Module overview
This module provides a theoretical and empirical overview of the role played by information, communication, and media within the politics of the modern state. Students are introduced to canonical as well as marginal and emerging perspectives on media politics and asked to weigh them against the empirical record established by extant qualitative and quantitative scholarship. The overarching question that will guide this course is the most important question in media politics today: under what conditions do the media increase the power of the masses and under what conditions do the media merely strengthen states and elites?
Students will gain an independent and critical command of the essential questions in media politics.
They will learn to engage with historical texts, theoretical texts, contemporary academic research, as well as cutting-edge contemporary discussions of media politics on the internet. In other words, students will acquire the theoretical tools required of any global citizen who would seek to produce new knowledge in the state-of-the-art of media politics.
- Students will be able to apply their knowledge to diverse real-world issues, questions, and historical trends.
- Students will improve their ability to develop original research questions and write formal academic research papers.
- Students will develop the oral and verbal skills necessary to communicate their ideas effectively to a wide range of audiences. In particular, through their engagement with contemporary theorists and practitioners of media politics online, students will learn the skills and norms required to become active and networked participants in both theoretical discussions and on-the-ground developments in media politics.