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Media Studies: The Essential Resource
Bringing together key writings with original textbook material, the second edition of Media The Essential Resource explains central perspectives and concepts within Media Studies. Readers are introduced to a range of writing on media topics promoting an understanding of the subject from both contemporary and historical perspectives. The text is split into three parts covering Analysis and Perspectives, Media Audiences and Ecologies and Creativities . The key areas of study are discussed, with accessible readings from essential theoretical texts and fully supported with an author commentary. Theoretical perspectives are used to analyse contemporary media forms and activities direct students to interrogate readings further and apply their learning. Encouraging critical and analytical study, Media The Essential Resource helps students to understand the main theories and theorists within Media Studies.
328 pages, Hardcover
First published December 11, 2003
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October 20, 2014
This is a lovely little textbook on Media Studies. It is really focused on the undergraduate market – and would make quite a good textbook for a semester course on the subject. What I liked most about it was that while it covered all the usual topics of Media Studies, it did this by reference to short passages from texts or even newspaper articles (there is even a part of a speech from HRH Prince Charles reprinted here). And then there are focus questions. The short passages are quite provocative and virtually every one of them had something interesting to say.
And the editors haven’t been afraid to point out that there is controversy in the field. One of the more interesting things I learnt from this is that there has been a shift in the demographics of people going to cinemas (towards people more my age) and that this might lead to films being made more for grownups – rather than the special effects films that are increasingly standard fair. However, there was a lovely rebuttal to this provided too. I really like the idea that a textbook is prepared to show live debates in a field – far too often textbooks present ‘the truth’ and it is only after you have gone deeper into the subject than undergraduate level that you learn that many of these ‘truths’ are, in fact, contested.
This is a really useful book. But it is also limited. It’s advantage is also its chief weakness (which is often the case, in life as in books), that the discussion presented is short enough to be useful for undergraduates. All the same, the book ends with a couple of interviews with people who have previously studied media studies and then gone on to have a career in the field – this is such a lovely thing to do, as it gives people a notion of the fact that there is life after study and what that life might look like. There are also very good suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter and these provide a sketch of the work suggested and what you might get out of it. Like I said, this is a nicely constructed textbook.
And the editors haven’t been afraid to point out that there is controversy in the field. One of the more interesting things I learnt from this is that there has been a shift in the demographics of people going to cinemas (towards people more my age) and that this might lead to films being made more for grownups – rather than the special effects films that are increasingly standard fair. However, there was a lovely rebuttal to this provided too. I really like the idea that a textbook is prepared to show live debates in a field – far too often textbooks present ‘the truth’ and it is only after you have gone deeper into the subject than undergraduate level that you learn that many of these ‘truths’ are, in fact, contested.
This is a really useful book. But it is also limited. It’s advantage is also its chief weakness (which is often the case, in life as in books), that the discussion presented is short enough to be useful for undergraduates. All the same, the book ends with a couple of interviews with people who have previously studied media studies and then gone on to have a career in the field – this is such a lovely thing to do, as it gives people a notion of the fact that there is life after study and what that life might look like. There are also very good suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter and these provide a sketch of the work suggested and what you might get out of it. Like I said, this is a nicely constructed textbook.
Displaying 1 of 1 review