Minority Media and Community Agenda Setting A Study On Muslim Press In Kerala

Abstract

Unlike their counterparts elsewhere in the country, Muslim newspapers in Kerala are highly professional in staffing, payment, and news management and production technology and they enjoy 35 percent of the newspaper readership in Kerala. They are published in Malayalam when Indian Muslim Press outside Kerala concentrates on Urdu journalism. And, most of these newspapers have a promising newsroom diversity employing Muslim and non-Muslim women, Dalits and professionals from minority and majority religions. However, how effective are these newspapers in forming public opinion among community members and setting agendas for community issues in public sphere? The study, which is centered on this fundamental question and based on the conceptual framework of agenda setting theory and functional perspective of minority media, examines the role of Muslim newspapers in Kerala in forming a politically vibrant, progress oriented, Muslim community in Kerala, bringing a collective Muslim public opinion into being, Influencing non-Muslim media programming on Muslim issues and influencing the policy agenda of the Government on Muslim issues.