Part 3: Prelims Review for Development Communication - Current Major Events

Dr Abe V Rotor

Guide topics for Development Communication

Choose one topic as a group (of three) work. Develop it like a thesis in form and presentation. (PowerPoint, print and group presentation in class.) Inclusive period, whole of February 2011

Population planning

Poverty

Juvenile delinquency

Global Warming

Maguindanao Massacre 2009

1. Death of Laguna Bay. The lake, which is more than 90,000 hectares, is in a state of irreversible decline which ultimately leads to ecological death.

2. School overload of school children. Childhood is no longer enjoyed because the school takes out its joy, adventure, and quaintness of growing up normally.

3. Genetically modified food. We are eating "Frankenfood" without our knowledge, more so our will and permission.

4. Gay and lesbian entertainment. There is a trend in not only in accepting, but promoting, third sex entertainment.

5. Talipapa. There is a talipapa somewhere in a corner - people's mall or grassroots informal market, reminiscent of village market in the past.

6. Tricycle and jeepney. People's engineering genius. What's next? These inventions have created sub-cultures of their own.

7. Life under the bridge. Poorest among the poor find home under the bridge, mostly in cities and big towns.

8. Bagsakan. They are found in Balintawak (Clover leaf market), Divisoria, Commonwealth are but few examples of people's wholesale markets.

9. Five-six. Underground lending. Illegal, exorbitant, yet it flourishes.

10. Jueteng. Truly it exists. Jueteng lords are are untouchable, they stand as padrino, they rise as political leaders.

11. Global Warming according to Aling Maria. How's the issue viewed and understood on the grassroots?

12. Three million Filipinos don't have enough food to eat. This is an underestimate.
But are there cases of death due to lack of food - like in Ethiopia and India?

13. Neurosis, psychosis on the rise. And suicide. Handling these cases by family and society needs research and redirection.

Depression

14. Exodus to cities. In spite of degradation of life in urban centers - or is this the effect?

15. Functional literacy. The 3Rs of literacy - wRiting, Reading aRithmetic - no longer the measure of literacy today in our computer age.

16. Agriculture versus Ecology. Strange bedfellows. Is there a unifying formula?

17. Darwinism doesn't apply anymore. Evolution is now in the hands of man playing God.

18. Ecumenism to the layman. Pledges, rituals, diplomacy, protocol at the top - but what does it really mean to the ordinary faithful, irrespective of creed?

19. Biotechnology. Cloning - what's cooking? Stem cells, in vitro, surrogate birth, post menopausal childbirth, and the like.

20. Cosmetics has gone a long way. We are changing the person.

21. Maguindanao Massacre. Justice delayed, justice denied. And the eyes of the world are focused on us. A case for the International Court of Justice?

22. Postmodernism. A misnomer? Are we simply drifting in the current of rapid change?

Reviving classical art with contemporary theme.
Paintings by the late Joey Velasco displayed during
the UST 400th anniversary retreat SMX, MOA

23. Child prodigies. Spurt or sprout? A certain "Alilea" was advertised to have a higher IQ than Galileo just by drinking a formulated milk product. Where is this child prodigy now?

24. Where is art heading for? What's beyond abstractionism? Is art history cyclical - we are going back to classicism. Or is it the opposite? Avant garde? Surrealism? Music to noise, ballet to break-and-split, poetry to simple makata.

25. Globalization is dissolving barriers - barriers of culture, genetics, politics, religion, economics, and the like. It is homogenization, it is loss of identity and diversity. Is it advantageous?

List is open ended. Suggestions are encouraged.