Media Studies Final

Who is Edward Bernays?

The nephew of Sigmund Freud and former reporter who inherited the public relations mantle from Ivy Lee. Bernays was the first person to apply the findings of psychology and sociology to public relations, referring to himself as a “public relations counselor” rather than a publicity agent

Modern Godfather of Public Relations

What is PR?

defined by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) as “a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.”

What are the origins of PR?

• First PR practitioners were press agents sought to advance a client’s image through media exposure in the early 19th century

• Primarily via stunts staged for newspapers

• Often to repair and reshape their reputations as cherished frontier legends or respectable candidates for public office

• P. T. Barnum used gross exaggeration, fraudulent stories, and staged events to secure newspaper coverage for clients

• William F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) hired press agents who used a wide variety of media channels

• Shaped lasting myths about rugged American individualism first to use publicity —type of PR communication that uses 

various media messages to spread information about a person, a corporation, an issue, or a policy—to elevate entertainment culture to an international level

What is the largest PR agency today?

Edelman

The relationship between PR and propaganda

Public relations, like advertising, pays careful attention to the needs of its clients—politicians, small businesses, industries, and nonprofit organizations—and to the perspectives of its targeted audiences: consumers and the general public, company employees, shareholders, media organizations, government agencies, and community and industry leaders. The PR can use propaganda for this.

Chomsky & Herman’s Manufacturing Consent and its five filters

1. Ownership

2. Advertising

3. Access

4. Flak

5. Creation of a Common Enemy

What is ghost work?

The invisible human labor that powers automated systems and digital platforms, such as tagging content, correcting AI errors, or proofreading.

It is problematic because it relies on a poorly paid, insecure workforce that is hidden from consumers

work done by a human being, usually online and for low pay, to do a task that most people believe is done automatically by a computer.

EX: Facebook content monitors

Marxist critique of capitalism & class relations (conflict theory)

Societies develop through class struggle:

conflict between ruling classes (bourgeoisie)

that control the means of production and

working classes (the proletariat) that work on

these means by selling their labor for wages

Base vs Superstructure

Base:

• Natural resources, tools, technology, workers and their skills, etc.

• Class relations of those involved in production: master/slave; lord/ peasant;bourgeoisie/proletariat; 1%/99%

Superstructure

• political, legal, educational, and cultural institutions (party systems, schools, military, art, etc.)

Tough Guise Documentary

• The tough guise is a front that men put up to protect themselves from scrutiny/shame caused by other male figures in their life

• Most violent crimes are committed by boys, but the media refers to “kids” in generalwhen speaking about it, and phrases it as kids being a problem

• “Violence against women” is spoken about something bad that just happens to women, and never talking about who is committing the violence. (men are responsible for 98% of this violence).

• Violent Masculinity is a culture that teaches young boys about what it means to be a man

• Violence is taught, not learned

Media Effects guiding questions

• How does media affect us behaviorally, cognitively, & emotionally?

• How can media effects be measured?

• How enduring are media effects?

• Under what conditions do media produce pro-social effects? Anti-social effects?

Hypodermic Needle theory

• Media shoot effects directly into unsuspecting victims.

• Ex: Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds broadcast in 1938

Cultivation effect

• in media research, the idea that heavy television viewing leads individuals to perceive the world in ways that are consistent with television portrayals.

Agenda setting

• “The media don’t tell us what to think, but they do tell us what to think about.”

• Media set agenda for public conversation/debate about world and national events

Uses and Gratification

We use media to satisfy various emotional or intellectual needs; instead of asking “what effects do the media have on us?” researchers ask “why do we use the media”?

Spiral of Silence

• Fear of social isolation when voicing minority views leads those holding such views to silence themselves; minority views aren’t voiced, thus leading louder, more aggressively advocated views to dominate.

Monopoly vs Oligopoly

Monopoly: One firm dominates production and distribution in a particular industry.

Oligopoly: A few firms dominate an industry.

1996 Telecommunication Act

• First major reform of telecommunications policy since 1934 under the Clinton administration

• Reduced important Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations on cross-ownership:

• Single company can now own TV and Radio Stations

• Telephone companies can now own TV and radio stations

• Cable companies can now compete in local telephone business and freely raise rates 

• allowed giant corporations to buy up thousands of media outlets across the country:

• Previously, cap on owning no more than 40 radio stations: Clear Channel [iHeartMedia] has grown from 40 stations to 1,240 stations.

Synergy

Opportunities to generate profits that come from interaction and cooperation among conglomerate’s cross-media subsidiaries

Pros and cons of net neutrality

Pros:

• Internet seen as basic necessity/public utility with equal access for everyone

• Can harm small start-ups that do not have the big money of Amazon and the likes

• Allows ISPs to abuse their position as gate keepers to generate larger profits

• May further concentration processes with bundling, mergers etc.

Cons:

• Loosening regulation, provides money for much needed network upgrades and increase broadband speeds

• Creates “fast” versus “slow” lanes

• AT&T and Verizon may start prioritizing to their own movies and TV shows

• Illustrates tensions between media economics, regulation versus deregulation, commercial marketing and production techniques that combine personalization with the cost benefits of efficient mass production

Mass customization

marketing and production techniques that combine personalization with the cost benefits of efficient mass production

Hegemony

• Acceptance of the dominant values in a culture by those who are subordinate to those who hold economic and political power

• Must convince consumers and citizens that the interests of the powerful are common sense and thus normal or natural.

• Examples?

• Media are crucial tools to both (re)produce dominant ideologies and reinforce existing power structures; but also sometimes to challenge them

Cultural Imperialism

• Dominance of U.S. pop culture/media products across the globe

• Although many indigenous forms of media culture are popular, U.S. dominance in producing and distributing mass media puts a severe burden on countries attempting to produce their own cultural products.

• What do those in favor of and those opposed to cultural imperialism argue?

Difference in paradigms

• Critical Theory  

• Media Effects   

• Cultural Studies

Birmingham School and it’s beliefs

• key scholars: Raymond Williams, Stuart Hall, Angela McRobbie

• do not believe in high vs. low culture divide more optimistic about pop culture; culture as map

• subversive capabilities of mass culture – how texts produce meanings, and how audiences negotiate those meanings

• interplay of representations and ideologies of class, gender, race, ethnicity, and nationality etc. in media multicultural approach

Ideology

• the study of signs and symbols (e.g., language, gestures, clothing) and how verbal and non-verbal cultural “signs” create systems of meanings circulate in media culture

Semiotics

• the study of signs and symbols (e.g., language, gestures, clothing) and how verbal and non-verbal cultural “signs” create systems of meanings circulate in media culture

Negotiated Readings (hegemonic, negotiated, oppositional)

Hegemonic: Audience fully shares and reproduces the dominant, preferred reading

Negotiated: audience partly shares the hegemonic reading, but sometimes resists and modifies it in a way that reflects their own position, experiences and interests

Oppositional: audience, understands the preferred reading but does not share the text’s code and instead, rejects it, forming an oppositional perspective

Society as a social construct

• human inventions or creations with real tangible impacts

• ideas, objects, institutions, classification systems that humans have produced

• Examples: money, democracy, gender, race

• specific historical and cultural contexts play a central role in how a social construct is formed, understood, and experienced

• social constructs change over time

Impact of “whiteness”

• Part of the power of whiteness is that it seemingly exists outside of categories of ‘race’ and ethnicity:

• Whiteness as the “norm,” “universal,” and “natural” from which all other races and ethnicities are a deviation: “the invisibility of whiteness positions it as the normative human” (Storey, 2012, 184)

• Precisely through its unmarkedness whiteness maintains its power and privilege

Impact of “heteronormativity”

• belief that people fall into only two opposite, yet corresponding genders (man and woman) with natural roles in life.

• upholds the binary two-sex/gender system (male/female; man/woman) as a universal fact.

• it presumes that sex (body), gender (presentation), and sexuality (desire) are naturally aligned – that men and women desire each other

Historical and cultural implications for social constructs

• Race

• Gender

• Sexuality

Intersectionality

“the interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.” Oxford Language Dictionary

Origins of #BLM

The unfair death of Trayvon Martin led to an increase in activism and a disagreement between civilians and police officers.

Origins of #MeToo

• Founder and Purpose: Burke, a survivor of sexual assault herself, coined the phrase "Me Too" to promote "empowerment through empathy" among young survivors of sexual violence, particularly Black women and girls from low-wealth communities.

• Context: Burke began using "Me Too" as a grassroots campaign on MySpace and as part of her non-profit work to create a community of advocates. Her intent was to show young survivors that they were not alone, providing a path to healing and support rather than public shaming or retribution.

• Inspiration: The phrase was inspired by a moment in 1997 when a 13-year-old girl confided in Burke about being sexually abused, and Burke felt unable to provide the simple but powerful acknowledgement the girl needed: "Me too."

How media connects to today’s activism landscape

• Rapid Dissemination and Mobilization: Information, images, and videos can be shared instantly across vast geographical boundaries. This allows for near-real-time coordination of physical protests and rapid awareness-raising during a crisis.

• Example: Movements like #BlackLivesMatter and the Arab Spring used social media to organize mass demonstrations and share real-time updates, often circumventing traditional media gatekeepers.

• Amplification of Marginalized Voices: Individuals and groups historically ignored or misrepresented by mainstream media can now share their stories directly with a global audience. This decentralizes power and allows for grassroots narratives to gain visibility.

• Example: The #MeToo movement gained global traction when women across industries used the hashtag to share personal testimonies, illustrating the magnitude of the problem and shifting the public discourse on sexual harassment and assault.

• Creation of Digital Solidarity (Hashtag Activism): Hashtags serve as organizing principles, aggregating voices, categorizing content, and fostering a sense of community among like-minded individuals globally.

• Citizen Journalism: Activists become their own reporters, recording events (like police actions or protests) as they happen and broadcasting them live, often providing raw, unfiltered perspectives that traditional news outlets later cover.