Shereen Usdin

Communicating HIV and AIDS, What Works? A Report on the Impact Evaluation of Soul City's Fourth Series

ABSTRACT This article describes the evaluation of the HIV/AIDS communication aspect of the multi media Soul City health promotion intervention in South Africa. The intervention consists of a television and radio drama and print material. The evaluation was multifaceted with a before and after national survey and a national qualitative study. In the before and after survey change was measured and then multiple regression analysis was performed to assess the variables associated with the change. The qualitative study consisted of focus group discussions, which were analysed thematically. The studies show that there are numerous instances of community change and how the change is mediated at the community level. The studies also describe the change at a number of levels of the described behaviour change model for individuals.

No short cuts in entertainment-education: Designing Soul City step-by-step

Contents: Preface. Part I: History and Theory. A. Singhal, E.M. Rogers, The Status of Entertainment-Education Worldwide. D. Poindexter, A History of Entertainment-Education, 1958-2000. P.T. Poitrow, E. de Fossard, Entertainment-Education as a Public Health Intervention. M. Sabido, The Origins of Entertainment-Education. A. Bandura, Social Cognitive Theory for Personal and Social Change by Enabling Media. W.J. Brown, B.P. Fraser, Celebrity Identification in Entertainment-Education. S. Sood, T. Menard, K. Witte, The Theory Behind Entertainment-Education. Part II: Research and Implementation. S. Usdin, A. Singhal, T. Shongwe, S. Goldstein, A. Shabalala, No Short Cuts in Entertainment-Education: Designing Soul City Step-by-Step. W.N. Ryerson, N. Teffera, Organizing a Comprehensive National Plan for Entertainment-Education in Ethiopia. B.S. Greenberg, C.T. Salmon, D. Patel, V. Beck, G. Cole, Evolution of an E-E Research Agenda. V. Beck, Working With Daytime and Prime-Time Television Shows in the United States to Promote Health. M. Bouman, Entertainment-Education Television Drama in the Netherlands. M.J. Cody, S. Fernandes, H. Wilkin, Entertainment-Education Programs of the BBC and BBC World Service Trust. A.C. La Pastina, D.S. Patel, M. Schiavo, Social Merchandizing in Brazilian Telenovelas. E.M. Rogers, Delivering Entertainment-Education Health Messages Through the Internet to Hard-to-Reach U.S. Audiences in the Southwest. Part III: Entertainment-Education Interventions and Their Outcomes. R.A. Abdulla, Entertainment-Education in the Middle East: Lessons From the Egyptian Oral Rehydration Campaign. Y. Yaser, The Turkish Family Health and Planning Foundations Entertainment-Education Campaign. N. McKee, M. Aghi, R. Carnegie, N. Shahzadi, Cartoons and Comic Books for Changing Social Norms: Meena, the South Asian Girl. A. Singhal, D. Sharma, M.J. Papa, K. Witte, Air Cover and Ground Mobilization: Integrating Entertainment-Education Broadcasts With Community Listening and Service Delivery in India. A. Singhal, Entertainment-Education Through Participatory Theater: Freirean Strategies for Empowering the Oppressed. T. Tufte, Soap Operas and Sense-Making: Mediations and Audience Ethnography. J.D. Storey, T.L. Jacobson, Entertainment-Education and Participation: Applying Habermas to a Population Program in Nepal. Epilogue.

A South African university- practitioner partnership to strengthen capacity in social and behaviour change communication

Globally, communication plays an integral role in public health strategies, from infectious diseases to diseases related to lifestyles. The evolution of the field of social and behaviour change communication (SBCC), combined with the need for evidence based practice and multi-level interventions to promote health, and human resource gaps in sub-Saharan Africa have led to the imperative to standardise and formalise the field. Moreover, current practitioners come from different disciplinary backgrounds underlining the need to define common core skills and competencies. This paper describes the partnership between the Wits School of Public Health and the Soul City Institute for Health and Development Communication and how the partners responded to this need. It highlights the factors influencing sustainable institutional capacity to provide quality assured, accredited training. We describe an unexpected positive response from a number of practitioner organisations that have chosen to send multiple staff members for training, specifically to build a critical mass within their organisations. Finally, we note the interest from (mostly) southern-based academic institutions in setting up similar programmes and postulate that south-south collaborations can contribute to building sustainable context specific and evidence-informed SBCC programmes in the global south.Globally, communication plays an integral role in public health strategies, from infectious diseases to diseases related to lifestyles. The evolution of the field of social and behaviour change communication (SBCC), combined with the need for evidence based practice and multi-level interventions to promote health, and human resource gaps in sub-Saharan Africa have led to the imperative to standardise and formalise the field. Moreover, current practitioners come from different disciplinary backgrounds underlining the need to define common core skills and competencies. This paper describes the partnership between the Wits School of Public Health and the Soul City Institute for Health and Development Communication and how the partners responded to this need. It highlights the factors influencing sustainable institutional capacity to provide quality assured, accredited training. We describe an unexpected positive response from a number of practitioner organisations that have chosen to send multiple staff members for training, specifically to build a critical mass within their organisations. Finally, we note the interest from (mostly) southern-based academic institutions in setting up similar programmes and postulate that south–south collaborations can contribute to building sustainable context specific and evidence-informed SBCC programmes in the global south.

Soul Buddyz: A Children's Rights Mass Media Campaign in South Africa

here are 12.5 million children between the ages of five and 18 in South Africa.l These children face enormous challenges, many of them inherited from the apartheid-era government. South Africa has an under-five mortality rate of 83 per 1000, much higher than would be expected from a lowerto middle-income country (GNP = US

Using popular culture for social change: Soul City videos and a mobile clip for adolescents in South Africa

3210). Costa Rica, for example, has a lower per capita GNP (

Children, Media and Health

2680), but its under-five mortality rate is 16 per 1000. Internationally, and within South Africa, the shift of health resources toward problems caused by chronic diseases among adults and the elderly is contributing to increasing inequities in the health of children. There is a strong commitment in South Africa to human rights and in particular to the rights of children.

Israel–Gaza conflict

The Soul City Institute for Health and Development Communication (SCI) is a South African NGO and the largest social and behaviour change communication project in Africa. Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC) is the systematic application of interactive theory-based and research-driven communication processes and strategies that go beyond individual behaviour change approaches to also address the social and structural drivers of unhealthy behaviours. Using a combination of mass media social mobilisation and advocacy the SCI aims to improve the quality of life and health of people in Southern Africa through strengthening individuals communities and society based on active citizenship and principles of health equity and social justice.

Achieving social change on gender-based violence : A report on the impact evaluation of Soul City's fourth series

This article looks at the way media is used by children and adolescents. It also examines how the use of modern technology and the media can be both harmful and promote the health of children. Harmful issues such as tobacco, alcohol, violence, bullying and obesity are discussed. Healthy ways the media is used are through providing marginalized people with important information and in some cases improving coordination and critical thinking. A case study of the Soul Buddyz intervention in South Africa is discussed.

The value of advocacy in promoting social change: Implementing the new domestic violence act in South Africa

892 www.thelancet.com Vol 373 March 14, 2009 has resulted in calls by the international community for boycotts of Palestinian academics and sanctions against the Palestinian people. The sad stories described of impediments to health care in Gaza and the West Bank are unfortunately in large part a result of use by Palestinians of medical facilities and ambulances to store and transport munitions and terrorists. This is an illegal activity occurring in the West Bank and Gaza and a clear breach of human rights that has resulted in the deaths of innocent Arabs and Jews. If Palestinian terrorists did not use women and children as suicide bombers there would be no need for the checkpoints and security barriers that result in delays for those in need of medical assistance. It is extremely concerning that Worth and colleagues do not recognise the root cause of the recent Israeli military action—ie, years of indiscriminate targeting of Jewish civilians arising from the currently unoccupied Gaza strip. We urge the editors of The Lancet to refuse to publish such biased letters in the future without adequate response in the same issue.