Intro To Media Studies Glossary

Model of Mediamaking 

An intentionally ambiguous term that implies that the media are themselves being made while they are simultaneously making something else. This means that the media cannot be studied apart from the active relationships in which they are always involved: We cannot study the media apart from the context of their economic, political, historical and cultural relationships.

Interpersonal Media

Primarily used for point-to-point, person-to-person communication; gives the communicator a good deal of control over the audience, enables the sending and receiving of messages from both ends. Ex: the telephone or the telegraph

Mass Media

Primarily used for communication from a single point to a large number of points, or from a single source to an audience that includes many people, allow the communicator select and little likelihood of knowing much about the audience, tend to separate the sender and the receiver. Ex: newspapers, magazines, books, radio, broadcast, film, etc.

Network Media

Can be used as either interpersonal or mass media; they can also be used to create a new geography of social relations, connecting many points to many points, all of which can be both senders and receivers. Examples include: teleconferencing, the postal service, fax, e-mail, the World Wide Web, and new hybrid cell phones connected to the internet.

Technology

The physical means of producing, reproducing, and distributing goods, services, materials, and cultural products. In the case of communication, technology includes the physical media and techniques, the technical practices and machinery, by which we communicate. Technologies are often created within, shaped by, and controlled by institutions involved in their production and use.

Institution

Any large-scale entity, embodying a range of social relationships and social functions, created by humans to perform an essential function for a society. This is a specific social organization where particular decisions are made and can be carried out.

Cultural Forms

Formats, structures, ways of telling stories; how the products of media technologies and organizations are structured; how their languages and meanings are structured into codes. These are an essential part of how the media make meaning. Ex: a typical product of television is the half-hour sitcom.

The 4 senses of Mediation

Modern communication embodies all 4 senses of mediation

1) Interceding or coming between

2) That which has been mediated has been biased by the mediator

• even if the mediator tries to be neutral, pure objectivity does not exist with humans

• mediators always bring biases/perspectives (intentional or not)

3) Space between the individual subject (person’s perception) and reality

• If you want to communicate reality, you have to make decisions on how to present that reality to others - mediated things exists between reality and how others interpret the media

4) How messages are transmitted from 1 person to another

• ex: Nixon and JFK debate captured on radio vs film —> people made different decisions on who “won” the debate based on how they consumed the debate

The Transmission Model Of Communication

Conceptualizes all communication as linear; communication is the process of moving messages from a sender through a media to the receiver. The model implies that the major challenge of the process of communication is to successfully transmit the content of a message as if from the mind of one person to that of another- the exact thought and meaning in the mind of the sender is what can, should, and will be placed in the mind of the receiver. This sharing of meaning is called understanding/intersubjectivity.

• Diagram: Source/Sender (has an idea) —> Message (how they communicate the idea) —> Receiver (engages with the message)

Cultural Model of Communication 

The cultural model of communication sees communication as the construction of a shared space or map of meaning within people coexist. Rather than a linear model, which first isolates the message and then sends it from one place or person to another, the cultural model emphasizes the fact that they take for granted.

• Ex: Different generations interpret a movie in different ways

Culture

The totality of things in our world that shape the way we make meaning, culture are wrapped in power

Visible vs Invisible Culture

Visible culture: aspects we see such as dress, tratirion, symbols, heroes, etc.

Invisible culture: shapes culture, not something we are always aware of, something implicit: assumptions, beliefs, values, etc.

Conflict model of society

emphasize the conflicts and inequalities within social life and the difficulties different groups have in living together; it is the power to define what others take as common sense.

Ex: racial inequality in the justice system,

Consensus model of society

emphasize the unity and harmony within society and the ability of different peoples to get along together.

Ex: Americans think of themselves as a “melting pot” in which different groups come together in a common identity: we are all americans.

Oral Culture

• communicating orally with our voice

• majority of humans on the planet just spoke using words/voice

• NO written or symbolic language

• messages had to be conveyed where the sender and receiver were in the same SPACE and TIME

• Viewed time as cyclical (ex- using seasons)

• There was a local, communal, tribe experience- you would have to physically travel to talk to others which led to communities being isolated from other communities

• Stories = performances, not necessarily “historical facts”, intertwined w/ myths and facts

• Elders in charge of knowledge did not “own” it but shared it with everybody —> communal nature of knowledge

Writing Culture

• When humans began to engage with agriculture and trading, symbols began to emerge

• you don’t have to see someone at the same place and time to share a message - this changed society’s worldview

• Memory was seen as thematic and writing was authoritative

• ONLY A SMALL PERCENTAGE of people knew how to read and writes

• laws and regulations were created (In the west Church had control over writing)

• Writing expanded empires; especially the Roman Empire

• Concepts of time became set in a concrete object and became seen as linear

• Introduced the idea that you could “own” knowledge

• Introduced the idea of an “inner psyche” or existance of the individual

Print Culture

• invention of the printing press- revolutionary —> made the written word more accessible

• literacy rates increased and became more important

• took power away from the church

• took ideas from the writing culture (linear time, inner psyche) and cemented them

• the introduction of capitalized letters and margins due to the printing press standardized how people think

• Rapid expansion and colonization

• loosened the power of monarchies

• rise of democracy + “freedom of the press” (for white men only so still had a system of oppression)

Electronic Culture

• used electronics to communicate such as the telegraph, radio, telephone, TV, computers, internet

• Information became more immediately accessible because the speed of communication is not dependent on human travel/transportation from 1 space to another —> this changed how we see time: time zones, the international date line, and uniform global time made our day more regimented

• power dynamics changed- everyone could hear the message and needed to only have mechanical literacy

• brought back some ideas of the oral culture, such as FDR’s fireside chats

• Introduced “Mass communication”, elements of togetherness because everyone could hear the same thing at the same time

• led to expectations of “immediacy”

• length of time a technology is in its prime is compressed

Technological determinism

The belief that technology is the principal (if not only) cause of historical change

• has some critiques that it does not allow for more nuanced aspects of human culture

Theory of Mass Society

Mass society theory held that as a result of various social changes, including industrialization, both the nature of social life and the form of social interaction were fundamentally altered for the worse.

High culture

People assume what we commonly call art, is both spiritually and formally (or aesthetically) more developed than other forms of culture, such as mass, popular, or folk culture; this is produced by specially trained professionals and/or uniquely inspired creative individuals.

Folk Culture

Refers to those cultural products and forms that can be traced to a particular community or socially identifiable group; this culture is assumed to be an expression of the experiences of this group. These artists are not professioinals.

Popular Culture

a culture which, regardless of where or by whom it is produced, speaks to a large public audience that cannot be simply described by a single social variable such as class, gender, or age.

Mass art

assumed to be purely and entirely commercially motivated; it is assumed to come from the top down, given to the people whether they like it or not.

Seven Factors of newsworthiness

1) The Bizarre

2) Conflict

3) Currency

4) Timeliness

5) Prominence

6) Impact

7) Proximity

The Bizarre

something so strange that it gets covered; ex: human interest story

Timeliness

something that needs to be covered right away; ex: severe weather alert

Currency

reporting on a set event that is happening within a longer context or story; ex: the 2016 clowns

Conflict

reports a conflict between side a and b; ex: BC vs BU

Proximity

reports on how close you are to something (geographically); ex: when white mtn closed, it was reported to local residents

Prominence

an event that occurs involving a prominent place, person, or company; ex: the Notre Dame fire in 2019 (fires happen A LOT)

Impact

how many people will be affected by the event?

Three origins for news stories

naturally occurring events, subsidized news, enterprise news

Naturally occurring events

one of three origins for news stories- unexpected tragic events such as a plane crash or flood

Subsidized News

one of three origins for news stories- news content that a journalist relies on resources provided to them by a 3rd party (information subsidies)

• ex: a press release, press conferences

• there has been a dramatic increase in subsidized news because of the rise in PR and demand for more news

Enterprise News

Type of news article or segment where a majority of the story comes from the work of a journalist (they investigate the source)

• Ex: “the crime beat” or “florida man”

Knowledge Gap Hypothesis

Suggests that in the development of any social or political issue, the more highly educated segments of the population know more about the issue early on and moreover acquire information at a faster rate than the less educated.

The two-step flow model

Term coined by Paul Lazarfeld- Mass media —>opinion leader: people who keep up with the news media and then share their opinions to the general public —> public

Early deciders in an election

make up their minds earlt, tend to be strong partisans, likely to identify with a major party, to be interested in politics, to pay close attention to political media, to be better informed about politics in general and about the campaign and candidates in particular, to be likely to discuss politics, and to eventually vote. Once they’ve made up their minds, they are UNLIKELY to change them so media messages have little impact on their decisions.

Campaign deciders in an election

less partisan, more likely to be political