The ways in which media are produced and consumed are undergoing fundamental changes. Traditional divisions between the senders and the receivers of media messages are blurred, citizen journalism is complementing the journalist profession, community media are increasingly recognized as a third media sector next to commercial and public service media, and tactical uses of communication and cultural expression are interfering with mainstream media processes and messages. While many such grassroots media practices are created in outright opposition against established media relations and power structures, a broader range of interactions with 'the mainstream' is visible, from contestation to cooperation and cooptation.
In this course we will analyze activist, alternative, civil society- and community-based media practices within the context of globalization and social change. We will discuss current forms of hegemony as well as counter-hegemonic movements, consider related concepts such as civil society and social movements, investigate social dynamics towards citizen participation, and discuss the roles of media, old and new technologies, and various forms of mediated expression as products and instruments of cultural, economic and political struggles.
The goal of the course is to develop a thorough understanding of media practices that exist beyond the established media structures, and to explore relations with a variety of broader social dynamics. The course addresses media and communications students who are interested in activist, alternative and citizens media, as well as students from other fields of the social sciences who would like to study participatory media as examples of interventions in the process of social change.
The first half of the course will develop the social and political context of media activism; provide an understanding of theoretical concepts such as hegemony, cultural imperialism, civil society, social movements and social change; and discuss the conceptual variety of alternative and participatory communication. In the second half we will look more closely at specific forms of media activism, from community radio and the radical press to hacktivism and culture jamming, and analyze specific agendas, such as media reform, communication rights, and access to the knowledge commons.
View complete course outline: COMS683A2010 [.pdf]