We can’t help but notice that our academics have been winning a lot of presentation awards recently.
The latest addition to this awesome list? None other than Head of School of Communication, Assoc. Professor Dr Ng Miew Luan, who won a Best Presenter Award at the recent 12th International Malaysian Studies Conference (MSC12) on 17-18 August 2021.
Dr Ng was one of 27 award-winners among a stellar field of 81 papers presented. Participants came from a wide array of public and private universities from Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Japan and Germany.
Her winning presentation was in the Contestations, Youth, Media, and Popular Culture subtheme. Other presenters for MSC12 also included presenters from Universiti Malaya, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Universiti Kuala Lumpur, Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, Segi University, the University of Kyoto and many more.
Dr Ng presented a paper titled “Media and Election: A Discourse Analysis of Sin Chew Daily before the 13th General Election”. The paper examined the relations of the media and the state power during the election through the analysis of the contents of four (4) editorials published in the largest Chinese newspaper in Malaysia, Sin Chew Daily one year before the 13th General Election in 2012.
Dr Ng said the findings indicate that these editorials were carefully shaped with a neutral tone.
“The research finding show that there was a political struggle during the research period between the ruling and opposition coalitions. This was coupled with the pressure faced by the printed newspaper with the emergence of online media and changing consumption pattern of its audience,” she said.
“This meant that most mainstream newspapers sacrificed their watchdog role when dealing with the state power, especially during the elections.”
Dr Ng’s award continues our excellent track record of presentation awards. Two School of Biological Sciences academics won at the Global Biotechnology Conference two years in a row, while another won a Young Investigator Award at the recent Young Scientists Network—Akademi Sains Malaysia (YSN-ASM) International Scientific Virtual Conference 2021
Another paper co-authored by Dr Ng titled “COVID-19 Vaccination Rollout: A Study on Factors that Affect Vaccination Willingness Among Young Adults in Malaysia” was also presented in this year’s MSC12.
Six of our School of Communication students also got the chance to experience the buzz of the conference as conference assistants, with two of them helping to produce videos for the Day 2 Special session
The 12th International Malaysian Studies Conference was organized by the Malaysian Social Science Association (PSSM), Institute of Malaysian and International Studies (IKMAS) and the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). This is the first-ever fully online conference since the first MSC was introduced in August 1997.
This year, the conference theme was Malaysia’s Transformation and Sustainable Development. There were a total of six parallel sessions for the two-day conference and were chaired by social scientists from Malaysia, Brazil, South Africa, Japan, India, Indonesia and the United States.
Congratulations once again Dr Ng!
