The Second Edition of this book provides a comprehensive overview of the ways in which social theory has attempted to theorize the importance of the media in contemporary society. Understanding Media Cultures is now fully revised and takes account of the recent theoretical developments associated with New Media and Information Society, as well as the audience and the public sphere.

Understanding Media Cultures: Social Theory and Mass Communication

Politics & Social Sciences

Stevenson, Nicholas

Social Sciences

Sage Publications Ltd.

This fascinating and lucid book provides an overview of the ways in which social theories of contemporary society have tried to deal with the place of the media in the production and reproduction of culture. Nick Stevenson illuminates the relationship between general social theory and the range of communication theories of the medium and the message - concepts of media production, communication and reception.  Understanding Media Cultures highlights the work of individual theorists including Raymond Williams, Stuart Hall, J[um]urgen Habermas, Marshall McLuhan, Frederic Jameson and Jean Baudrillard. The author also covers important traditions of media analysis from feminism, cultural studies and audience research. Show

The Transformation of the Media

The changing pattern of contemporary media is one of the most striking and important transformations of our age. This major new work seeks to understand the implications of a series of mediated processes in relation to public cultures and modern identities. In The Transformation of the Media the author leads the reader through a number of complex theoretical issues, connecting the nature of modern communication to the affects this has on our common moral and ethical lives. Most significantly, he argues that a number of perspectives as diverse as Marxism, post-modernism, liberalism, communitarianism and technological determinism can all be found wanting in this regard. The Transformation of the Media attempts to situate the media, and more theoretical concerns, within a broad sociological framework. The volume adds to our shared understanding of the media's relation to contemporary cultural transformations including globalisation, the development of informational capitalism, the changing nature of the public sphere and the impact of new social movements. More specifically, through a discussion of the 'new media order' and the Rwandan genocide a critical prism is held up to existing debates concerning the globalisation of the media. Key features:    an extremely topical and accessible analysis of the media's implications for  contemporary cultural transformations combines a theoretical and empirical approach presents complex theoretical ideas in an accessible way  This book will be essential reading for students studying globalisation, the global media, new media technology, identity and cultural development in cultural studies, media studies, and sociology and politics courses.

The Transformation of the Media: Globalisation, Morality and Ethics

History

Historical Study & Educational Resources

Routledge

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