The Japan Media Communication Center (JAMCO) produces international editions of Japanese television programs (in English, Spanish and other languages) and provides them without cost to TV stations in developing countries. Since 2007, JAMCO is also supporting education in developing countries by taking steps such as providing programs free of charge to Hanoi National University of Education. In education support activities, unlike broadcasting, “recipients” are limited to a specific group of people. Therefore, we think that this symposium is an opportunity to conduct a sample survey on a group of “recipients” to learn about how audiences in developing countries perceive and understand international editions of Japanese television programs. Needless to say, “how programs are perceived” is an essential point to consider when sending Japanese television programs abroad. We expanded program genre to include documentaries as well as educational programs in order to widen the scope of the study of “how programs are perceived” and named the study “Audience Perception of Japanese TV Programs in Asia and the Middle East”.
JAMCO’s approach to overseas transmission is different from businesses in contents market and we believe this symposium will be a good opportunity to learn about “how programs are perceived” by “recipients” in developing countries.

In this symposium, we will ask participants to give reports on surveys conducted for each genre, educational program genre and documentary genre.
With regard to educational programs, the research group consisting of Assistant Professor Takayuki Konno of Meisei University, Specially Appointed Lecturer Makiko Kishi of Meiji University and Professor Kenichi Kubota of Kansai University, which has conducted education support activities using JAMCO’s educational programs in classrooms in developing countries is scheduled to give a report on “How Japanese educational programs and television programs related to daily life are being perceived and understood by local children and teachers” based on field surveys in Jordan, Uzbekistan and the Philippines.
Moreover, Hanoi National University of Education in Vietnam which uses continuously educational programs from JAMCO in classroom, will examine the educational effect of Japanese educational programs.
With regard to documentaries, Takanobu Tanaka, Senior Researcher at NHK Broadcasting Culture Research Institute is scheduled to present result of study conducted in cooperation with a university in Bangkok, Thailand, in which television programs about earthquakes in Japan were shown at the university.
In addition, the relation between earthquakes, disaster prevention and television will be discussed by specialists who have detailed knowledge about the subject, such as Regional Director for Southeast Asia at the Japan Foundation, former member of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO and the Earthquake and Tsunami Observations Division of the Japan Meteorological Agency, and representative from the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU).

The significance of this symposium from viewpoint of sending information through television programs from Japan is it will provide basic data for studying effectiveness of broadcasting mainly the international language version of television programs which are originally created for Japanese audiences. It will also help us to examine difference of results per country and per program genre, effectiveness of producing programs for specific countries, etc.
If we take another point of view, this symposium focuses : “How ‘recipients’ who have different historical, cultural and educational backgrounds perceive and understand television programs that Japanese producers created for Japanese audiences.” We hope that when thinking about providing Japanese broadcast programs to other countries, looking at Japanese broadcast programs from the point of view of “recipients”, and moreover, recognizing and understanding the image of Japan in eyes of people in Asia and the Middle East permit us to see “self portraits” of Japanese society in a new light and contribute to deeper international exchange.

We hope that this symposium will contribute as much as possible to promote mutual understanding between audiences of different cultures through television programs and consequently heighten potential for cultural advancement in each country.