british cultural studiescritical studies – frankfurt school B u s i n e s s F i n a n c e

Answer the question below in an essay format . Please limit your answers to 550-1100 words. Confine any references to our course materials, ie. textbook, lectures, videos, PowerPoint slides, etc. You are not allowed to use any other text reference, but can use examples and cases not mentioned in the classroom.

Your answer must contain: One media platform as example, a social group, and at least two concepts used in the course.

QUESTION:

As discussed in the whole course, communication enables the spread of culture. It propagates the values and symbols, structures and discourses from a culture through the repeated interaction and exchange of information enabled by the communication process. Without using social media as an example, explain HOW media shaped the discourses of our society in the past and influences us today.

FOLLOW THE STRUCTURE BELOW

Guiding Questions to support you with the essay: Answer the following points, then write them in paragraph form. Don’t keep the answers separated, turn them into one single text.

I. The platform: Introduction (about 100 words)

a) Choose a media platform

b) Why did you choose this? Why is it important to study this in a communication and social change class? How did your relationship with this object change over the last year?

c) Identify the main theme in this object you would like to explore (the impact of that object in our culture and discourses)

d) Write a brief summary of your main points about this object – this will be your thesis.

II. The Communications Object and the Culture Industries (100-200 words)

a) Situate (put) the object in the discussions of The Critical Theory or any other theory you prefer and discuss. You could choose:

Cultural Studies – Stuart Hall and the British Cultural Studies

Critical studies – Frankfurt School and the Critical Studies

Strong Effects Theories – Hypodermic Needle/Magic Bullet or the Mass Society

Limited Effects perspective – Two-Step Flow and Lazarsfeld’s perspective

Political Economy of Media

Surveillance Theory

b) Describe every important aspect of that product in its context;

c) Discuss each part in relation to your communication object in 1-3 sentences using concepts from the text.

III. Social Changes (about 200 words)

Choose ONE or two of the following social groups with which you will analyze your object. You will assess how your media impacts the chosen groups and can influence people over history:

age

class

gender

sexuality
• race and ethnicity

disability and health • national framing
• religion

IV. Reflection and Summary (about 100-150 words)

Summarize your main thoughts about your analysis of the communicational object, including:

What makes this object unique or special as a source of information about communications?

What can this object tell us about the society we live in and about the specific theoretical dimensions you discussed?

What can be learned from studying communications platforms in this way?

V. Academic Sources and Citations – Include a “References” list at the end of your work

All sources must be relevant to your topic and from 2010 or later (unless classics, such as The Communist Manifesto or Orientalism)

APA style – ex. (Lee, 2018) or (Lee, 2018, p. 3). Please use Alexander College’s APA Citation Guide to help you

2 in-text citations per paragraph

3-5+ academic references, including books, journal articles, and high-quality websites etc.

The textbook counts as a source, as do the Contextual Assignments, using the same references as you did in these assignments