“Out of many One People” (Jamaican Motto)
For a small island Jamaica is auspicious in terms of its media accomplishments. With a population estimating about 2,801,544 it’s hard to think that it can be so advanced in media. With that being said it’s even hard to think that 15 years ago there was some part of Jamaica that didn’t have electricity. When one thinks of Jamaica they think reggae music and the phrase “yeah man” they don’t really think media and news paper and hot topics such as politics and high rate of crime and corruption. That’s what so interesting about this country so much goes on there but no one really sees it they just get a glimpse but hearing the music. For a small island it as its fair share of accomplishments i.e. cleaning up the 2008 track and field Olympics and among many other things. The languages spoken in Jamaica are English and an English dialect called patois (Patwa). (Of which I speak both). The languages most spoken are patois broken English that is mixed with Spanish English and African. There is even a story that the slaves made up that language so that their masters wouldn’t understand them when they talked.
Jamaica only got media savvy maybe two decades ago; the media was mostly used to popularize the very vibrant culture. The subjects covered by the media are like any other culture; sports local news and tabloids. However the presentation of the news styling in Jamaica is still a lot different from the published news here in the United States.
The newspapers in Jamaica are the Daily Gleaner, the Observer and the Star which is an afternoon newspaper that was basically a tabloid. The Daily Gleaner in Jamaica was equivalent to what The New York Times is here in New York. It was established in 1834 being the oldest running newspaper in the Caribbean. The company that published the paper was rightly called the Gleaner Company which was the company’s “flagship paper” they later-on published the Sunday Gleaner in 1939 along with the Afternoon Star. The Weekend Star was an extension of the Afternoon star, which included music reviews, Dance, Theater and social cultures; it was first published in 1951.
The Gleaner is no respecters of persons the publications were brutal, especially when it came to politics. This paper was known for their coverage of the Michael Manley Administration. They were a political administration that was in office during the 1970s. The Gleaner was not afraid to expose the corruptions behind the Jamaican governments. The Gleaner not only took on corrupt government they also made an attempted to endorse education by putting out a children’s magazine “I recall reading this paper when I was in seven years old I enjoyed coloring the comics and drawing picture that I wanted to send in to the magazine in hopes that I would see it published in the next paper”. The name of the magazine was called Children’s Own that came out every week to help to build artistic development. The Gleaner Company would be the biggest publishing company for a very longtime in Jamaica with offices also located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada; London and New York. The company raking up over $1.8 Million in 2000 and making a little less than that in 1999 in the way of $1.6 Million. The Gleaner reached mainly young male readers being that 54 percent of their readers were male and 56 percent of them being between the ages of 18 and 34.
The Star under the same company of the Gleaner dealt more with Jamaica’s tabloid than anything else which was meant for entertainment purposes than informative. The magazine was more about scandalous stories with less traditional newspaper styling. There were even stories told in the patois the Jamaican dialect. Similar to this was another newspaper called XNews (I was not allowed to read) another tabloid magazine that lives up to its name of being X rated news. There’s no doubt that print media was widely supported in the small island of Jamaica however it was the most popular medium.
Radio was the most supported medium in the country which start goes back to ham radio operator John Grinan from the late 1930s. He was under wartime regulation and gave his equipment over to the government because of WWII. In any case Grinan coax the government into having him use his equipment to do public broadcasting soon after Jamaica had regular scheduled programming. The first radio broadcast aired on November 17th 1939 on the fist radio station VP5PZ which was Grinan’s call sign. With a small staff in 1940 they started a daily broadcast that got better and better in spite of the. The kinds of program were of course news and war information later-on after that broadcast included live performance from local artists. But this was costing the government to much; it must not have been very lucrative for them so they decided to issue out license to private company; that birth to JBC Jamaica Broadcasting Company who got the first license on 1949 and commercials began to broadcast on July 1st 1950.
Since it was the only company that was doing radio broadcasting in the country they had the job of covering everything that went on, on the island. The company also gave out 200 portable radios stationed in rural areas as to not keep the people in the country out of the loop. These radios were areas of large gatherings such as schools, police stations, and stores around various places. There after the station did something exciting and new hey established the frequency-modulated transmitter making Jamaica the first of the British Commonwealth achieve regular broadcast programming.
Another huge step made by JBC was to bring radio all over the island by transmitting signal via wire connection, thus carrying it into homes retails outlets bars hotels and etc and by 1958 more than 15000 sign up to receive this service. There were so many new developments after this, during the 1960s the station started to run music non-stop. This was possible because of new equipment, a tape machine system called Reditune this gave way to even more advance technology that was used to broadcast music. In 1972 a new radio station was introduced to the Jamaican population a station by the name of RJR Radio Jamaica on the FM band this was more the station for continual music. RJR purchased “the television and Radio 2 assets from the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation for about $70 million Jamaican”. RJR grew as great radio media Giant with company and stations such as Radio Jamaica Limited, Television Limited and Multi-Media Jamaica Ltd. Under its supreme ruling reached the majority of Jamaicans with coverage of news and world events along with entertainment this subjective area’s became the most important endeavor of the broadcasting company.
June 2002 was first sign of Government regulation coming into effect with the Access to Information Act. In this act the press was allowed to release to the public government information concerning the welfare of the people. The acts gave rights to the media to release vital information to the public but also withheld information to protect “essential public interests and private rights”. Other purposes of the act were to “improved, more transparent government; greater accountability of government to its people; increased public influence on and participation in national decision making; and knowledge of the functions of government”. Simultaneously another law another law was in the make to replace the Official Secret law which gives a fine or possible jail time to those who reported certain Government investigation.
Regardless of some of the Government regulations the media was mostly free a press. The Official Secret Acts was of course rejected by most journalists because this causes more problems. For instance when the government raise taxes the people put up road blocks as form of protest and the streets were littered with violence but when the reason for the taxes revealed to the people they drew back on the protest and the roads were cleared. The Gleaner and the Observer were prominent pains in the rare for government Officials buy always asking questions and getting to the bottom of the most important stories that would benefit the people if they know it. A new wave of entertainment was taking over in Jamaica as television became popular in Jamaica.
Among being the first radio broadcast company JBC was also the first television broadcast company as well. Officially established on August 4, 1963 they aired program mostly of public interest. They used the medium as a way to communicate with the people of the island. “These included public service announcements (PSA), magazine style variety series with recurring features, hosted talk shows with live audiences and panels of resource persons, interview shows with interesting and informative inserts, popular music specials, docu-dramas, news and sports”. The shows were popular because they reflected a lot of what was going on the people’s lives. The topics were about the unemployment rate at an all time high, topics like the choices that the politicians for people that cause riots and road blocks. The politician also covering and protecting Gunmen because they can get them voted back in the office. These were some of the topics that were covered but could cost you your jobs and maybe your life if you’re not careful as a reporter.
[6] www.jis.gov.jm/special_sections/ATI/default.html
archivesatrisk.org/restricted/madrid_2006
Satirical news is a new wave of entertainment taking over the media world. Popular websites such as The Onion and TheStreet.com get thousands of hits everyday.
DID ANYONE NOTICE that Jamaica cleaned up 8 gold medals in the track and field events in this year’s Olympic? NOOOooooooooo well that’s not surprising considering who was airing the 
Hey bloggers and readers alike. This is Just a short intro to Nickheisa’s Blog Called Destined For more. I know the name is type corny but it’s just my way of giving myself positive reinforcement. I might not write a lot because i often have writers block and my writing also is a little weird. First of all these Bolgs started for my TVR class and I didn’t like it too much. But I am warming up to the idea of people reading my writing. But I now welcome constructive criticism.