Multimedia edutainment projects in global media

Abstract

Edutainment (a hybrid term, coined from educational entertainment) and language media didactics have been actively embraced by educators to exhilarate people’s learning experience. In the media studies, however, edutainment have long been taken for granted as a combo function of education and entertainment. Presented from a cross disciplinary and practice-driven perspective, the current work aims to fills the void in the research field and rethink ‘edutainment’ as a media experience that can be addressed to engage media audiences and boost their loyalty. Another novation concerns Russia’s cross-border news providers as a newly emerged subject of media scientific enquiry and understudied subject of the Russian language media didactics. Relevance of the topic is explained by the following observation: long-term strategic reports of the well-established media like the BBC and Deutsche Welle distinctly reveal the importance of reporting in English as a lingua franca, while launching new world services in other languages, and promoting their national language as an agent of cultural influence across the globe. In the densely saturated media environment, cross-border news providers with the global outreach, strong national identification, multilingual and multimedia sources, can target edutainment as a media experience to stand out in the global media market and turn a non-user into a loyal consumer. Object of the study is foreign-oriented media with the strong national identification, multilingual and multimedia content: Germany’s public broadcaster Deutsche Welle and its online version as a successful model, and Russia’s print publication and online project Russia Beyond The Headlines as a case study. Aspect of the study is language-learning component in the content media strategy: German as a foreign language in the case of Deutsche Welle, and Russian as a foreign language (hereinafter – RFL) - for Russia Beyond The Headlines (hereinafter – RBTH). Aim of the research is to analyze language-learning initiatives taken by globally oriented media abroad and in Russia - from the Soviet times to the present day, in order to test RBTH as a potential provider of RFL. Tasks: 1. To particularize edutainment as a media experience with the focus on foreign language didactics; 2. To study premises, challenges and opportunities for integrating RFL component into the newly emerged international media based on the experiences of mature media players abroad; 3. To assess the potential of RBTH as an online communicator and as a media organization to provide RFL; 4. To propose recommendations for RBTH in developing its content strategy for a better audience’s engagement. Chronological framework: the period of testing RBTH.com as a platform for RFL learning started in the fall 2016 with the preliminary survey of twenty one non-Russian speakers and the subsequent launch of the video series ‘Russian2Go’ on rbth.com/education. The final stage of the research falls on the spring 2017 with interviewing experts and surveying users’ preferences related to producing and consuming RFL content. Methodological foundation: the empirical part of the study uses a mixed-methods approach that combines quantitative methods of web-analysis, social media monitoring and online survey with a qualitative method of expert interviews. Practical implementation of the work: the video series ‘Russian2Go’, developed as a pilot project was successfully implemented into the content strategy of RBTH in cooperation with its central desk for education. Structure of the work: the master thesis includes introduction, three chapters, conclusion, bibliography and appendices. In order to assess the plausibility of a Russia-based international media to provide RFL component, Russia Beyond The Headlines was first compared to Deutsche Welle and then studied empirically at the two levels – online communicator and media organization. The empirical research was conducted in two stages. The preliminary study of Russia Beyond The Headlines as an online media proved that, even though the RFL-related content is still rare on RBTH.com, its current and potential audience actively welcomes this type of content. The pilot project ‘Russian2Go’, designed for Russia Beyond The Headlines, showed that if managed the content and followed the online media logic properly, educational programs at RBTH.com could generate competitive traffic and positive reactions. The main stage of the empirical study was based on the interviews with experts in teaching Russian as a foreign language and included the extended online survey of the potential RFL online learners. The experts agreed that the lack of Russian language edutainment in the media could be explained by a huge supply of other online learning sources and current political agenda in the country. The expertise also stated that the idea of promoting RFL via media has not yet manifested itself. Among other challenges that the Russia-based international media can face are the professional gap in the RFL teachers’ community and multiple intricacies of teaching Russian as a foreign language online. The survey of the potential audience, i.e. non-Russian speaking adults, revealed that 1) the key characteristics of the respondents coincide with the demographics of the current RBTH online users – English speaking adults, aged 25-34; 2) learning objectives of the respondents and their level of RFL proficiency comprise a target audience – business-oriented people, 25+, - that represent an unoccupied niche in the media market for the online RFL learning sources; and 3) the most preferred topics for RFL learning are those from the actual media agenda that can be fully covered by Russia Beyond The Headlines. Both qualitative and quantitative surveys proved that technical capacity of the media must enable multimedia content (with videos as the most preferred media) scalable for different platforms (desktop, mobile, tablets). The research results demonstrated that the target audience of the potential RFL-related content can become the actual audience of Russia Beyond The Headlines, provided that the media remains to be multilingual, multimedia, and multiplatform, while its online and social media logics are properly followed. In general, Russia-based global media are capable of providing RFL-related edutainment under certain limitations – such as the role of the state as a key agenda setter and the language policy maker, a degree of independence in the editorial decision-making, as well as technical, financial and professional assets of the media organization and its audience’s needs.

Edutainment (a hybrid term, coined from educational entertainment) and language media didactics have been actively embraced by educators to exhilarate people’s learning experience. In the media studies, however, edutainment have long been taken for granted as a combo function of education and entertainment. Presented from a cross disciplinary and practice-driven perspective, the current work aims to fills the void in the research field and rethink ‘edutainment’ as a media experience that can be addressed to engage media audiences and boost their loyalty. Another novation concerns Russia’s cross-border news providers as a newly emerged subject of media scientific enquiry and understudied subject of the Russian language media didactics. Relevance of the topic is explained by the following observation: long-term strategic reports of the well-established media like the BBC and Deutsche Welle distinctly reveal the importance of reporting in English as a lingua franca, while launching new world services in other languages, and promoting their national language as an agent of cultural influence across the globe. In the densely saturated media environment, cross-border news providers with the global outreach, strong national identification, multilingual and multimedia sources, can target edutainment as a media experience to stand out in the global media market and turn a non-user into a loyal consumer. Object of the study is foreign-oriented media with the strong national identification, multilingual and multimedia content: Germany’s public broadcaster Deutsche Welle and its online version as a successful model, and Russia’s print publication and online project Russia Beyond The Headlines as a case study. Aspect of the study is language-learning component in the content media strategy: German as a foreign language in the case of Deutsche Welle, and Russian as a foreign language (hereinafter – RFL) - for Russia Beyond The Headlines (hereinafter – RBTH). Aim of the research is to analyze language-learning initiatives taken by globally oriented media abroad and in Russia - from the Soviet times to the present day, in order to test RBTH as a potential provider of RFL. Tasks: 1. To particularize edutainment as a media experience with the focus on foreign language didactics; 2. To study premises, challenges and opportunities for integrating RFL component into the newly emerged international media based on the experiences of mature media players abroad; 3. To assess the potential of RBTH as an online communicator and as a media organization to provide RFL; 4. To propose recommendations for RBTH in developing its content strategy for a better audience’s engagement. Chronological framework: the period of testing RBTH.com as a platform for RFL learning started in the fall 2016 with the preliminary survey of twenty one non-Russian speakers and the subsequent launch of the video series ‘Russian2Go’ on rbth.com/education. The final stage of the research falls on the spring 2017 with interviewing experts and surveying users’ preferences related to producing and consuming RFL content. Methodological foundation: the empirical part of the study uses a mixed-methods approach that combines quantitative methods of web-analysis, social media monitoring and online survey with a qualitative method of expert interviews. Practical implementation of the work: the video series ‘Russian2Go’, developed as a pilot project was successfully implemented into the content strategy of RBTH in cooperation with its central desk for education. Structure of the work: the master thesis includes introduction, three chapters, conclusion, bibliography and appendices. In order to assess the plausibility of a Russia-based international media to provide RFL component, Russia Beyond The Headlines was first compared to Deutsche Welle and then studied empirically at the two levels – online communicator and media organization. The empirical research was conducted in two stages. The preliminary study of Russia Beyond The Headlines as an online media proved that, even though the RFL-related content is still rare on RBTH.com, its current and potential audience actively welcomes this type of content. The pilot project ‘Russian2Go’, designed for Russia Beyond The Headlines, showed that if managed the content and followed the online media logic properly, educational programs at RBTH.com could generate competitive traffic and positive reactions. The main stage of the empirical study was based on the interviews with experts in teaching Russian as a foreign language and included the extended online survey of the potential RFL online learners. The experts agreed that the lack of Russian language edutainment in the media could be explained by a huge supply of other online learning sources and current political agenda in the country. The expertise also stated that the idea of promoting RFL via media has not yet manifested itself. Among other challenges that the Russia-based international media can face are the professional gap in the RFL teachers’ community and multiple intricacies of teaching Russian as a foreign language online. The survey of the potential audience, i.e. non-Russian speaking adults, revealed that 1) the key characteristics of the respondents coincide with the demographics of the current RBTH online users – English speaking adults, aged 25-34; 2) learning objectives of the respondents and their level of RFL proficiency comprise a target audience – business-oriented people, 25+, - that represent an unoccupied niche in the media market for the online RFL learning sources; and 3) the most preferred topics for RFL learning are those from the actual media agenda that can be fully covered by Russia Beyond The Headlines. Both qualitative and quantitative surveys proved that technical capacity of the media must enable multimedia content (with videos as the most preferred media) scalable for different platforms (desktop, mobile, tablets). The research results demonstrated that the target audience of the potential RFL-related content can become the actual audience of Russia Beyond The Headlines, provided that the media remains to be multilingual, multimedia, and multiplatform, while its online and social media logics are properly followed. In general, Russia-based global media are capable of providing RFL-related edutainment under certain limitations – such as the role of the state as a key agenda setter and the language policy maker, a degree of independence in the editorial decision-making, as well as technical, financial and professional assets of the media organization and its audience’s needs.