MIL ETA

Media

All human-invented technology that extends the range, speed, or channels of communication

Medium

Specific type of media (i.e. books, radio, email)

Ecology

Environment where the medium is used, what they are, and how they affect society

Media Ecology

Study of different personal and social environments created by the use of different communication technologies. Also refers to the evolution of the medium

Herbert Marshall McLuhan

Proponent of the Evolution of Media, was a pioneering media theorist, studied the relationship between media and culture, predicted the world wide web almost 30 years before it was invented

Mcluhan’s Media Map of History

Evolution of Media

Tribal Age, Age of Literacy, Print Age, Electronic Age, Digital Age

Tribal Age

Before 1700. Primary medium was oral communication. Dominant sense receptor was hearing. Personal interaction and attention are evident. People led richer and complex lives compared to their descendants.

Age of Literacy

Dominant sense receptor was sight. Literacy triggers an ear-to-eye switch that isolates the reader. Words fixed on a page detach from the meaning of the immediacy of context. People became independent learners.

Print Age

Dominant sense receptor was sight. Dated to the invention of the movable type mechanical printing press (1930s-1970s). Visual dependence became widespread. Printing press was the extension of phonetic literacy.

Electronic Age

Dominant sense receptors are hearing and touch. With the telegraph, the power of the printed world started to decline. People became a global village/singe tribe. Constant contact became a reality. What we feel is more important than what we think. People are more informed about internation events.

Digital Age

Digital technology is altering the electronic environment. Electronic data is becoming more personalized. A lot of digital tribes are forming around ideas, beliefs, values, interests, and fetishes. Digital media is altering our present environment. Allows for father communication and creation of social networks.

Agenda

Underlying ideological plan

Setting

Manner or direction in which something is set

Theory

Scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena

Agenda Setting Theory

Ability of news media to influence the importance places on the topics in the public agenda

Media’s Main Goal in Agenda Setting Theory

Inform us on what they believe is important issues to our society. Push the public into a specific kind of thinking.

Media Agenda

Repetition and consistent prominence attached to an issue to elevate it higher. Media focus on topics that are deemed newsworthy.

Agenda Setting Proponents

Maxwell McCombs & Donald Shaw

Organization of Media

Truth > Media Gatekeepers > Media Agenda/Reality > Framing of Stories

Framing of Stories

This determines the salience of a story. Process involves selection, omission, emphasis, and/or elaboration

Framing Theory

How an issue is presented to the audience influences the choices people make about how they process information. Second step in agenda setting. Helps boost media attention.

Framing Theory Proponents

Gregory Bateson and Erving Goffman

Agenda vs Framing

Agenda = influences what we think about

Framing = influences the way we think about something

Types of Framing

Positive and Negative Framing

Semiotics

Study of signs, symbols, and meanings

Semiotics Proponents

Ferdinand De Saussure and Roland Barthes

Signifier

The image, object, or sound itself

Signified

The concept it represents

Referent

The which is outside the test is excluded in the semiotic process

Advertising

Impersonal communication of information about products, services, or ideas through media. Usually persuasive and paid by identified sponsors.

Famous Person Testimonial

Product endorsed by a well-known person

Plain-Folks Pitch

Associates a product with simplicity

Social Appeal

Gives the audience a sense of social acceptance. Focuses on finding joy in friend-making, feeling included, increasing in status, or being affiliated with a particular group.

Romance Appeal

Focuses on relationships. Product will enhance the romance and relationship like a portrayed couple. Effective when there is perceived weakness in a couple’s relationship.

Scarcity Appeal

Effective when things are time-sensitive and can sell out. Product/sale usually will only last a short time

Snob Appeal

Using the product will maintain or elevate their social status

Bandwagon Effect

Suggesting you should join the crowd by buying the product

Emotional Appeal

Uses emotions to encourage their audience to take action

Because of Advertising…

Products become “fetish objects'“. Individuals start to measure their self-worth and worth of others in terms of the value of the goods they possess. Capitalists have a means to control and manipulate our needs and desires.

Culture Industry

Popular culture in capitalist society functions like an industry, producing standardized products that lead to standardized people. It highlights the uniformity and false uniqueness of cultural items, which are carefully regulated.

Main Concerns about the Culture Industry

Dark side of modernity, commodity fetishism, false consciousness created by the dominant classes and the media

Culture Industry Proponents

Theodor Adorne and Max Horkheimer