Analyzing one of the current issues in the media.docx
- 1. Analyzing one of the current issues in the media Analyzing one of the current issues in the media Academic Level : Bachelor Paper details You should write a 6-page long assignment analyzing one of the current issues in the media that the course has also dealt with. Choose an event or case that matters to you and possibly made headlines or led to a public debate. Examine every possible aspect that may have a bearing not only on the case in question, but especially the presumptive contradiction between media theories and media practice that the issue has raised and typifies. Beside a short introduction of the chosen case itself, elaborate and analyze both the supporting facts as well as the contrasting or contradictory claims by using at least ten reliable and independent sources.These should justify your final conclusion arrived at through the method of comparing different approaches and points of view; the approach will also allow you to present the full characteristics and idiosyncrasies of the chosen topic according to the media theories the course has dealt with. Put special emphasis on the possible dilemmas, which are likely to typify the media organization involved and the case itself. You should apply not a descriptive but an analytical focus. In the essay (Introduction, Main Body, Conclusion format), you are also required to examine the interplay of all variables regarding the chosen media outlet associated with the chosen topic and the applicable media theory in order to provide as complete an understanding of an event or situation and the corresponding media theory in the given media organization as possible. Feel free to use as much sources as you need.Topics I studied this semester:1) Introduction to Theories of the Media (historical overview of the media and its expansion; media influence and media effects) 2) Effect Theories (what the media does to audiences and what audiences do with the media, the theory of “the magic bullet” and the “two-step-flow”) 3) Reality and Media- Reality (the media as a consciousness industry, the theories of priming and framing) 4) Entertaining Media vs. News Media: (the interaction between social norms and their representation in the media; the watchdog function of the news media in informing the electorate, the gatekeeping theory) 5) Elitist and Deliberative Media Model (from gatekeepers to gate openers, agenda setting theory) 6) The Media as a Tool of Propaganda (political and propaganda devices in the everyday run of the media; the reception media theory) 7) From the “Global Village” to the Rise of the Network Society (Innis’, McLuhan’s and Castells’ Theory) 8) Media Systems and Characteristics (Polarized Pluralist, Democratic Corporatist and Liberal Model, Normative Media Theory and its Applications) 9) Affective Modulation Theory (the 9/11 trauma and its consequences in the media, the work of the consciousness and the “fear industry”) 10) New Media (the emergence of social media, their
- 2. influence on participatory democracy, and the blurred distinction between interpersonal and mass communication, and between public and private communication) 11) User- Generated Media Content Consumption (the media consumers’ capability of creating personalized, home-made, ”self-service” media making citizen and mainstream media products equal and mutually replaceable)