Communicating when environmental interest groups collide
A research team at the University of Queensland recently offered a “how-to” for addressing inter-group conflicts about climate change and the environment. They suggested a “social identity” approach. It focuses on our identities derived from the groups to which we belong. Citing case examples, they described four social identity strategies to communicate across groups that differ in their views of climate change and the environment:
- Use in-group messengers
- Forge an inclusive identity that encompasses conflicting subgroups
- Remind people of their past pro-environmental behaviors
- Promote in-group norms that support environmental norms
You can learn more about the strategies in this 2016 article published in the journal, Frontiers in Psychology.
A call for good communication between architects and agronomists
An article in the September/October issue of New Ag International magazine included this call. It came during Greensys2017 (International Symposium on New Technologies for Environmental Control, Energy-saving and Crop Production in Greenhouse and Plant Factory) in Beijing, China, during August. A keynote speaker emphasized that urban agriculture involves more than food production – also environmental and social services with direct interaction with local urban markets.
According to the summary, effective communication will be vital in the design and development of new urban solutions such as community gardens, green roofs, vertical farms, and indoor farms (plant factories).
You can read the article here.
Note: the article cited is on pages 73-75 of this online edition.
Do farmers differ in recognizing wild birds? And so what?
Some differences appeared from a recent study in northeastern Brazil. Compared with conventional farmers (using monocultures, mechanization, and external inputs), non-conventional/organic farmers (using diversification, ecological processes, and natural inputs) could identify more bird species. They held “more favorable attitudes toward birds, and engaged in practices more beneficial to the conservation of avifauna.”
Researchers concluded, “Conventional and non-conventional farmers have both similarities and differences in their perceptions and knowledge of birds. There are incentives to help farmers recognize and treat birds as beneficial to farming systems and vice versa. Birds are still not widely recognized as important elements that could serve fundamental ecological functions in agro-ecosystems and contribute to their efficiency and sustainability.”
You can read this journal article here.
Discovering new sources
You may be interested in some of the journals from which we have identified agricultural communications literature for the ACDC collection during recent months. The great scatter of literature about agricultural communications continues to impress and amaze us.
International Journal of Advertising
Rhetoric and Public Affairs
Pacific Journalism Review
Qualitative Research Reports in Communication
Language Teaching Research
New Genetics and Society
British Food Journal
International Journal of Web-Based Communities
Journal of Information Technology in Agriculture
Precision Agriculture
Communicator events approaching
April 8-10, 2018
Annual meeting of the North American Agricultural Journalists (NAAJ) in Washington, D.C.
Information: http://www.naaj.net/meetings
April 10-13, 2018
“Power Up” Agri-Marketing Conference of the National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA) in Kansas City, Missouri.
Information: http://nama.org/amc/home-2018
April 16-20, 2018
Conference of the Association for International Agricultural and Extension Education (AIAEE) in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico.
Information: http://www.aeaee.org/index.php/conference
Nothing new about fake news
We often find ourselves humbled by the historical information we find in searching for literature about agricultural journalism and communications. In that spirit, we close this issue of ACDC News with a 1665 gravestone message reported in W. H. Howe’s Everybody’s Book of Epitaphs:
“Here lies an editor –
Snooks, if you will.
In mercy, Kind Providence,
Let him lie still.
He lied for his living, so
He lived while he lied.
When he could not lie longer
He lied down and died.”
Best wishes and good searching
Please pass along your reactions, suggestions, and ideas. Feel free to invite our help as you search for information. Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter @ACDCUIUC. And please suggest (or send) agricultural communications documents we might add to this unique and valuable collection. We welcome them in hard copy (sent to Ag Comm Documentation Center, Room 510, 1101 S. Goodwin Avenue, Urbana, IL 61801) or in electronic format sent to docctr@library.illinois.edu