This study is concerned with the potential of a community radio station under the ownership of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) in being a facilitator and social actor of community-based development. XK fm is a radio station run by members of the !Xun and Khwe (two ethnic San communities), but owned and governed by the SABC. It was established to preserve and protect the cultures, languages and histories of the two communities as well acting as a facilitating and promoter of development. The focus of this research is on the examination of the station‘s day-to-day development programmes, the processes involved in operation, production and transmission of these programmes and the outcomes of these processes in the reception of the programmes among the two communities. As a means of critically analyzing the multi-layered aspects of operations within the radio station and the listening habits of its audiences as a whole, this study is situated within a Circuit of Culture (du Gay et al, 1997) framework of theory. It is also based on a case study approach of methodology that utilizes ethnographic methods of data collection from semi-structured and in-depths interviews to passive and participant observations that have been recorded on video. Based on the principles of both forms of development radio broadcasting, this study concludes that XK fm has been successful in utilizing indigenous knowledge and culture to produce radio programming that is sensitive to the development needs of the !Xun and Khwe communities. It has created awareness of development issues through both its cultural programmes and it informational programmes, and through the SABC has been enabled to be productively sustainable, technically advanced and participatory in nature. However, the SABC‘s control over the station does limit the two communities‘ ownership of the station and participation in policy construction, thus constraining the station in more effectively acting as a community radio station. It suggests that XK fm cannot act alone as the sole facilitator of development and needs other mechanisms to enhance participation and effective dialectical information exchange such as radio listening clubs. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2011.

A dissertation submitted in full fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts by Research in Media Studies, Department of Media Studies, Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, February 2018 / This project examines the ways in which Radio Islam, a South African community radio station, constructs masculinity in the South African Indian Muslim community. This community is its largest audience. The radio station is strongly influenced by the ideologies and rulings of the Jamiatul Ulama, an ideological body whose teachings stem from Indo-Pak interpretations of Islam and with whom much of the South African Indian Muslim community align themselves. The conflation of this culture and religion in this context results in patriarchal and misogynistic teachings being repeated by this body without much questioning, resulting in the common upliftment of men and confinement of women in the community to certain roles and spaces only. Through the examination and discourse analysis of broadcasted content on Radio Islam in three categories that have many gendered dynamics to them - hijab, marriage, and Ramadan - this study aims to unpack the way in which masculinity is constructed, and the extents to which these constructions then facilitate the entrenchment of patriarchy in the broader South African Muslim community. / XL2018

A thesis submitted to University of the Witwatersrand in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, Johannesburg, 2017 / Decolonisation and Africanisation of spaces emerging from administrative and settler colonialism have been suggested as forms of challenging colonial legacies that are still largely present in the Global South and particularly within the African continent. Mainly, this has also been the case in recent South African discourses that have called for the decolonisation and ‘transformation’ of key areas in the country to build a decolonised African country of the future. This thesis, therefore, deals with the subject of the community radio broadcasting sector that is operating during South Africa’s ‘postcolonial’ era, and the steps undertaken by this sector in Africanising itself. Starting from the conviction that the media has a historical role in shaping and communicating cultures as well as identities of the colonised and ‘formerly’ colonised, the thesis posits that the community radio sector is one of the vital arenas that can be used to understand the continuities and discontinuities of colonial cultures in media institutions. Thus, to comprehend and establish the state of Africanisation within the community radio sector of the country, the study investigated and analysed the case of Vukani Community Radio (VCR); a community radio station that is easily one of the oldest community orientated broadcasters in South Africa. Furthermore, to challenge the idea of colonised and neo-colonised media spaces, this thesis was grounded on an understanding of the complexities of Africanisation as a decolonising project in a media institution that is operating in the post-settler-colonial administration of this country. Adopting a case study approach, this study attempted to understand the urgency of a broadcast media platform in asserting the cultures and identities of ‘previously’ colonised Africans on the medium's airwaves. To make sense of the conceptual challenges surrounding the study, the thesis has drawn on decolonial discourses, including the theory of Afrocentricity, the coloniality of power, coloniality of knowledge, the coloniality of being and the decolonial turn. The adoption of these theories by the study, therefore, also demonstrates a conscious delinking of this study from the traditional theories of media and cultural studies that have habitually underpinned the South African canon. Moreover, this study has adopted the use of critical decolonised methodologies approach in the pursuit of answers about the extent of Africanisation of the media institution. The decolonised approach of the adopted method lay in revealing the colonial excesses that have underpinned research methodologies as well as an ‘auto-critique’ of these excesses in the context of this study. The data analysed to arrive at the findings of this study included several macro and micro policy documents, a content analysis of three (3) categories of community radio programmes [Talk Radio, African Cultural Lifestyle & News Programming] that totalled 270 hours of community radio content. The study also relied on several semi structured interviews with various internal and external stakeholders that make up the station's key constituencies. In the analysis of evidence that would uncover the extent of the Africanisation of the community radio station, the findings of the thesis revealed several yet overlapping thematic areas that suggest pathways towards the Africanisation of the media institution. These, among others, included the use of this media institution as an African public sphere, its embracing of the philosophy of Ubuntu, its role in the decolonisation of African memory and its approaches towards ethnicity and Africanity within the broadcasting area. These themes emanating from the analysed data of the study also illustrate how this media institution is operating as a pocket of resistance against colonial, neo-colonial and imperialistic media cultures. In addition to these thematic areas, the findings of this study also demonstrate that when only media policy documents are adopted, this can lead to ambiguities in the pursuit of Africanisation as decolonisation. The study however also demonstrates that the urgency of the community radio station in catering for the surrounding constituency can potentially demonstrate an eventual Africanisation of the airwaves. Finally, this study concludes that the Africanisation of the airwaves is demonstrable at Vukani Community Radio (VCR) but its permanent enforcement is dependent on the vigilance of the stations constituencies and how they define and enforce the role of their media institution. / XL2018

This study is based on an assessment of XK FM as a community radio station for the !XQ and Khwe ethnic communities. Various political under-currents and factors are examined: the refusal to accept the two groups as separate ethnic communities, the anomalous creation of XK FM as a community radio station under the auspices of SABC. This anomaly has created an ambiguity of what a community is within a community radio station, what are the historical and present complexities encompassed in considering the !XO and the Khwe as a single 'minority ethnic media community' and awarding them a radio licence, what is the nature and governance of community radio in general? The study followed a qualitative research paradigm whose epistemology IS phenomenological, using case study method, theories of the public sphere and ethnicity. According to this frame of reference XK FM radio station is seen as a case study of ethnic minority media. Community radio is therefore described as the expression of a small population, and a third voice between the state and private commercial radio. It also has the ability to correct the distortions inherent in the majority-controlled media by acting as the alternative media. The alternative element is associated with its potential to challenge the establishment, and in giving people an independent voice which is often perceived as alternative and free speech. Us major characteristics are; independence, equality, community participation, and representation. XK FM as a community radio is likely to consolidate the sustenance of beliefs in collective will, participatory approach to communication and citizen input. This enhances language as both a means of communication and expression of cultural identity for the local communities. This study concludes that the lXQ and Khwe are two different ethnic communities, with varied worldviews and aspirations. This assertions surmises that the issuing of the licence by ICASA merely focused on their cultural distinctiveness, and allowed for a localised form of public broadcasting, thereby entrenching ethnic cleavages most probably with the aim of manipulating the two communities. By implication, XK FM is not a community radio station in the strict sense, but an extension of SABC in a decentralised version. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2006.

Community radio stations play an important role in the development of their communities. Forte FM is a community radio station located at University of Fort Hare Alice campus and was established to facilitate development in communities within the Amathole district municipality. Alice, a small rural town under Raymond Mhlaba Municipality, is one of the communities under the coverage of Forte FM. This study assessed the role that Forte FM plays in facilitating the development of Alice community. The study adopted a mixed method design in which questionnaires and interviews were used to collect primary data. The study findings show that although Forte FM is faced with serious financial challenges, it contributes to the development of Alice in various ways which includes providing the community with agricultural information, health information, promoting local culture, equipping the community with skills, promote local artists and sports personnel and educational programmes. The findings also revealed that the community is involved in the management of some aspects of the station’s operations through a board which is elected annually by the community itself. The results indicate that the radio station involve some community members in programming as experts on some topics or as people who have experienced an ordeal so they could share their experiences and advice other people how to manage similar situations. However, there is need to involve the community in the whole production process. The respondents’ attributed poor levels of community participation in programming to insufficient funds. The study recommends that Forte FM should lobby members of the community to fund the production of programmes since the station belongs to the community. This will enhance the sense of community ownership towards the radio station.

This research project was aimed at investigating strategies that are used for the sustainability of selected rural-based community radio stations in the Transkei area of the Eastern Cape. The study was done under a hypothesis that, in the absence of big business and migration of literate people and skilled labour from rural communities to urban centres, rural-based community radios struggle to attract operational revenue through advertising, community support, etc., and that the supposedly high illiteracy in the rural areas render it difficult to run the stations. Two rural-based community radio stations were selected for this study: Alfred Nzo Community Radio at Mount Ayliff in the Alfred Nzo District Municipality area, and Vukani Community Radio at Cala in the Chris Hani District Municipality area. The aim was to study their activities with regard to the most and widely agreed three-dimensional method of sustaining community radio stations: Financial Sustainability, Institutional Sustainability, and Social Sustainability. Relevant literature has been reviewed and data have been collected using both quantitative and qualitative methods through questionnaires. The study however leans more on the qualitative approach and a quantitative approach has merely been used to identify the trends of the views of the participants. The analysis of data highlights the views of the respondents about these radio stations with regard to their strategies to sustain themselves. The views of the respondents represent all people from all levels of people involved in the stations: From the Member of the Board of Directors in the boardroom to stations’ members of management at their desks. From Presenters behind their microphones to the listener in the dusty streets of the poor rural areas. The results confirm the hypothesis that the areas have high unemployment and illiteracy rates, and that their sustainability depend largely on trade-outs with local business and government support. However, the study also shows that strategies for Financial Sustainability, Institutional Sustainability, and Social Sustainability may overlap or influence each other. For instance, an activity of Institutional Sustainability may result in Financial Sustainability, and visa-versa. The study also reveals that the stations struggle to establish and maintain effective Social Sustainability for the benefit of the station. In the light of this, a proposal for further study and recommendations are given at the end of the study.

This research set out to investigate the role that community radio can potentially play as a space in which young people engage with their own role as citizens and, in so doing, participate in discussions that seek to address social problems in a community divided by class, income, gender and race. The study examines how a local community radio station - Radio Grahamstown - developed a youth programme Y4Yin which the producers of the show and its audience came together to negotiate the meaning of citizenship. The study examines whether this interactive programme was able to function as something like a public sphere where in young people were able to develop a greater sense of agency, at least in the realm of citizenship. Using evidence gathered through focus group discussions with a group of young school-going leamers, interviews conducted with the producers of the show Y4Y, and drawing on Dahlgren's elaboration of a functional public sphere, the research concludes that the show provided a useful platform for Grahamstown high school students to develop their own notions of citizenship and to, at least partially and tentatively, build some 'bridges' across the vectors of socio-economic division in the town. However, the research also concludes that the Y4Y producers often failed to use a mode of address contemporary to the youth and often did not use production techniques congruent with young people's cultural tastes. This limited the programme's appeal and its potential as an enabler of discussion about notions of citizenship and as a platform for social bridging. In addition, because of the producers' control over the choice of topics put up for discussion, open interaction was more limited than could have been expected. In addition, the study also concludes that various limitations to the leamers' freedom of expression (including their fear that teachers might be listening in to the shows) inhibited the programme's role as a deliberative public sphere where issues could be aired, common ground found, and solutions discussed.

The thrust of this dissertation is concerned with investigating beneficiary communities‟ participation in HIV/AIDS communication through community radio stations. The aim is to understand the presence and access of targeted community voices in the dialogue against HIV/AIDS. The research focused on a single case study of a community radio station that is based in Platfontein, Kimberley in the Republic of South Africa. X-K FM is a community radio station under the auspices of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) and its primary target audiences are !Xun and Khwe communities of Platfontein. It is the only formal communication channel that targets these San community members in their respective mother tongues. The study approaches communication at a nuance level in that it evaluates participation possibilities between communicators and the communicated. In its third decade, the Human Immunodeficiency Virus is one of many challenges facing sub-Saharan Africa and the Republic of South Africa is no exception. This dissertation attempts to understand participation and access of civil voices in the strategies of prevention, care, support and treatment of HIV/AIDS. On a broader level, the dissertation seeks to understand the possibilities of bottom-up approaches in communicating about HIV/AIDS. In analysing the beneficiary community participation at X-K FM, the research was underpinned by the theory of Jurgen Habermas: The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere – An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society. The data was gathered using semi-structured interviews, as well as simple and partial participant observation. The study concludes that the radio station has provided some avenues to facilitate the process of beneficiary community participation in HIV/AIDS communication content. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.

This study sets out to investigate Lunchtime Live, a twice-weekly, one-hour long current affairs show broadcast on a small community radio station, Radio Grahamstown, to understand its role in the local public sphere, and its value in helping civil society’s understanding of and involvement in the power structures and political activities in Grahamstown. Lunchtime Live seeks to cultivate a collective identity and promote public participation in the public affairs of Grahamstown. As a key avenue of investigation, this study seeks to test theory against practice, by evaluating Lunchtime Live’s aspirations against the audiences’ perception of it. This investigation uses qualitative content analysis of selected episodes of recorded transcripts of the shows that aired between August 2010 and March 2011, together with the audiences’ verbalised experiences of this programme through focus group discussions. The study principally uses qualitative research informed by reception theory. The research reveals three key findings. First, that resonance rather than resistance is the more dominant ‘stance’ or ‘attitude’ towards the content of Lunchtime Live. Residents interviewed agreed that the programme is able to give a “realistic” representation of their worldview, and thus is able to articulate issues that affect their lives. Second, that whilst the programme is helping establish links between members of the civil society as well as between civil society and their political representatives, residents feel that local democracy is failing to bring qualitative improvements to their everyday lives and that more ‘participation’ is unlikely to change this. Most respondents blame this on a lack of political will, incompetence, corruption and populist rhetoric by politicians who fail to deliver on the mantra of ‘a better life for all’ in the socioeconomic sphere. The study finds a scepticism and even cynicism that participatory media seems to be able to do little to dilute. Thirdly, in spite of the largely positive view about Lunchtime Live’s capacity to be a platform for public engagement, its participatory potential is structurally constrained by the material privations of most of its listeners. Given that in order to participate in talk shows and discussions audience members have to phone in, economic deprivation often precludes this. It is clear from this research that despite shows such as Lunchtime Live that are exploring new techniques of popular involvement, the voice of the ordinary people still struggles to be heard.