The Department of Broadcast Communication (DBC) of the College of Mass Communication (CMC), University of the Philippines, Diliman (UPD), will host a virtual conference marking the 100 Years of Broadcasting in the Philippines (100 YBP) from October 18 to 21, 2022.
The conference highlights the Department’s year-long campaign of evaluating Philippine broadcast media as an industry and institution, first introduced in the country by the Americans in 1922, but eventually appropriated for our purposes across time.
The conference is keynote lectures by broadcast network executive and TV writer Jose Maria Bartolome (October 18, 10:30 am); journalist and news anchor Marga Ortigas (October 19, 10:30 am); and Waray radio stalwart Francisca “Babes” Custodio (October 20, 10 am). The keynotes will tackle Filipino audience cultures, the future of transnational news and journalism, and Eastern Visayas radio, respectively.
The conference also features parallel lectures on various aspects of broadcasting by academics, students, and practitioners from all around the country.
The keynote lectures will be live-streamed via UPD’s official radio arm DZUP 1602 kHz Facebook Page. Meanwhile, the parallel lectures are exclusively for conference participants only.
Last March 2022, 100 YBP kicked off with the pilot episode at DZUP of “Pag-uugat, Pagpapatuloy: Ang Epikong Dumaracol ng mga Tagbanua Kalamianen ng Hilagang Palawan,” a set of never-before-heard recordings of the epic, foregrounding the importance of human memory and the voice in the evolution of broadcasting.
On June 22, it was formally launched in a virtual ceremony, also aired at DZUP. A documentary titled “Wika, Awit, Radyo, at Pananakop,” which underlined the role of the national language in the acculturation of the medium was screened for free. The event was attended by UP President Danilo Concepcion, UPD Chancellor Fidel Nemenzo, UP Visayas Chancellor Clement Camposano, and UPD CMC Dean Fernando Paragas.
DZUP ran four other 100 YBP-related programs—”Ikaw ang Saysay ng Kasaysayan” by historian and DBC faculty Michael Charleston “Xiao” Chua; “Mga Panayam ni Betsy Enriquez,” a series of conversations with industry figures by the broadcaster, DBC professor, and foremost media historian; “Gawad Plaridel (2004-2019),” a documentary on the UPD CMC Gawad Plaridel winners hosted by literary critic and former CMC Dean Nicanor Tiongson; and “BCQ: Broadcast in Quarantine,” a talk show series on pandemic media practices.
Forthcoming productions include retrospectives of the Cultural Center of the Philippines radio program “Diskarte”; and Probe Production’s 1990s youth program “5 and Up”; “Musika, Boses, at Naratibo ng Pilipino,” a set of three documentaries on Filipino rap music, session musicians, and music on the radio during the American colonial period and World War II, respectively; “Siday on DYVL,” a documentary on the flourishing of the Waray literary form on a radio station in Leyte; and “Ang Drama ng Ating Buhay,” an interview documentary on the history of the soap opera in the Philippines.
For more information on the 100 YBP, contact the Secretariat at [email protected].
