Communication and Human Values - Böcker

The growing connections between media, culture, and religion are increasingly evident in our society today but have rarely been linked theoretically until now. Beginning with the decline of religious institutions during the latter part of this century, Rethinking Media, Religion, and Culture focuses on issues such as the increasing autonomy and individualized practice of religion, the surge of media and media-based icons that are often imbued with religious qualities, and the ensuing effect on cultural practices. Editors Stewart M. Hoover and Knut Lundby examine each of these issues and the implications of major recent findings of religious, media, and cultural studies as they pertain to one another. In a primary effort, the leading class of contributors to this work effectively triangulate these three separate areas into a coherent whole. The book explores phenomena like rallies, rituals, and resistance as they are distinct expressions of religion often transmogrified into different mediated or cultural expressions. This collection should benefit the work of scholars and researchers in communication, media, cultural, and religious studies who seek a broader understanding of the two-sided relationships between religion and media, media and culture, and culture and religion.

The growing connections between media, culture, and religion are increasingly evident in our society today but have rarely been linked theoretically until now. Beginning with the decline of religious institutions during the latter part of this century, Rethinking Media, Religion, and Culture focuses on issues such as the increasing autonomy and individualized practice of religion, the surge of media and media-based icons that are often imbued with religious qualities, and the ensuing effect on cultural practices. Editors Stewart M. Hoover and Knut Lundby examine each of these issues and the implications of major recent findings of religious, media, and cultural studies as they pertain to one another. In a primary effort, the leading class of contributors to this work effectively triangulate these three separate areas into a coherent whole. The book explores phenomena like rallies, rituals, and resistance as they are distinct expressions of religion often transmogrified into different mediated or cultural expressions. This collection should benefit the work of scholars and researchers in communication, media, cultural, and religious studies who seek a broader understanding of the two-sided relationships between religion and media, media and culture, and culture and religion.

This new volume brings together articles that apply critical discourse analysis to texts and speech that contributes to the marginalization of minority groups. Studying both the fine details of language use and the political values implicated by word choice, the contributors examine how an "us versus them" division is played out in a wide array of cultural settings. Among the groups considered are immigrants in Western Europe, African Americans, African Canadians, Mexican Natives, Jews in Austria, and Muslims in Europe and North America. Examples of everyday speech through which prejudice is conveyed include advertising, parliamentary debate, travel literature, newspaper articles, the law, autobiography, and even classroom discourse. Collectively, the chapters make a strong and original case for the values of linguistic perspective in the study of prejudice and social inequity. The Language and Politics of Exclusion demonstrates, especially to such disciplines as sociology, journalism, and communication the ways in which discourses can marginalize others. Students and professionals will gain insight into this problem and ideally, learn the self-monitoring skills necessary to prevent this from happening. This book's in-depth look into the issue helps to lead the way.

This new volume brings together articles that apply critical discourse analysis to texts and speech that contributes to the marginalization of minority groups. Studying both the fine details of language use and the political values implicated by word choice, the contributors examine how an "us versus them" division is played out in a wide array of cultural settings. Among the groups considered are immigrants in Western Europe, African Americans, African Canadians, Mexican Natives, Jews in Austria, and Muslims in Europe and North America. Examples of everyday speech through which prejudice is conveyed include advertising, parliamentary debate, travel literature, newspaper articles, the law, autobiography, and even classroom discourse. Collectively, the chapters make a strong and original case for the values of linguistic perspective in the study of prejudice and social inequity. The Language and Politics of Exclusion demonstrates, especially to such disciplines as sociology, journalism, and communication the ways in which discourses can marginalize others. Students and professionals will gain insight into this problem and ideally, learn the self-monitoring skills necessary to prevent this from happening. This book's in-depth look into the issue helps to lead the way.

This is a welcome addition to recently published work on the popular musics which have emerged in many countries as a response to and as a result of the encounter of local musical traditions with Anglo-American pop/rock. . . . The empirical components make this an impressive book. . . . It is also quite unique. . . . The data collected is presented in a successful combination of quantitative information and 'windows' of text telling the story of different individual musicians, and tracing the influence on them of economics and politics, of local and foreign musicians. --Cambridge Journals "The book is a magnificent achievement and stands on par with the work by Wallis & Malm with which it inevitably must be compared. One looks forward to the companion volumes of the project. Of particular note is the research style that drew on 40 indigenous researchers from over 20 countries. This is a highly ambitious project in intercultural studies and stands as a landmark in intercultural cooperation." --Canadian Journal of Communication "Music at the Margins is the utopian experiment par excellence. . . . We are treated to an intriguing print montage of the current 'world music' landscape; this book's multicultural scholarship is a tour de force in cross-cultural dialogics. . . . The results of the studies help to set the agenda for further research in the field. . . . The book is an extremely ambitious project. . . . Music at the Margins . . . is a groundbreaking study of popular music in its international contexts. The book is a must for anyone interested in the subject." --Journal of Communication "Music at the Margins: Popular Music and Global Cultural Diversity fills an important scholarly gap by investigating the nature of the international recording industry and production of music by local performers working at the margins of that industry in a variety of national contexts. The authors report on cross-cultural research done by a large international team that "tests the cultural imperialism hypothesis" that a largely one-way flow of cultural texts is leading to worldwide cultural homogenization." --International Journal of Intercultural Relations "A very interesting, highly readable book about the global pop-music world, reflecting its complexity and its artistic, economic, cultural-social, and political involvement and influence. . . .Music at the Margins is a special book and will be relished by music fans, general readers, and students in music, sociology, economics and other courses." --Academic Library Book Review "One of the better books in the trend toward establishing legitimacy of popular culture studies through pseudoacademic trappings, this is a responsible attempt to collate and make sense of information and perceptions gleaned by researchers in more than 15 First-, Second-, and Third-World countries." --Choice "It inspires great respect for its authors. For someone who writes about popular music for a daily newspaper and magazines as well as academic settings, it has a lot of value and interest. The broad conceptual framework alone helps me think about what's happening with all aspects of pop culture, not just music. . . . Most important for me is the evidence the book provides of how the process of cultural production actually works at both individual and national levels." --Lynn Darroch, Mt. Hood Community College "An exhaustive academic account of the forces governing the international music industry. . . . Music at the Margins is an ambitious project encompassing many complex issues. . . . For anyone interested in the past, present and future of international popular music, it is an impressive and rewarding volume." --Tracking "An amazingly rich tour-de-force of contested territory: how meanings are negotiated between domination and diversity, cultural erosion and enrichment. Indispensable for students of mass media and popular culture, as well as of music." --George Gerbner, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania Popular music is a form of communication easily recognized and understood around the world. But as it spreads from culture to culture, is it becoming more homogenized? Or, conversely, is there a continuing and perhaps ever-increasing diversity of song styles and forms? Music at the Margins explores the debate surrounding popular music's spread, testing the more conventional "cultural imperialism" hypothesis as based on empirical findings from a study by the International Communication and Youth Culture Consortium. The primary focus is on how the process of popular music production is perceived by local musicians--people who are immersed in overlapping international, national, and local contexts of production. Discussions on theory, local case studies, and interview data are provided and integrated to show how societal influences are tempered by and interpreted through cultural and semiotic codes--as well as individual musicians' experiences and creative talents. Specific topics addressed include the rise of the international recording industry, music production in socialist or formerly socialist countries, censorship, and sociopolitical influences, to name but a few. Music at the Margins will appeal to a wide range of scholars and students in the fields of communication, popular culture, and sociology.

This is a welcome addition to recently published work on the popular musics which have emerged in many countries as a response to and as a result of the encounter of local musical traditions with Anglo-American pop/rock. . . . The empirical components make this an impressive book. . . . It is also quite unique. . . . The data collected is presented in a successful combination of quantitative information and 'windows' of text telling the story of different individual musicians, and tracing the influence on them of economics and politics, of local and foreign musicians. --Cambridge Journals "The book is a magnificent achievement and stands on par with the work by Wallis & Malm with which it inevitably must be compared. One looks forward to the companion volumes of the project. Of particular note is the research style that drew on 40 indigenous researchers from over 20 countries. This is a highly ambitious project in intercultural studies and stands as a landmark in intercultural cooperation." --Canadian Journal of Communication "Music at the Margins is the utopian experiment par excellence. . . . We are treated to an intriguing print montage of the current 'world music' landscape; this book's multicultural scholarship is a tour de force in cross-cultural dialogics. . . . The results of the studies help to set the agenda for further research in the field. . . . The book is an extremely ambitious project. . . . Music at the Margins . . . is a groundbreaking study of popular music in its international contexts. The book is a must for anyone interested in the subject." --Journal of Communication "Music at the Margins: Popular Music and Global Cultural Diversity fills an important scholarly gap by investigating the nature of the international recording industry and production of music by local performers working at the margins of that industry in a variety of national contexts. The authors report on cross-cultural research done by a large international team that "tests the cultural imperialism hypothesis" that a largely one-way flow of cultural texts is leading to worldwide cultural homogenization." --International Journal of Intercultural Relations "A very interesting, highly readable book about the global pop-music world, reflecting its complexity and its artistic, economic, cultural-social, and political involvement and influence. . . .Music at the Margins is a special book and will be relished by music fans, general readers, and students in music, sociology, economics and other courses." --Academic Library Book Review "One of the better books in the trend toward establishing legitimacy of popular culture studies through pseudoacademic trappings, this is a responsible attempt to collate and make sense of information and perceptions gleaned by researchers in more than 15 First-, Second-, and Third-World countries." --Choice "It inspires great respect for its authors. For someone who writes about popular music for a daily newspaper and magazines as well as academic settings, it has a lot of value and interest. The broad conceptual framework alone helps me think about what's happening with all aspects of pop culture, not just music. . . . Most important for me is the evidence the book provides of how the process of cultural production actually works at both individual and national levels." --Lynn Darroch, Mt. Hood Community College "An exhaustive academic account of the forces governing the international music industry. . . . Music at the Margins is an ambitious project encompassing many complex issues. . . . For anyone interested in the past, present and future of international popular music, it is an impressive and rewarding volume." --Tracking "An amazingly rich tour-de-force of contested territory: how meanings are negotiated between domination and diversity, cultural erosion and enrichment. Indispensable for students of mass media and popular culture, as well as of music." --George Gerbner, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania Popular music is a form of communication easily recognized and understood around the world. But as it spreads from culture to culture, is it becoming more homogenized? Or, conversely, is there a continuing and perhaps ever-increasing diversity of song styles and forms? Music at the Margins explores the debate surrounding popular music's spread, testing the more conventional "cultural imperialism" hypothesis as based on empirical findings from a study by the International Communication and Youth Culture Consortium. The primary focus is on how the process of popular music production is perceived by local musicians--people who are immersed in overlapping international, national, and local contexts of production. Discussions on theory, local case studies, and interview data are provided and integrated to show how societal influences are tempered by and interpreted through cultural and semiotic codes--as well as individual musicians' experiences and creative talents. Specific topics addressed include the rise of the international recording industry, music production in socialist or formerly socialist countries, censorship, and sociopolitical influences, to name but a few. Music at the Margins will appeal to a wide range of scholars and students in the fields of communication, popular culture, and sociology.

Selected as One of Media & Values' Best Books Using varying approaches, researchers have tried to capture the actual dynamics and role of media in culture and society, but do we really understand this relationship? Super Media introduces and illustrates the newly emerging cultural studies approach to understanding the media in society. Drawing from both humanities and the social sciences, cultural studies centers its analysis in text, meaning, representation, interpretation, conflict, ideology, hegemony, and culture. In his analysis, Michael Real first provides a critical review of previous traditions of media research and theory--illustrated with tables and comparative charts--and then reintegrates media study around cultural studies. He then presents extensive case studies that illustrate the concepts and theories of the cultural studies approach. Included are the most widely available expressions of culture in history: the Olympics, superpower politics, Oscar-winning films, prime time television, and other transnational cases. Original in perspective, Super Media examines top research in media communication and provides a synthesis between research and the media experiences that affect people's everyday lives. The result is a provocative volume that will provide useful insights to professionals and advanced students in all areas of communication and popular culture. "In many overviews of the field, the canon provides the student and mere tourist alike a standard guide to familiar sights assumed to embody enduring lessons about our mass-mediated world. Contemporary media studies, however, comprise a sprawling network of alternative routes that offer access to more intriguing, dynamic sites of cultural production. In Super Media, Michael Real charts some of these alternative perspectives, broadly related as critical culture studies, in terms that can be understood by the initiate. Further, he attempts to synthesize `the best' of behavioral and critical media research toward a new reference guide." --Communication Quarterly "Super Media is the smartest and most accessible volume available that introduces the fundamental theoretical and methodological positions and practices in cultural studies. It challenges the reader to think through the very issues that cultural studies research and theorizing promotes. Real's touch as an author has produced a very readable text. Super Media helps signal the relevance of cultural studies for communication studies in America." --Journal of International and Intercultural Relations "The book aims to simplify several aspects of critical theory into easily accessible concepts which can be applied to cultural phenomena by the general media consumer. The book succeeds in its goal of raising the reader's awareness of the ways the media pervade our daily existence." --Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media "This is a serious attempt to make cultural studies' insights accessible to U.S. students. Many teachers should find it helpful and stimulating. It will challenge students and teachers to grasp the tools of cultural studies and apply them to super media." --Journal of Communication "Has much to recommend it. . . . Super Media is the most comprehensive of all popular culture volumes with textbook potential. It generously embraces both the American and European cultural studies traditions. . . . Besides comprehensive range, Super Media has textbook potential because it also provides and illustrates methodological approaches. . . . In many ways, and perhaps most importantly though, the book makes a tacit statement about the nature of a cultural studies approach. . . . It integrates explication of theory, methodology, and topic discussion throughout. . . . The thoughtful organization of this book thus says much about the organization of meaning, society, culture and, of course, cultural study itself." --Popular Communication Newsletter and Review "Real provides a clear and compelling introduction to the cultural studies approach and provides a series of innovative and insightful studies that illustrate the cogency of this approach. . . . A valuable source of critical analyses and methods. His presentations are equally lucid and illuminating and this book should find a large audience among students studying media criticism and those who want to develop tools and strategies for analyzing and criticizing our media culture." --Journalism Quarterly "Michael R. Real's Super Media is an important book at an important time... Many who know of Real's work realize that he has been perhaps the key player in the emergence of the cultural studies tradition in American media research. . . .perceptive and engaging. . . .a telling analysis. . . .Michael Real's Super Media offers complex and important understandings of the working of media on us. His arguments are convincing. . . .McLuhan placed us in a new media world. Michael Real has taken us a step farther. He has provided us with some tools to understand super media and to dissect what parts of its mirror are distinctly clouded and harm our view of what we want to become..." --Lawrence Wenner, Television Quarterly "Selected among the "16 best books on television, mass media and communications." --Media and Values magazine "Real's Super Media has much to recommend it as the new text anchor, especially for those wanting to deal in their courses with the central, theoretical contribution offered by popular communication and culture scholars: how the construing and maintenance of meaningful reality occur in everyday experience in a culture (rather than as a result of a simple message or media system). Super Media is the most comprehensive of all popular culture volumes with textbook potential. It generously embraces both the American and European cultural studies traditions, ranging from American studies of icons, genres, myths, and ritual to European concerns with discourse systems and ideology. Diverse schools and concepts are tellingly introduced by Real, and then interwoven to advance the field's common inquiry: into the organization and reorganization of meaning. . . . Besides comprehensive range, Super Media has textbook potential because it also provides and illustrates methodological approaches: empirical, structuralist, critical, and ritual analysis. . . .In many ways, and perhaps most importantly though, the book makes a tacit statement about the nature of a cultural studies approach. . . .it integrates explication of theory, methodology, and topic discussion throughout. . . .the thoughtful organization of this book thus says much about the organization of meaning, society, culture, and, of course, cultural study itself." --Dennis Corrigan, Popcom Newsletter

Hamid Mowlana, for decades, has been one of the foremost trackers and analyzers of global communications--their volume, character, and impact. No one is more qualified to explain these increasingly important and central issues to a wide public. --Herbert S. Schiller, New York University The rapid changes in the way we communicate across the globe continue to alter the many facets of society. Both interdisciplinary and intercultural in its approach, Global Communication in Transition examines the human dimensions and technological imperatives of international communications. Author Hamid Mowlana provides a comprehensive analysis beginning with the rise of modern political systems and the interactions of various cultures, through the expansion of social organizations and the growing global infrastructure. This unique perspective on global communication is organized around a number of basic concepts such as history, power, community, legitimacy, and language. By analyzing the political, economic, and cultural implications of communication today, within the broader concepts of such issues as community, Mowlana provides a new paradigm for the study of international communication. This auspicious text covers the history, theories, processes, and issues of international communication. Advanced undergraduates and graduate students in political science and international relations as well as communication will benefit greatly from the insightful scholarship offered in Global Communication in Transition.

The volume is celebratory in two senses: first, it brings together the experience of many committed media activists whose work is little known; second, at a time when much of the liberation potential of cultural studies is wrapped up in reception studies, it issues a challenge to complacent theorists to turn the computer off and go out and do some active political work in their field. --Intermedia "Pilar Riaño's analysis of communication, development, and feminist literature via women as producers of communication is clear, and I think, accurate. I am impressed with the breadth of her knowledge of these fields and her clear thinking and careful organization of the material. . . . I would certainly include a book of this type on the reading list of my course." --Mary Ellen Brown, University of Missouri "A wide-ranging study that addresses key questions in the fields of political science, anthropology, women's studies, development studies, and popular culture as well as communication. Riaño and her collaborators move us beyond explanations of women's subordination rooted in notions of passivity and the domestic sphere to an understanding of how women's communicative strategies can propel social change. By placing the particular experiences of women as communicators and organizers within the context of wider sociopolitical realities in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and North America, Women in Grassroots Communication demonstrates the role of communication strategies and processes in social movements that offer the promise of liberation and democratization." --Elizabeth Mahan, Director, Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, University of Connecticut How and to what extent are women in grassroots communication creating avenues for democratic communication and fostering social change? How is grassroots communication consolidating women's views and perspectives on gender subordination and social transformation? Women in Grassroots Communication brings together a stellar cast of contributors from across the globe--Africa, Asia, Latin America, and North America--to answer these and other questions. First, they review the various frameworks for addressing the relationship between women, participation, and communication, looking at the ways women have been perceived. Next, the authors look at the social roles of women in their communities, their capabilities to communicate, and their informal networks at the local and community levels. The third section focuses on media production and the issues of media competency, identity, representation, evaluation, and group process. Finally, by looking at the connections between women's participatory practices and wider sociopolitical initiatives, the final chapters examine the issues of organization, leadership, and communication strategies. Women in Grassroots Communication is an important reference or supplemental text for anyone working in or studying the field of development, intercultural communication, women's and communication studies, and social change.

Roach provides an excellent account of the contributions of feminist peace researchers to the analysis of cultural militarism and its twin, cultural violence against women. Altogether, this book is a worthy enterprise that will help both activists and scholars gain a more in-depth understanding of the barriers to change errected by the media's use of information technology, and will be useful in developing scenarios and strategies for the creative use of that technology for peaceful social transformation. --Elise Boulding in Media Development Does the media have a perverse fascination with war and violence? Do television, newspapers, and magazines neglect the forces of peace in favor of the more dramatic war machines, thereby amplifying the guns rather than muting them? If so, how does media coverage reflect the culture for which it works? By exploring the role of both culture and mass media, this volume fills a crucial void in the study of war and peace. Outstanding scholars provide a history and overview of critical mass media research and investigate emerging issues dealing with the ongoing debate over communication in war and peace. Several chapters deal specifically with the role of communication culture in the Gulf War, while others discuss more general themes, including the military/industrial/communication complex, cultural imperialism, and transnational control of communication. Many of the essays offer a uniquely feminist reading of war and peace, a perspective typically unacknowledged in mainstream communication work. This timely book also weaves peripheral concerns like multiculturalism, international communication law, women and peace, and communication technology into the primary themes of media and war. The research and practical information given here will be useful for courses in peace and conflict studies, international mass communication, and intercultural communication. Professionals in international relations, negotiations, and the media will find this book to be both fascinating and illuminating. "Original research on the coverage of disarmament stories and peace issues in Canadian dailies and Vincent Mosco's excellent blueprint for converting the military machine to a peace system give Roach's work practical and positive dimensions. Abstracts at the beginning of the chapters, full bibliographies, and a preface by the 'father' of peace studies, Johan Galtung, add to the importance of this book. Recommended for anyone interested in the use/minuses of mass media to cover up/explain/promote governmental efforts to keep situations tense and warlike." --Choice "Communication and Culture in War and Peace provides a strategic road map for scholarly and citizen action. This is tightly edited, passionately--and convincingly--argued, and a broadly conceived book. It fills a large gap and is likely to be a widely used seminal resource and text for some time to come." --George Gerbner, Professor of Communication and Dean Emeritus, University of Pennsylvania

How do politics influence communication technology? What forces shape technological enterprise? How do politics, society, and technology intersect? To answer these questions, author Gerald Sussman looks beyond the techno-functional aspects of product and process and focuses instead on the human agents and institutions involved in the making of information technologies. Sussman begins with a look at theory and then reviews the social history of communication technology. He next examines contemporary issues in the U.S. context, from the diminishing of citizenship and work experiences to the growing use of commercial and political surveillance. In so doing, he reveals to readers "just who the heavy truckers are on the information highway and what that means for the rest of us." The author concludes by examining the global dimension of the information society, pointing out effects on developing countries and alternatives to the hegemonic tendencies of the U.S. and world economies. Through his carefully detailed and critical analysis, Sussman demystifies the political and social inner workings of communication technologies and guides readers to an understanding of the real meaning of the information revolution. Ideal as a main text or as supplement for courses in American politics, contemporary political issues, the political economy of communication, and public policy, Communication, Technology, and Politics in the Information Age will be an invaluable resource to students and academics in the fields of communication, political science, sociology, and mass communication.