The first Plenary session of IAMCR 2010, “Presidential Conversations: Media and Citizenship in Africa", had the presence of Annabelle Sreberny, President of IAMCR, and Carlos Lopes, Executive Director of United Nations Institute for Training and Research.
Mr. Lopes started by teasing the audience to rethink the role of new communication technologies and the different cultural identities perceptions we have developed with globalization. He also gave some interesting numbers and information related to the use of social networks, such as Facebook. “Seven years ago, English was the most used language in the internet. Now it´s Mandarim, followed by English, Spanish, Japanese and Portuguese. It is also important to notice that we can find more 200 different languages in that social network”, informed Mr. Lopes. He continued his provocative speech by questioning how that new perspective of social networks is in Africa. According to him the social, political and economical future of the continent can be more positive than people in general imagine. “Nowadays Africa has only three civil wars and all indicators show that numbers are rising. In 2015, it is expected to 80% of Africans have cell phones and they are starting to realize that communication can be essential to their citizenship”.
Raquel Lobão e Renata Freitas
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