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BEM200 Online U1 Media Ubiquity
119
Media Everywhere
"We come to know who we are by the stories we tell."
1. This
Class
Alistair MacIntyre
This class:
This class:
Our work this semester begins and ends with stories and the way we tell them. Stories embed each tweet we write, each news brief we read, each song we hear.
Types of Communication
2.
Terms
Let's start with definitions.
Intrapersonal Communication
Think self talk. When have you engaged in intrapersonal communication today?
Here's a Seinfeld example:
Interpersonal
Interpersonal Communication
That's face to face communication. We are going to talk about ....
Mass Communication
Mass Communication
Mass Communication means a message
is shared with a whole bunch or "mass"
of people at once.
Media comes from the word "medium" or
"mediated." So, mass media is really talking
about the channels used to communicate through a lot of media .... television, newspapers, the Internet...
even this Prezi ....
3.
Using
Media
Using Media
Your text explains how these communication types work. All, however, require encoding and decoding.
SMCR Transmission Model
The basic model of communication is the same whether you are talking about one or a bunch of people or through a medium.
Pay attention to your text descriptions about each part of the model
The Channel Changes Things
The American Council for the Blind is encouraging media producers to create audio descriptions for movies and TV shows. Lots of new programs are taking them up on the suggestion, particularly on Netflix.
Take a break and try this out: Watch part of a show or a movie using audio description. You can find the option on your TV or computer in the same corner box to click on closed captioning for subtitles. The goal here isn't about imagining being blind. Instead, ask: How is this story different with the description added? What changes?
Media Ubiquity
Now there is a term you need to know: Media Ubiquity. It means media is everywhere all the time.
Get out pen and paper:
Really...get out pen and paper
Write down all the different types of
media you have used in the last 24 hours.
You will need this list at different times during
this Prezi and on your Discussion Board.
Ubiquity ... really means everywhere
Yes, that's a tweet from Mount Everest
This Canadian astronaut sang from space ...
He got more than 12 million
views ... and counting.
Americans on average spend
up to 5 hours or 30 percent of
their day consuming media.
Teenagers average over 7 hours.
Goal for you in this class:
Media Literacy
4.
Media Literacy
Textbook definition:
Understanding how the media operates, the roles it plays, how messages are created and delivered, and how audiences respond.
Fighting myth with knowledge
To study media, we have to recognize some things:
There is no such thing as mainstream media.
Remember the United States media business model is narrowcasting, or getting the right audience, not on broadcasting, which means getting the whole audience.
Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and the now defamed Bill O'Reilly all have claimed that they are an alternative to something they call mainstream media. In reality, Fox News has considerably more viewers than CNN and MSNBC combined. The same is true for Rush Limbaugh and his liberal radio counterparts.
There is no big media agenda.
We'll also talk about corporate ownership next week. For now, know that corporate conglomerates do pose a threat to smaller voices in the marketplace. However, that doesn't mean there is a coordinated conspiracy.
So, when President Trump calls stories he doesn't like "fake news," what does that mean?
The Newseum in Washington, D.C., and Facebook came up with this chart to help separate real news or "share-worthy" information from other types of information available online.
Do you think the chart helps set criteria for real news? Or ....
Is Facebook a credible contributor since the company has admited Russian scammers loaded its system with fake news?
Take a look at the chart more closely and decide what you think is shareworthy. (A link is also available in the Unit One folder on Blackboard.)
Important term:
Demassification
American mass communication took off a hundred years ago when radio stations wanted to advertise to biggest audience possible. For a long time, that's what media companies wanted ... big audiences.
5.
Audience Size
In the last few decades, they discovered what will raise more revenue. They want the target audience, not everyone. So rather than mass communication, they want demassification.
Narrowcasting
Next term to know:
Narrowcasting
Narrowcast is why
Abercrombie and
Fitch asked Jersey
Shore's The
Situation to stop
wearing it's label.
He just didn't
represent the kind
of audience they
wanted to target.
Homophily
Homophily
With narrow audiences, we also
get homophily... that's like when birds
of a feather flock together. People with
similar interests tend to seek out the
same media. That makes it good for
advertisers but it also means media
consumers only see one viewpoint on
most ideas ... and seeing only one viewpoint
doesn't make you very media literate.
Take a break:
6.
Break
Get a soda/coffee/water/beverage of choice.
Let all this sink in.
Theories about how media works
7. Big
Effects
... because no one would spend money on this if there wasn't some effect
Life in 1938 ...
Think about this: What was life like in the U.S. in 1938? Where did people live? How did they feel about technology? Where did they get their news? Broadcasting was just getting started. CBS was a large broadcasting company … but how did it broadcast? Not television yet. The Mercury Theater aired radio dramas produced by Orson Wells and John Houseman. The two decided to put on an adaptation of HG Wells’ War of the Worlds.
H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds
H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds
Listen to clips of the hour-long program and imagine how you might have reacted to a story about a Martian Invasion. In 1938, radio is your primary form of entertainment.
Here were the headlines the next day...
But in reality ...
There was no real panic. How did the story of panicked listeners begin? Researchers today say, "Blame America’s newspapers. Radio had siphoned off advertising revenue from print during the Depression, badly damaging the newspaper industry. The papers seized the opportunity presented by Wells’ program to discredit radio as a source of news." Audience ratings showed only about 5,000 people heard the original broadcast. Yet, as War of the Worlds grew more infamous over the next two years, thousands more claimed to have heard it than possibly could have. These fake listeners told researchers of the day that they panicked over something that they never heard.
This new medium of radio was deemed scary. It was believed to be able to make people respond in ways beyond their control. That's how the Big, Powerful Media Effects Theory was born.
Symbolic Interactionalism
Theories of Big Media Effects
It no longer mattered what actually happened. People believed it happened, and that belief shaped their memory and perception. New technology became even scarier. Your readings talk about W.I. Thomas, who came up with the idea of symbolic interactionalism. People will take action based on their beliefs, even if those beliefs are not based on reality.
Active Audience Theories
8.
Limited
Effects
Sociologists and other researchers realized pretty quickly that there was no magic bullet or powerful media effects. Media consumers bring lots of factors into play in deciding what to believe or how to react.
Two-step flow theory
Lazarfeld's
Two-step flow theory
Researcher Paul Lazarfeld had worked on the War of the Worlds' studies and thought the results were wrong. He came back with a new idea ... He and others set out to research how people planned to vote in the 1940 presidential election. They interviewed over 2,000 women and discovered something important. Some women kept up with news and developed opinions. Their friends turned to them for suggestions on who to vote for. This became known as the two-step flow.
Two step flow theory today
Two step flow theory today
Here's a British example of how two step flow works in social media now ...
Lasswell's Model
Lasswell's Media Communication Model
This is one you need to know because it serves as a foundation for later theories.
Marshal McLuhan's Theory: The Medium is The Message
McLuhan
Medium is Message
He focused on the channel or medium part of Lasswell's model. What do you think of his argument?
Media Impact Analysis
Numerous researchers try to figure out exactly what kind of impact the media has on consumers and the consumers have on the media.
9.
Analyze
Media
Uses and Gratifications
This theory argues people use media for specific reasons:
- Entertainment: Pleasure or even Zoning Out
- Survelliance: Being Aware of the World
- Empowerment: Political or Other Knowledge
- Status: Bragging Rights
Uses and Gratifications
So what about you ... What do you use your favorite media for?
Agenda Setting
The media doesn't tell us what to think; it tells us what to think about. In other words, people tend to think topics are important if they get lots of news coverage and not if those topics don't. The theory: Consumers will form their own ideas as to why something is right or wrong, but the importance of the idea gets saliance (meaning significance in our eyes) if there are a lot of news stories.
Agenda
Setting
Agenda Setting Now
This theory came out when legacy media (newspapers and nightly TV news) controlled news spread. Agenda setting is even more important now that consumers can talk back through social media. Something that generates lots of Twitter response is going to be on the public agenda. Your text talks about the #WheresRey outrage when the one new female Star Wars character didn't get her own action figure. Check out what came out on May 4 Star Wars Day in anticipation of the new movie.
Spiral
of
Silence
Spiral of Silence
Think about your own social media feed. Has the way you express opinions changed? Have you not posted something or limited the audience because of how others might react?
Violence and Media Effect
10.
Media
Violence
- Does watching media violence make people more violent?
- Does it desensitize viewers to violence?
- Does it serve as a catharsis? (Look that word up.)
Cathartic Effect
Socrates is credited with
coming up with the idea of
catharsis... Watching violence
releases tension and makes you
less likely to become violent for
real. He said that is why people
watched Greek Drama and the
Olympic Games.
Theory: Watching violence is good
Two Ideas on Violence is Bad:
Theory: Watching violence is bad
Aggressive Stimulation Theory:
Largely discredited because it is a Magic Bullet Theory. Assumes people see violence and act on it.
Aggressive Stimulation Theory:
Early Bobo Doll studies found that kids watching violent cartoons would become more violent in play.
Aggressive Stimulation Now
Aggressive Stimulation Now
However, there are lots of examples of serial killers emersing themselves in violent movies and games. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold watched the Basketball Diaries and played Doom again and again in the days leading up to the Columbine Massacre, the largest high school mass shooting to date. They modeled their costumes and moves from these two media. Considering that these media images are two decades old, what do you think about the aggressive stimulation? Watch just a few minutes of Doom and the full Basketball Diaries clip.
Catalytic Theory
Catalytic
Theory
But lots and lots of people watch violent video games and they don't become mass murderers. Research backs that up. Social learning theory researchers also document that watching lots and lots of media violence does desensitize people to real violence, especially for kids.
Entertainment violence can lead to increases in aggressive attitudes, values and behavior, particularly in children.
American Medical Association,
American Psychiatric Association,
American Academic of Pediatrics
The Bad News
The Bad News
Repeated social learning research shows men who were high TV-violence viewers as children were significantly more likely to have pushed, grabbed or shoved their spouses, to have responded to an insult by shoving a person, and were three times more likely to have been convicted of a crime than other men.
Women who were high TV-violence viewers as children were more likely to have thrown something at their spouses, to have responded to someone who made them mad by shoving, punching, beating or choking the person, to have committed some type of criminal act. Such women, for example, reported having punched, beaten or choked another adult at over four times the rate of other women.
These findings hold true for any child from any family, regardless of the child's initial aggression levels, their intellectual capabilities, their social status as measured by their parents' education or occupation, their parents' aggressiveness, or the mother's and father's parenting style.
These doctors and medical boards are not saying that everybody who plays video games becomes a mass murderer. But, intensive exposure to violence particularly in children causes problems.
The Better News
However, research also shows parents can play important roles to limit the negative effects. Parents watching TV with their kids means kids are less likely to:
- identify with perpetrator
- think violence is real
- play out violence in fantasy games
And now you're finished with Unit 1...
Take a look back through the Media Effects on Violence section of this Prezi and get started on your Discussion Board.
You've done well so far.