Tawana Kupe

After Robert Mugabe goes, Zimbabweans will have to face the fact that they have not enjoyed freedom of expression and a free media to the extent they should have as a modern and independent nation. Zimbabwe remains one of few countries in the world where the government still monopolises broadcasting and controls the largest print media company.

The date for municipal elections is looming, and still hardly any voters get media access to local government candidates. Professor Tawana Kupe suggests that opening the airwaves could go a long way towards addressing the protests on lack of service delivery.

Against a background of raised political temperatures, Professor Tawana Kupe enagaged with Dr Snuki Zikalala, the SABC’s MD of news and current affairs, at the recent Harold Wolpe Lecture Series. He gives here a summary of the disagreements.

The dominant representations of sex prove that local media’s pro-equality approach in August of every year is a big con. Professor Tawana Kupe argues that while women are seen as sexy, the jobs they do are not.

Professor Tawana Kupe argues that Jacob Zuma’s cries of "trial by media" are misinformed. The media works on the presumption of reasonable suspicion, not on the legal presumption that one is innocent until proven guilty.

South Africa will commemorate World Press Freedom Day by focusing on community media, explains Professor Tawana Kupe, because it can be the strongest voice speaking truth to power.

Local media are uncritical praise singers of Finance Minister Trevor Manuel, argues Professor Tawana Kupe. Should Manuel’s success not be judged on how his policies are sensitive to his context?

Professor Tawana Kupe nominates President Mbeki for "communicator of the year" for 2004. It may be a controversial accolade, but the president does know how to outsmart us.

We may have made some major advances since the colonial era, but is their really anything "African" about the continent’s media? Professor Tawana Kupe is sceptical, claiming that the modern media is an effect of the colonial intrusion into Africa.

American commercial media has a lot in common with state-controlled media in undemocratic states, argues Professor Tawana Kupe.

For the media, there’s a thin line between acting as publicity agent for a terrorist group and disseminating vital information. Prof. Tawana Kupe unpacks the danger and subtlety of these news events.

The second series in the political soapie that closed with Judge Hefer’s report is currently on air. Professor Tawana Kupe unpacks the media’s role in the intrigue.

The ANC’s election strategy pulled the rug from under the media, argues Professor Tawana Kupe. Why was their communications plan, which centred around President Mbeki, so successful?

The media industry globally, and here I am including advertising, could be said to thrive on the four Ss: Sex, Sin, Scandal and Sport. What is it about sport that whips the usually cynical media into a nationalistic frenzy? Prof. Tawana Kupe looks at the sex, sin and scandal, and then sees the politics.

Fierce civil strife, it was. The battle between South African newspaper editors and the feminist organisation Gender Links, waged in the run up to International Women’s Day on March 8th, was instigated by the "back page". There’s no easy solution to the fight that recently erupted between editors and feminists over the "back page". Tawana Kupe explains the problem.

The ANC is going to win the third democratic elections, so say the media and analysts. This is true. So how is the media going to cover a competitive contest where the result is already known? Tawana Kupe thinks the media should alert the elite it so loves to the dangers of endemic poverty.

The dismissal of Mathatha Tsedu as editor of the <i>Sunday Times</i> raises questions not just about transformation of the media, but about transformation of South African society. The two are interlinked, because the media is its own social institution as much as it has an institutional role which impacts on all other social institutions, writes Tawana Kupe.

What’s the use of an ‘off the record’ briefing if people can’t keep secrets? Tawana Kupe considers the question against the Ngcuka leak.

A script like this couldn’t have been made up. <b>Tawana Kupe</b> comments on the Zuma affair’s ascendancy over soapies, and looks at how the Sunday papers have come along for the ride.

Is it true that freedom of the press belongs to those who own or control media? If so, it would make nonsense of the universal right to freedom of expression, argues Tawana Kupe.

United States President George W. Bush descended on Africa with at least 150 of his own journalists, denying access to local reporters. Yet, argues Tawana Kupe, our media weren’t as critical as they should have been.

Governmental information services in Africa are still largely based on an elitist system inherited from the colonial past. Tawana Kupe discusses the concerns, and looks at South Africa in the continental context.

The United Nations will host a World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva this December. Who cares?

Tawana Kupe, head of media studies at the University of the Witwatersrand, addresses an issue overshadowed by the louder Broadcasting Amendment Bill controversy.

Tawana Kupe takes a retrospective glance at how SABC and e.TV handled the war in Iraq. Was the local angle well balanced?