Risk, Resilience, and Reception: Local Stakeholders’ Interpretation of Disaster Messages in a Coastal Philippine Municipality

Abstract

In the Philippines, where over 20 typhoons enter the country annually (Bankoff, 2004; Kapucu, 2008), disaster communication is a life-saving function. This study examines how Media and Information Literacy (MIL) shapes the reception and use of disaster messages in San Luis, Aurora—a coastal municipality frequently impacted by typhoons. Guided by Reception Theory (Hall, 1980), the Community-Based Communication Approach (Manyozo, 2012), and Crisis Communication Theory (Coombs, 2007), the research analyzes how residents, barangay officials, Indigenous Peoples, and disaster personnel interpret and act on official warnings. Findings from interviews and FGDs reveal that trust in local messengers (Houston et al., 2015), cultural and linguistic resonance (Cadag & Gaillard, 2012), and redundancy across multiple channels (Spence et al., 2007) enhance message uptake. Interpretation is often filtered through prior experience and indigenous knowledge (Gaillard et al., 2009), indicating that MIL in disaster contexts must extend beyond access and comprehension to include cultural calibration and experiential literacy. The study proposes the SALIGAN Framework, a scientized, community-rooted model integrating multimodal strategies, knowledge co-production, and feedback-driven adaptation, positioning MIL as a critical competency for disaster resilience.