Purpose of Social Action and Community Media Production
Written by Rhys Collins
Definition
Social Action refers to an act which takes the actions and reactions of others into consideration and attempts to persuade people into behaving in a similar, likeminded way.
Purpose
The purpose of Social Action is to bring about local, global or national change. For example, an anti-smoking video can be considered Social Action as it intends to bring around the change of stopping people smoking around the globe. However, if an anti-smoking campaign specifically featured a picture of British celebrities, it would be targeting a more national change within the UK. If that British celebrity was Guy Martin (a Grimsby celebrity) it may be more targeted at the local Grimsby area.
Purpose
While typically inciting change in an area, a more broad purpose of Social Action would be to, typically, change attitudes. Somebody may be inclined to believe that smoking has no negative effects, but seeing the video with the smoke filling the room with the children (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhuHeI4H00U) could very much change their opinion on smoking around children.
Purpose
Raising awareness is a simple way of looking at Social Action. People may not have known about the invisible side effects of smoking, and the advert may have helped to create a new commentary on it that they had not previously thought of.
Purpose
Creating access to media is another purpose of Social Action. Some people may just like to listen to the radio on the commute, and not engage in media at any other point. Hearing about the negatives of smoking via a radio advert may make them think about their habits and may make them actively engage with access to media via the internet or TV due to wanting to find out facts.
Purpose
Dominant Representations need to get challenged via Social Media at times. If people aren’t willing to challenge the current ruling party of a country, then the politics may never change and become static over time. If the opposition releases a video challenging the ruling party it may change the dominant representation in a country. This also represents Social Action to Change Voting Behaviour and to Campaign.
Purpose
Creating and Strengthening Community Ties is a large purpose of Social Action. This could also refer to a political stance, in that there may be a rift between a community due to different political views, but Social Action listing points of different parties could change people’s mind.
Purpose
Providing Information and Infiltrating Mainstream Media are prime uses of Social Action Media, to try and give information about a subject (ie smoking) in the middle of prime time media, such as providing an advert during a political debate or a sporting match.
Purpose
Social Action can also build relationships with subjects. For example, there may be an attempt to use media to generate interest in a charity campaign, and the charity will attempt to maintain contact between donors and the people they’re helping, creating and building relationships between the donors, charity and people in need.
Change
I think one example of opinions being changed through the use of Social Action media was the most recent American election. At the start, Donald Trump was believed to be a joke and an underdog, but with the right publicity and media, with Social Action media trying to portray him as better than Clinton, he ended up being able to win. This, to me, evidences that Social Action media and communications can really change the hearts and minds of people and potentially change the world, for better or worse.