New Media Environment

Andrea L. Press is Chair of Media Studies and Professor of Sociology at the University of Virginia. She is the author of Women Watching Television and the co-author (with Elizabeth Cole) of Speaking of Abortion, and has published widely in the area of media reception and feminist theory. Bruce A. Williams is a Professor in the Department of Media Studies at the University of Virginia, and the author of After the News: Media Regimes and the New Information Environment (with Michael X. Delli Carpini) and Democracy, Dialogue, and Environmental Disputes: The Contested Languages of Social Regulation (with Albert Matheny). His current research interests focus on the role of a changing media environment in shaping citizenship in the United States.

"The book contains both extensive footnotes and a complete bibliography and index." (Communication Research Trends, 2011) "If your students read just one book on the contemporary media environment, this should be it. Press and Williams deliver a masterful overview of the changing media landscape – addressing issues of ownership, politics, democracy, and identity – written in lively, lucid prose." (Laura Grindstaff, University of California at Davis)"This accessible text draws readers into the complex new dynamics shaping our  media environment today. From film to news, economics to textual interpretation, Press and Williams provide an indispensable introduction to the debates that now drive media studies." (Nick Couldry, Goldsmiths, University of London)“Solidly founded on responsible media scholarship, this crisp analysis of the new media environment makes the novel seem familiar and the familiar seem novel. Press and Williams’ bright and timely text demonstrates once again that there’s nothing so practical as good theory.” (Menahem Blondheim, Hebrew University of Jerusalem)

• Acknowledgements viii1. Introduction: Modern Life Is a Media Experience 1A Tale of Two Hurricanes 2What Is a Media Environment? 8The Importance of Changing Media Environments 10The electronic media 12Media in the Twenty-First Century: What Has Changed? 16The age of the internet 19Conclusion 212. Ownership and Control in the New Media Environment 26Patterns of Media Ownership and Control 26Ownership and Control of the Media: Assumptions and Realities 32Alternative models of media ownership 35Who owns the media? 37Ownership and control in a global context 46Does It Matter? The Consequences of Concentration and Conglomeration 48The argument for market-driven media 48The argument against market-driven media 49What this means today 55Conclusion 563. Media and Democracy 63Introduction 63Changing Media Environments and Changing Democratic Politics 68Why nervous liberals are still with us: The enduring problem of propaganda 71John Dewey and the reconstruction of media and democratic politics 74Empirical research: How do media actually affect citizens? 75Television and the "Age of Broadcast News" 79Politics in the New Media Environment 84Conclusion 874. Studying Popular Culture: Texts, Reception, and Cultural Studies 91Introduction: Hollywood and Representations of Reality 91 Media Studies and the Study of Reception: A Brief History of Its Methods and Findings 101Conclusion 1075. Studying Inequalities: Class, Gender, Race, and Sexuality in Media Studies 112A Critical Perspective on Inequality in Media Studies 112The Frankfurt School 116Cultural studies 116Media studies research findings on class, gender, race, and sexuality 119Gender in Media Studies Research: Are Gender Roles Culturally Reproduced? 124Film and gender: Issues of reception and representation 128Television and gender: Issues of reception and representation 132Media and Race 136Sexuality 144Conclusion 1486. Studying Media Texts and Their Reception in the New Media Environment 156Transformative Images in the New Media Environment 160Globalization and the new shape of media identities 162Media Reception Research in the New Media Environment 163Global reception in the new media environment 167Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Class Inequality in New Media Reception: A New Study 169New Studies: Gender and Social Class Identities in the New Media Environment 173Politics, Media Impact and Use, and the New Media Environment 178Old and New Media in the Individualized Media Environment: The New Media Environment Is Never Just New Media 181Bias in old media and new 182Civic engagement in the new media environment 184Americans and Political Discussion: How the New Media Environment Is Changing the Civic Landscape 184Conclusion 1877. Conclusion 194We Are Living in a Mediated Age 194The Complexity of Our Relationship With the Media 196Human Agency in Media Decisions and Directions 198In Closing: The Case of the RFID 202Index 205