RTV Theory and Practice - Special Issue

for tourists anđ hence an almost endless supply of rađio sets . The deposed Primeminister, Bavadra, continued to talK to his people by giving interviews to RA . He made excellent use of radio as a means of keeping up the political spirit of his followers - and generally calming down the potentially very đangerous situation - whereas Colonel Rabuka with no talent for the handling media seemed to become more and more frustrated with his inability td convince апуопе of the rightfulness of his actions . Although the coup (and the subseguent second coup) had become big media events for the Australians and New Zealanders, for the Fijians, RA was the only medium of relevance since Fiji's newspapers were either closed or under strong censorship , Fiji radio had become ап instrument of the army and other ,news sources were not available . 9) RA looks , so to speak , after the information needs of smaller nations in the Pacific. lo ) But who looks after smaller groups in Australia itself? SPECIAL BROADCASTING SERVICE Australia prides herself to be a multicultural nation and much is made on a political level about the importance of the term multicultural (a concept which is by no means universally accepted and agreed to) 11 ) . In order to satisf у the đemanđs of various ethnic groups , the Labor government in 19 78 established the Special Broađcasting Service (SBS) to provide multicultural radio services. (Since 1980, SBS also handles a multicultural television station,) 12 ) Already in 1975, two rađio stations , 2EA in Sydney and ЗЕА in Melbourne had been established by government as 'Ethnic Radio Australia'. (Before that, the ABCs only concession to non-English speaking listeners had been "a daily 15-minute learning English program, anđ a weekly bilingual magazine program.” l3 ) Until 1984, SBS also provided subsiđies for Aboriginal radio. SBS Radio broadcasts in 60 foreign languages , app . 250 hours each week through 2EA in Sydney and two adjacent industrial towns anđ ЗЕА in Melbourne and Geelong. It also relays a number of programs to Brisbane . App . 15 small commercial radio stations situated in areas with a particularly heavy concentration of ethnic groups also broadcast between 125 min . and 180 min . of ethnic programs . 1 4 ) A number of public rađio stations also broadcast ethnic programs. The Criteria for Ethnic Broadcasting , according to the government, are:

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