Popularization of Science in Local Context: Case Study of Newspapers Published from Uttarakhand

Abstract

Science is Universal by nature, but it needs to be defined in local context because common man can better understand the logics of science in their own environments. Original science is understood by the scientific community only while general public is required to be communicated it in simple as well as in their native language. As per the definition of popularization of science, "it is nothing else than an endeavor to image scientific ideas in such a way that everyone (non- scientist) can grasp the fundamental concepts and have an idea of what science in essence is.¹”

General concepts and principles of science are universals in nature. It means each and every scientific happening has same traits and impact everywhere. Logics of science are equally applicable too. That's why it becomes easy to spread scientific awareness in the local context as a medium of communication. Just publishing scientific research and information in newspapers is nothing but a mere formality of bringing the science in the public domain. Instead of this if the same science is written in local context, the more people will definitely take it interestingly and seriously. Keeping these objectives in mind a study was conducted on how to visualize scientific happenings through local context? It means is it possible to spread scientific awareness in view of local context? And if yes, then how these newspapers cover science issues in this regard? For this purpose six most circulated newspapers published from Uttarakhand were selected for the study. Amar Ujala, Dainik Jagran, Hindustan and Rashtriya Sahara were selected in Hindi newspapers category, while The Pioneer and Garhwal Post were selected in English newspaper's category.

When any local issue, related to scientific work, is covered by the newspaper it automatically gets appreciation and value for the work. As science is the part of our daily life so every news item has some elements of science in it too. Sometime newspapers adopt this approach to give a scientific treatment to the general news, but this trend is not common in practice. The similar case was found during the study while analyzing the different newspapers for the research work. On 5^th December 2010 when the former chief minister of Uttarakhand, N.D. Tiwari was admitted to hospital due to some illness, each newspaper covered this news due to his news value as former Chief Minister. As most of the newspapers presented it as an informative way like ‘Tiwari falls sick admitted to hospital', Rashtriya Sahara on the other hand gave it an excellent scientific touch. Instead of giving simple information about the health of former CM of the state, Rashtriya Sahara took it with basic cause of illness and warned its readers also about the use of Anti Termite Treatment in its headline. In a similar case happened when the students of Doon school developed a robot named ‘iTalk' capable of conversation on any given topic. The Pioneer gave it good space with color photographs. This is the way when science can also be defined in local context, making its greater impact on local people.