About 10% of Pakistanis are fluent in English, to the level where they can read and fully understand the English language broadsheets in that country-I refer to Dawn and The News International (Jang English edition).
That 10% correlates almost exactly with the top 10% of Pakistan in terms of wealth and education, the well to do people. As a result news items in those papers, opinion pages and so on, and geared towards that target demographic-with the associated slant and spin.
I ask given that they represent such a small proportion of the populace, how reliable a source of information are they? 90% of the people cannot relate. I guess really ask if those of us who read those and only those papers get a rosy view of Pakistan, from a top down perspective.
Re: How reliable is the English language press ?
Not at all..in fact the English press in Pakistan is the fiercest critic of any govt.
I am not sure how u co-related the readership of english dailies with reliability. If anything they should and are more reliable because the educated lot reads them.
Re: How reliable is the English language press ?
i am not sure about reliabilty but their approach is certainly different from urdu papers
Re: How reliable is the English language press ?
it is based on how reliable the reader's analytical skills are.
each and every country or nation's news papers are an index of how they are informed.
some papers are reliable, others are not.
it does not have to be the complexity or collegiately expressed ideas of the language alone.
also, what is the meaning drawn or draw able from that what is communicated via print.
some colleges have started teaching student s how to read a news paper and be able to glean info and news as well as news analysis in a through manner to avoid receiving the unintended conclusions.
any news papers including, Pakistani news papers should be read keeping the criteria of truth telling and unbiased explanations in mind.
dushwari
Re: How reliable is the English language press ?
About 10% of Pakistanis are fluent in English, to the level where they can read and fully understand the English language broadsheets in that country-I refer to Dawn and The News International (Jang English edition).
That 10% correlates almost exactly with the top 10% of Pakistan in terms of wealth and education, the well to do people. As a result news items in those papers, opinion pages and so on, and geared towards that target demographic-with the associated slant and spin.
I ask given that they represent such a small proportion of the populace, how reliable a source of information are they? 90% of the people cannot relate. I guess really ask if those of us who read those and only those papers get a rosy view of Pakistan, from a top down perspective.
Just because they report in English does not make them any more reliable. They tell just as many lies as the Urdu press. It's the bias of the jouranlist you have to look at, rather than what language they report in.