Final Thoughts on Intro to Media Studies

Looking back on the past 6 weeks, I am really hating on ratemyprof.com.

Before a class begins I always go check out the website for any heads up on the professor that I am about to have. Why not? At least I may get a warning if the teacher is completely unbelievable.

For the first time in my 4 years at the University of Ottawa ratemyprof.com could not have been more wrong.

Intro to media studies was an awesome class. This was my last class ever…and being a major in Criminology I thought it was going to be way out there, but the concepts and idea discussed by Dr. Strangelove (strangelove.com) closely reflect many concepts in criminology. Overall I was impressed, I got my memory boosted because some ideas were very similar and I learned a little bit more.

Capitalism is a big concept in criminology. Many theorists, including Karl Marx discuss capitalism as the main cause of inequality, and in criminology when you have inequality you have the commission of crime. The fact that there are only about 5 white, old guys that own 80% of media corporations in the world does not surprise me at all. Those are the people who decide what we as consumers see in the media and what we as an audience get to hear about in the media. The voices and the issues concerning those at the bottom of the hierarchy are not addressed because they are basically nobodies.

With Capitalism comes a system that ensures that those who have no power never actually get it. As a society we value things like private property and freedom of speech therefore these notions are what is keeping those 5 white guys in power. We all have the impression that if we work hard enough we will be at the top and whatever we need to say will be heard. However, this will never happen, because since we value those two things, the people at the top who actually have them are never questioned, and us down here at the bottom only try and work harder to get there, but in reality it will never happen.

This is quite a depressing concept, and in my opinion, as was lectured by Dr. Strangelove, the only way that ones voice can be heard is to stop valorizing private property and freedom of speech and start valorizing collective property and equality. Think about it for a second? If we began to think in terms of equality and collectivity there wouldn’t be such a HUGE gap between the rich and the poor. People would be on a more equal playing field. Instead of having some people that have everything and some people that have nothing, all people would have SOME!

Bringing this argument back to my criminological roots, I am in complete agreement with this need for change in values. So many things would be different, INCLUDING our crime rate. We need to keep in mind that crimes that get the harshest punishments are usually crimes committed due to inequality, theft because one has no food or money or murder because one was unfairly treated!

The solution to life’s problems = abolishing the capitalist system we live in!!!

Balkanization

The internet is a system which is subdivided into separate enclaves….this can be described in terms of Balkanization. The breakdown of cooperative arrangements due to the rise of independent competitive entities.

With this break down, individuals who have access to the internet, then gain access to unlimited sources of information. The internet can provide answers to all of life’s questions, from an online doctor to learning a procedure in Microsoft Excel. However, these answers are rarely questioned for the reliability. This poses the question of whether or not the internet is a valuable asset as a source of information.
This unlimited amount of information also poses another question… are people gaining collective intelligence from the internet? Or are they actually getting less and less intelligent because they rely on the internet for everything and no longer need to memorize and/or retain information?

There are two sides to this coin, some theories support the notion that the internet supprts collective intelligence, that says that with all sorts of people from all over the world sharing information, there can not be a down side to this. People are learning about issues that are going on all over the world that normally, without access to the internet, would not be possible. The internet is the perfect means to broaden our world view.

However, the other side is that the internet may actually reinforce our biased views of the world! Dr. Strangelove (strangelove.com) mentioned in class how the search engine google.com actually keeps track of the terms that are searched for and future searches revolve around what interests a particular individual….therefore, no matter how diverse someone thinks they are being and no matter what they search, the search engine itself actually refines searches to revolve around past interests.

So, it all depends on what theory you decide to believe….personally, I love the internet and I search absolutely everything. However, I do know that not everything is reliable. I also do believe that the internet builds a collective intelligence, I can get so much information on the internet and personally I can rely on my brain to retain what I learn. I use the internet as a tool for entertainment and education and it has never really let me down. It may not widen my world view but as an individual I think that I am pretty open minded and that that is not a great danger for me!

Everything I Have Learned in Class!

First Class (May 3^rd, 2011)

Media

·        Anything with a communicative component

·        Transmitting messages

Media Studies

• Looks at the issues of power
• Looks at producers of cultural codes

Mediums

• Carry the message
• DO NOT alter the message
• CAN have properties that shape the message

Consumption

• Buying into it

Economic Systems as a Communication system

-Came from the Communication part of corporate media system

• We attach meanings to materials that the economic system produces
• This “meaning” is what ultimately propels consumption

-This consumption of a certain meaning leads to patterning

• The Paris Hilton “look” pattern
• “dude” pattern
• “Gansta” pattern

Producers

I.E. Rogers

• Want us to bundle our commodities (TV, Cell Phone, Home Phone, etc…)
• But no one does it
• Because of this, big producers are losing us, one new device at a time
• We USED to be a passive audience
• We are now the global consumer
• In order for this global consumption to occur, capitalism needs to have meanings attach to its products
• We are NOW active producers of content
• Because of this……does capitalism face a difficult future?

• Due to capitalism there is a loss of diversity
• Everyone is similar

Second Class (May 5^th, 2011)

Double Phenomena

• Domination gets flipped back and forth
• i.e. rising social status of women
• however, today this leads to the eroticizing of women in the media; aligned with the theme of pornography
• One goes up = Equality
• One goes down = Eroticization

Capitalism as Patriarchy

• A feminist theory
• Finally, women are beginning to have power
• How does the economic system respond?
• It is a threat to the dominant group
• Symbolic response to a sexualized femininity

Culture

• Describes a reality we know
• We all know the patterns of culture
• Makes decisions for us
• Tells people how to act
• Presents opportunity and constraints
• Choices are already being made for you
• Limits possibilities
• Language
• Clothes
• Food
• Belief system

Media System and a Cultural System

• Produces patterns of connections and values

Democracy

• Democracy has a lot to do with how we analyse media
• Closely related to the press (the news system)
• Directly related to the free press

 The Press

• Ideal is to be corrective
• Who is the press?        
• 5 white old dudes
• Therefore, it is not really “free”

Chomsky’s Model

#1 Most Quoted Person Today

• Far left criticism on democracy
• Democracy = Tyranny
• A system that ensures that citizens do not get real power

Is he right?

• Is democracy a system that promotes elite rule?
• The press is the voice of the corporations

Private Property

• A value
• Is important to us
• We selected private and freedom instead of collective and equal
• Our values (private a free; protect their power)
• This gives us slim chance to ever be “like them” (in power)
• When you select one you automatically de-select the other

Mass Media

• Agopolistic
• Eliminates competition
• 5 firms dominate 80% of information flow
• Broadcast based
• A few senders that foes to many receivers

Propaganda

• A specialized activity to feed dominant interest
• Make us think that their interests are our interests
• The intent is to sway public opinion

Class

• We live in a hierarchal society
• A unequal distribution of opportunities, goods and awareness
• We possess a notion of social mobility
• You can move within classes
• The notion of the American Dream
• No longer determined by birth
• Education is the key to the ability to move

• We have a world order defined by inequality

·        The significance in media

·        The media is tied to class structure

·        The media is unequally owned

• Those who own it have a special power
• Being powerful; and/or wealthy makes it easier to have your voice heard

Ideology

• Where power is exercised through ideas
• Symbols spoken in order to gain power and influence
• One of the most complex notions (besides culture)

May 10^th, 2011

Democracy = Free Press

• What if democracy is really a way for those in power to STAY in power?
• What if the press perpetuates this?
• It is “Corporate owned press”
• Is it true “the freer the society the freer the press?”

Filters

• Everything gets filtered
• Individually and culturally
• Ownership of the media; is what decides what you see
• We all see what owners of the media want us to see

Gender

• Media is owned by men
• Journalism is by men about men for me
• Men are in dominations
• Back to capitalism as patriarchy

Systemic Biases

• is the inherent tendency of a process to favor particular outcomes
• the information that we receive are those that owners of corporations what us to receive

Flack

• Too far out of line
• Disciplined

Agenda Setting

• What is discussed in the media?
• What people are thinking tends to be directed by the flow of media
• The internet is now a vehicle to influence the news
• Money buys agenda setting influence

Gatekeepers

·        Professionals of journalism

·        Owners of media system

-There is no gatekeeper to the internet

-Corporate systems have Flack, gatekeepers and owners

-The internet has none of this

Opinion Leadership

·        Opinion leaders in society exist

·        They are “the think tanks”

·        There are the center in social networks that have influence over opinion

·        In our hierarchal society, not everyone’s opinion is important

Standardization

·        A function of the economy and the media

·        Same look and feel

·        Same shit on the TV

·        Same kind of music on the radio

·        Certain types or categories are made “the standard”

·        i.e. Highly sexualized women in music videos

·        youth culture

·        pretty

·        attractive

·        or there is no value

·        It’s never absolute

·        Why does it affect the economic system?

o       Efficiencies of scale

§         Make one thing for millions of people

§         The production system leans towards standardization to be more efficient, there is less effort being put into making NEW objects

§         This leads to the standardization of people

Advertizing

·        Funds the entire system (80%-90%)

·        Serves to deliver ads to us

·        It segments the market that is important

·        Deliver the right message to the right person

·        Advertizing is that thing in-between the content

·        We have learned to avoid it

·        However, now they do product placement in the content

·        All commercials are an ad for capitalism

·        We define ourselves through our consumptive choices

Americanization

·        America exports 50% of ads around that world

·        With these cultural products comes American culture

·        There world would be a better place if it were a little bit more American

·        They are bound to control and determines culture to make us all little Americans

May 12^th, 2011

Fragmentation

·        A post-modern theory

·        In media there is a fragmentation with

·        The Audience; is still feeding off of the corporate source, but watching different things

·        Reception paths; before there was only TV and radio

·        From the internet; Massively fragmented

·        Billions of producers

-Therefore we have complexities and contradictions

·        On the one hand, production is centralized

·        The contradictory force is the fragmenting force, points of contribution.

·        Massive fragmentation of producers

The Internet

·        Both and ogopoly and a fragmentation

·        For policy makers, the internet Is a threat to using the media to promote nationalism

Lock-In

·        As in facebook

·        This is what the internet will revolve around for a long time

·        The biggest treat to facebook right now is another “kid” inventing something bigger and better

Fragmentation in Countries

·        They use the media to promote nationalism

Norms

·        Every society has different norms

·        Moral is the normative standard

·        Change through time

·        The media is the main communicator of norms

·        The news = Deviance labelling

·        To identify the “bad” ones

·        The Media de-politicizes

·        Politics are no longer at the top

·        The producers values are

Fisk

·        The media is progressive but never revolutionary

·        Works with the changing tides of the time

Resistance

·        The media; a system where power is exercised

·        Wherever this power is found, we face resistance

·        A key notion for thinking about power

·        Doubly Significant

·        Audience

·        1- Context of suffering and pain, unequal wealth, gender

·        Resistance as a daily activity

·        2- minimize resistance

·        Like the middle class

·        Give people enough but keep them wanting more so that they are too tired to resist

Segmentation (1930s, 40s and 50s)

·        A powerful tool for advertizing

·        Groups

·        Sports

·        Baking

·        News

·        Cartoons

·        Home television

·        No one can appeal to EVERYONE

Trust

·        Important for the news

·        Gibbs        

·        It is a key feature of modernity because we come from a generation of professionals that we cannot individually monitor

·        Same goes for the media

Editorial Independence

·        Within journalism, paper should be independent from commercial news and the ideas of its owners

Info-tainment

·        News as entertainments

·        Most teenagers get news from entrainment

·        The daily show

Social Construction of Reality

·        Right wing

·        Reinforce dominant society

·        Typical media view; don’t worry about the media concentration because there is no treat to democracy or consumers

·        BUT media is power

·        Universal concept among anthropological ways of thinking

o       Everything is socially constructed

Appropriation

·        What you think is a social construction is the corporations trying to restrain us

·        The mass producers of norms are corporate media systems

·        Corporations are mass producers of shared culture

·        Substantial influence over culture

·        With the internet, we can rewrite the stories

·        We can now resist

Socialization

·        The family is the main socializing unit

·        Te media system is another significant socialiser

·        The internet can give us an insight of hidden corners of other cultures

Structure/Agency

·        What is in a society that constructs the mind

·        Agency is what individuals can do

·        Structure is a way of looking at things that make up society (beliefs, institutions, etc…)

·        The main problem is tension between agency and structure (individual VS. Society)

2 Schools of thought

1- the mind is under the power of structuring forces

2- the active mind resists and re-works society

Race

·        The Media reinforces hierarchy of race and gender

·        Supremacy

·        The media is a system of power that reinforces traditionally racist and patriarchal ways

Colonialism

·        Empires used to have direct control

·        Now it is indirect control because of the media

·        Americans influence the entire world (Americanization)

·        Absolute power

Fans

·        An intense emotional connection with a media product

·        There is an increase in fan productivity because of the internet

·        It is a double edged sword; we can change it however how ever they put us right

·        where they want us to be

Cultural Convergence

·        Taking groups and symbols and mashing the together

·        A mature and professional culture

Textual poaching

·        Taking bits and pieces of information from different texts and making them your own

May 17, 2011

Corporations

·        Can gains status like people

·        Have the rights of personhood (speak to gain power)

·        What “is” is due to a long process

·        By the end of the 20^th century, corporations became the all powerful

-More areas in life are becoming completely encased by corporations

      -We fear complete entrapments but its going on all over

·        Central lotus of power over social worlds

o       In charge of the economic system

o       Structures our lives

o       Story making machine that we have no say in

Memory

·        Oral cultures continually practiced their memories

·        Today we rely on the internet for everything we never have to memorize anymore

·        All our memories are online

·        We cannot forget and re-tell our stories

·        A new memory system

·        There is an issue of loss of control of our memories to the YouTube world

·        Technology destroys the private sphere

Intertextuality

·        Goes back to antiquity

·        Stories that draw upon other stories

Participatory Media (Active Audience)

·        The shift from the 20^th century to the 21^st century

·        From couch potato by stander to creator of content

·        Passive consumption to active production

·        Active Audience Theory; Our interpretive abilities

Censorship

·        Intra group struggle

·        Who is at the top and silencing the others

Symbols

·        Not just a representation

·        Master symbols have power and function in a society

·        Reinforce social order

·        Can also change social order (this is where censorship comes in)

·        Ideal and desirable

·        Good reinforce consumer identity

·        Therefore corporations don’t want us messing with it

Bias

·        Everything is biased

·        It is an ideological notion

·        It is a way of gaining trust and legitimacy

Objectivity

·        Hard to maintain or achieve

·        Is to science what bias is to media

Production

·        Defined by the age

·        New state of audience is ever increasing

·        Productive capability

·        =More power

Cultural Transmission

·        Culture is transmitted

·        Primary is by mother about men

·        It depends on means of expression (first there was oral)

·        The type of culture you have depends on means of expression

·        In 1480 it shifted from hand written to books

·        Information is to be extended through time and space

·        Different types of societies wont end up with the same values

May 19^th, 2011

Normalization of Idiosyncratic Behaviour

·        i.e. the professor dancing on the table is idiosyncratic (not normal)

·        like the public display of private life

Public Sphere

·        Where opinions are mediated by the media system

Corporate Speech

·        Largest voice in the land

Media Concentration

·        Power; it is critical when thinking about  media

·        5 white guys owning 80%

May 24^th, 2011

 Media System

·        Through which power is excercized

·        State run

·        Leaders switch positions

·        They reinforce their values

·        Television reflects contemporary values in life

Broadcast Analogue TV

·        Presenting to a homogenous audience

·        In 1970’s

·        Homogenous

·        Unified

·        Commonly shared

Today

·        Audience is fragmented

·        Unsure

·        Viewer created TV

·        The market is less effective at controlling the audiences

·        However the hierarchy of society hasn’t changed

Shifts in Society

1)      Industrial

2)      Knowledge

3)      Individuals using both and creating media (hybrid)

a.       MAKING THINGS FOR FREE (youtube videos)

Normative Debate

·        Society is structured by it

·        Debate over the shape of society

·        Not everyone has an equal voice

·        Debate through the news system

-The news filters the opinions that the elite hold

      -It is not a huge range of thought

      -If debate determines the shape of society then the elite determine the outcome of society

-The internet transforms this Debate

      -We can now circulate ideas without gatekeeping

      -we get heard because our opinions are easily accessible

      -we can force a conversation from the bottom of the hierarchy up

Media Culture

·        Describes relationships in our culture

·        Media is a way to describe culture

·        A way of recognizing the relationship between culture and media

Hegemony

·        When culture absorbs transgression, to become another add on of the cultural system

·        How does capitalism respond to hegemony?

·        It doesn’t push the new away, it reacts and brings it to the fore front, accepts and makes it main stream in order to gain money from it.

·        We deeply value private property and freedom of speech

·        However the masses of people will die without private property and without ever having their voices heard

·        Our value legitimate the unequal distribution of property

May 26^th, 2011

Concentration

·        Increased concentration of ownership

·        5 people own 80% or corporations

·they won more than one media medium

Globalization

·        Buying into the values of America

·        Some people are starting to resist globalization

Post Modernism

·        Fragmentation of social and media system

·        Uncertainty in modern times

·        Science today produces so much un certainty

·        In the past religion knew all

Virtual Reality

·        Invention of an unreal reality

Hyper reality

·        Implication of virtual reality and media; represents reality but its not real

Privacy

·        Private individual

·        Valued but not real

·        It is a privileged of the rich

June 2^nd, 2011

Tastes

·        Socialized

·        With the help of the media

Master Symbol

·        Symbols that reproduce a meaning

·        Complex layers of meaning

Co modification

·        Turning something into something marketable

Analog – Atoms

·        The different with digital is its reproductiove ability

·        Analog is expensive

·        Digital is cheap and simple

·        Analog is easy to control

·        Digital is not

Digital Piracy

·        Stealing things online

·        With the Gutenberg press there was security for authors

·        Now with the internet there is the reverse

Digital Locks

·        Attempt to control

·        A sign of failure to control

June 7^th, 2011

The Global Village

·        Metaphor for technology reuniting us

·        Technology can be disruptive, can lead to war

Sense Ration

·        The idea that there is a balance between the senses

·        The balance shifts depending on which sense is used the most

·        Some mediums are more engaged than others

Monopoly

·        Does not exist

·        Everything is an ogopoly

·        In the 20^th century the production of culture was monopolized by the corporate system

·        Has shifted to a fragmented system with two forms of cultural production

·        Market Place

·        Amateur

Empire

·        All face resistance

·        Have centers and capitals

·        Capitalism captures our culture and colonizes our mind

Amateur

·        Distinct from professional who creates media as his job

·        It is deinstitutionalized

·        They create the bulk of production

Net-Neutrality

·        The idea that the government should get involved to regain control

Fair Rights

·        Behind copyrights

·        The idea of limited

Copyrights

·        Control of behaviours

Digital Divide

·        Internet is unequally divided

Free Market Place of Ideas

·        The idea that the best ideas will rise to the top

Balkanization

·        Does the internet re-enforce our own concepts?

·        Or does it broaden our world view?

Code Based regulation

·        Buying and privatizing of codes that control the internet

Collective Intelligence

·        Intelligence is better when more minds of connected

·        Some people believe the internet is making us collectively smarter

·        Others say the opposite