Mass Communication Notes

Learning Outcomes

• Define the terms “massa”, “massakommunikasie” and “massamedia”.
• Mass media is further discussed in detail in KCOM111.

Importance of Mass Media

• Mass media is an important communication context.
• It affects the way we think and perceive the world.
• To some extent, we are even shaped by mass media.
• It is important to note the effects of this mass communication context on individuals and cultures.

Mass Communication

• Definition: The process of providing information, ideas, and attitudes to a large and diverse audience by means of a medium intended for it.
• Enables communication to send messages from a single source that are distributed to and received by a large, mixed audience.

Mass Media

• Enable communication to be sent from a single source and distributed and received by a large, mixed audience.
• Definition: ‘mass media are the cultural industries—the channels of communication—that produce and distribute songs, novels, TV shows, newspapers, movies, video games, Internet services, and other cultural products to large numbers of people.’
• Example:
  • Newspapers and news channels – managed in one location in Johannesburg but received by a larger audience across S.A

Mass Communication Considerations:

• Need to understand how people react to media
• Media influence social, political, economic, and cultural systems
• Impact can be:
  • Immediate / Long term
  • Useful / Harmful
  • Deliberate / Unintended consequences
• Influence on the audience

The Process of Mass Communication:

Interpersonal Communication

• Face to face
• Sender and receiver
• Transactional process with feedback
• React to verbal and nonverbal communication
• Meeting with person

Mass Communication

• Uses complex technology
• Organization/team and mass audience
• Sender does not know the audience and does not engage in interaction with them
• Messages are not personally aimed at individuals – the audience is too diverse
• Meeting with a medium and message