Mediation and new media

Transcription

1 Content Page 1 Mediation and new media Monday, 5 March :02 PM Media Oxford English Dictionary Main means of mass communication E.g. Newspapers, radio, reporters, etc. Raymond Williams A conduit Medium Something that enables the passage of a message A place where we have a convergence of meaning Convergence of three senses Intervening or intermediate agency or substance Conscious technical sense As in the distinction between print and sound and vision as media Economic player in the marketplace Specialised capitalist senses In which a newspaper or broadcasting service is a medium for something else, such as advertising Marshall McLuhan Medium is the message "Information and perception which forms our thoughts, structures our experience, and determines our views of the world about us" Technological determinism Technology drives behaviour Technology/medium which transfers the message is what changes us, the society, work, family and more Or does how we behave inform the technology? Mediation Process happening between the senders and receivers of messages through the media How we mediate Movement of meaning from one text to another Roger Silverstone Media is a process situated at the liminal zone between medium and actors around it Mediation occurs in the exchange of ideas and the making of meaning Experience as the starting point for media Role of experience in shaping media Experience shaped by media It is the mundane world that the media operate most significantly At the heart of our social discourses (especially media) is the following: Classification/distinction/judgments The aesthetics Ethics Politics of everyday life Made aware of parameters of original medium when a new medium brings them into focus Clinque (2012) Media is a reciprocal process Concurring with Silverstone I.e. Media is not just an object, but also interactions Connection/relationship between media and culture

2 Content Page 2 Media is multifaceted Technological Cultural and social Nick Couldry "Media transforms the smallest details of individual actions and the largest spaces in which we are involved" Media shapes social life Media provides entry into understanding society and social action Mark Deuze Sees a much bigger role for media "We do not live with, but in, media" "Who you are, what you do, and what all of this means to you does not exist outside of media" "Media are to us as water is to fish" Jurgen Habermas Media is in the public sphere Describing the role of media in democracy Where people come together and form public opinion Provides for a healthy civil society Emerged at the same time info was readily available Cultural and historical specificity of media How people perceive media at a particular time E.g. Concern about the impact of advertising New media Dichotomy Hopeful Democratise society As hoped with newspapers Create turmoil Harmful, negative content, etc. Use as propaganda Cyclical nature to how society fears and then adopts new media Changes Constantly connected Privacy concerns Dueze (?) 1954 Privacy is the domain of self-defined values and interests Public is domain of shared interest and values This demarcation of private vs public is blurred Leading to new terms Prosumers Toffler 1970

3 Content Page 3 Prosumption Tapscott 1995 Everyone has a share in media production and consumption Manuel Castells: Flows Less linear flows Greater complexity Multi-directional flows bring media into every aspect of our lives Intensification of media characterised by intensive interface between personal media and mass media Nick Couldry Supersaturation Changes to the possibilities of order within the social Media practices Mark Couldry Media practice changes only because media technologies within everyday contexts mesh with our wider habits, our ways of getting by Methodological tools How do we grasp media (as scholars)? Mark Couldry Political economy Economic structure Ownership Dynamics Ideological content Medium theory What's distinctive about a medium E.g. McLuhan Textual and visual analysis Signs and representations Reading the media Socially-oriented media theory How we watch/use/behave through and in response to media Why study the media? Because the media are central to our everyday lives Part of the general texture of experience - the grounded nature of life in the world We should trace media through the ways in which they participate in contemporary social and cultural life E.g. Teacher, phone ring, texting while walking Technology of media might change rapidly, but institutions have different life-cycles and different histories Who mediates the media

4 Communication, media and culture Wednesday, 21 March :03 AM Definitions of communications Affordances Allow us to play the role of broadcasters/producers and consumers OED Senses relating to affinity or association The fact of having something in common with another person or thing Interpersonal contact, social interaction, association, intercourse Relevant to the ritual concept of communication Building associations between people Senses relating to the imparting or transmission of something Transmission or exchange of information, knowledge or ideas Thus can be ritual and transmission viewpoints History/temporal 1958 Communication a God-given gift that enables us to unify 1796 Cathartic feeling; releasing Communication as a means by which we can externalise/share the internal 1900s Word has less spiritual significance and more practical uses Reflects science Identify the relationships between communication, media and culture Culture Raymond Williams 1976 Culture is one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language Early use was as a noun of process Tending to crops and animals; agriculture Extended to process of guman development from C C It gained modern senses Culture (material) vs civilisation (spiritual) Social and anthropological use of culture is extended s Sub-cultures E.g. Youth sub-cultures Not derogating these as vulgar, low-brow and valueless 1980s Media as an important part of contemporary culture Media culture Media form a central part of contemporary culture Media are associated with their own culture forms, uses, impact, etc. E.g. TV culture, apps culture, new media cultures Questions What can a culture studies approach contribute to the our study of media and communications? How might it help explain/interpret some off the changes described by Jenkins? What is meant by participatory media culture? New media has an embedded-interactivity that implies a transformation from a traditional media form that has led, arguably, to the disappearance of the audience (Marshall, 2004) Do you agree? Explore classic approaches to studying communication Shannon & Weaver 1948 Mathematical theory of communication Reduces complex process to a linear arrangement Weren't concerned with the message's content Information source Content Page 4

5 Represents the solo or collective decision to convey information Noise source Something that distorts the message E.g. Static or technological influence Can also be read as anything, e.g. societal resistance John Fiske on noise Discomfort/awkwardness is noise E.g. Bad seat in a lecture theatre 3 levels of communication Technical How accurate can symbols of communication be transmitted Semantic How precisely do transmitted symbols convey the desired meaning Effectiveness How effectively does the received meaning affect conduct in the desired way Less helpful with visual communication Because a picture doesn't fully work on a linear platform Photographers use other more subtle elements to create meaning E.g. Angles Falls on the audiences to make meaning One-way model Ends with the receiver Omits the opportunity for feedback/response Harold Laswell developed S&W further A convenient way to describe the act of human communication Similar Who Says what In which channel (transmission) To whom Added: With what effect does the message have E.g. On audiences when receiving media messages E.g. Directors want audiences to be emotionally affected E.g. Advertisers want people to purchase products Looks beyond merely the technological Also criticised: Too linear Prioritising the source rather than also considering how it is received James Carey 1989 Communication is a symbolic process whereby reality is produced, maintained, repaired and transformed To study communication is to examine the actual social process wherein significant symbolic forms are created, apprehended and used Importance of a cultural approach to communication Distinguishes: Transmission Communication is a process whereby messages are transmitted and distributed in space for the control of distance and people Messages Knowledge Ideas Information Control and attitude change is primary purpose Key words Imparting Sending Transmitting Giving information to others Objectivity and science Doesn't consider how media is imbrued with cultural meaning Reproduces cultural values and norms Media as having unqualified effects on the audience Assumes a sequence in which institutions generate texts, texts generate meanings, and meanings affect audience (Burton 2011) Formed from the metaphor of geography/transportation Movement of goods, people and info Viewed as communication Extend the kingdom of God Telegraph broke the morphed identify of communication and transportation New tech of communication then came to be seen as an ideal device for the conquest of space and populations Content Page 5

6 E.g. Newspaper Medium as an instrument for disseminating news and knowledge over great distances Enlightening or obscuring reality? Changing or hardening attitudes? Breeding credibility or doubt? Ritual Argues for the primacy of this cultural view Maintenance of society in time and the representation of shared beliefs Not the imparting of info Stressing meaning, identity and belonging Underpinned by culture Projection of community ideals Embodiment in material form E.g. News stories, speeches Creates a symbolic order Reality is bought into existence by communication Construction, apprehension, utilization of symbolic forms We produce the world by symbolic work Then take up residence in the world we have produced Symbols for: create the very reality they present E.g. Blueprint metaphor: House produced under its guidance Also: Symbols of: present reality E.g. Blueprint metaphor: House represented by the blueprint Not to alter attitudes or change minds Society is possible because of the binding forces of shared information circulating in an organic system Due to predominant transmission view, rarely seen new tech advances as opportunities to expand people's power to learn and exchange ideas and experience Social life is more than power and trade It is also: Sharing of aesthetic experience Religious ideas Personal values and sentiments Intellectual notions I.e. Ritual order Involves Rituals and ceremony Maintenance of order Drama Key words Sharing Participation Association Fellowship Possession of a common faith Community Archetypical case Sacred ceremony that draws persons together in fellowship and commonality E.g. Newspaper Reading is viewed less as sending or gaining info and more as attending a mass Nothing new/no info is learned but a particular view of the world is portrayed and confirmed Portrayal of the contending forces in the world Does not describe the world Portrays a continually shifting arena of dramatic focus and action E.g. Story on women's political causes casts them into liberation movement; a tale of violence on the campus evokes class antagonisms and resentments News reading and writing is a ritual act Invites our participation on the basis of our assuming (vicariously) social roles within it Historic reality Form of culture invented by a class at a point of history Content Page 6

7 Reflects a hunger for experience by that class for changing traditions E.g. Do away with the epic, heroic and traditional in favour of unique, original, novel (news) But not mutually exclusive Ritual view does not exclude the processes of information transmission or attitude changes David Morley New Keywords 2005 Earliest ideas of communication shows its close relationship to transportation Also recognises the social and ritualistic aspects Dialogue, activity, intercourse, interpersonal communication Technical medium through which communication occurs Transmission works for info, but not for other forms of communication E.g. Interpersonal Who controls communication and its messages? Is communication premised on the notion that we can never perfectly communicate Is misunderstanding normal Or is normal communication transparent Communication without noise There is a distinction between successful communication and where it fails through understanding Content Page 7