mass communication and media literacy 12
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Mass Communication & Media Literacy 12
The public sphere
What obligations do media companies have beyond delivering a return on their investment?
What is the role of the media as a public sphere?
The public sphere
http://bit.ly/gbNlX9
a virtual or imaginary community which does not necessarily exist in any identifiable space. In its ideal form, the public sphere is "made up of private people gathered together as a public and articulating the needs of society with the state" (176). Through acts of assembly and dialogue, the public sphere generates opinions and attitudes which serve to affirm or challenge--therefore, to guide--the affairs of state. In ideal terms, the public sphere is the source of public opinion needed to "legitimate authority in any functioning democracy" (Rutherford 18).
The public sphere
Does mass communication afforded by the mass media offer an option for the operation of a proxy public sphere?
But what about profits?Should they treat audiences as citizens?Citizenship can be identified with
The right to participate fully in existing patterns of social life and to help shape the forms that they may take in future (Murdoch – http://bit.ly/behindthescreens )
Civil, political, social and economic, and cultural rights
Cultural rights
Entail rights in four areas: Information Knowledge Representation Communication
These areas must be served by the media in order to ensure an active and participating citizenship
Can such a system exist (or thrive) when its in thrall to a free market?
Can it exist in a globally converged free market ? http://bit.ly/mediaownership
Cultural rights
US newsreader Mika Brzezinski has attempted to burn her script live on television in protest at being made to lead her bulletin on Paris Hilton.
The co-presenter of MSNBC's Morning Joe programme refused to read out the story about the celebrity socialite's release from jail ahead of items on Iraq.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VdNcCcweL0
Organisation studies of the media
Helps us to consider the practices and decisions that lie behind the origination, development and delivery of media products – as commodities and texts that have meaning for us.
Examines the way that staff roles and production processes are arranged within a single company
Starts by mapping the different divisions, staff groupings, production activities and functional roles in a specific business.
Allows us to focus on the concrete processes behind production that we fail to see as consumers
Broad categories
Primary creative personnelTechnical craft workers
Creative managersOwners and executives
Hesmondalgh (2002)
Gatekeeping
http://bit.ly/fRTJXh
Gatekeeping
http://bit.ly/fRTJXh
The culture of production
‘the distinctive practices used in the production of the [artefact] and the way that such widespread practices are represented in terms of specific values, beliefs and patterns of working’ (Du Gay 1997)
Data gathered through workplace ethnography
Geertz and Pacanowsky ‘critical theory of communication in organisations’ in Griffin
The culture of production
Explore the brand and identity of the product the media workers produce
Identify and analyse the routine tasks that media workers undertake to produce the product
Contextualise individual contributions in the hierarchy of the organisation
Identify and analyse the different ideas of audiences used by media workers and how they find out about them
Explore the ethos of craft, creativity, professionalism that informs a particular media job
What is it?
Why is it important?
What is it?
Media in the Digital Age
Rushkoff on the media
http://rushkoff.com/videoaudio/web-20-2/