comes from Kuensel Online
http://www.kuenselonline.com

The URL for this story is:
http://www.kuenselonline.com/article.php?sid=4618

I thought this was an interesting read. It shows just how powerful the media really is in affecting cultural changes over a short period of time. Those of you who are geographically challenged Bhutan is between China and India.