Media Today

Description

Media Today puts mass communication students at the center of the profound changes in the twenty-first century media world – from digital convergence to media ownership – and gives them the skills to think critically about what these changes mean for the role of media in their lives.

Comprehensive and engaging, Media Today features:

• an interactive companion website featuring a full range of instructor and student materials including study podcasts at www.routledge.com/textbooks/mediatoday
• a three-pronged media systems approach focused on media literacy, convergence, and emerging trends in today's media culture
• up-to-date coverage of the latest political, economic, technological, and cultural issues affecting media industries
• exciting new resources including an enclosed free DVD with media examples.

Completely revised with updated examples, case studies, and media resources, the third edition of this innovative mass communication textbook is built upon a media systems approach that gives students an insider's perspective on how mass media industries operate. By making students more knowledgeable about the influences that guide media organizations, Media Today builds media literacy skills to make students sensitive to ways of seeing media content as a means of learning about culture. Joseph Turow emphasizes throughout the many ways in which media convergence has blurred distinctions between and among various media.

Each chapter of Media Today will:

• guide students through the essential history of media industries
• examines the current forces shaping their creation, distribution and exhibition
• explores the impact of emerging trends in media and society from globalization to social networking to video games.

Media Today is designed to be used independently, but can also be used with the supplemental textbook edited by Brooke Erin Duffy and Joseph Turow, Key Readings in Media Today.

Reviews

"Media Today is the best textbook to understand the organization, economics, and emerging trends within the U.S. media sector. Its institutional focus and the level of detail and updated knowledge it provides in this regard makes it the best textbook for an introductory media course."—Gisela Gil-Egui, Fairfield University

"What makes Media Today especially stand out is the extra attention to the dynamics of the ever-changing media industries. Joe Turow's book offers a nuanced, comprehensive and accessible treatment of how economic incentives and current trends in media matter for us and our democracy."—Matt McAllister, Pennsylvania State University

"Media Today engages students and serves as a helpful guide to our new media-saturated world. The writing is lively and concise, and the colorful illustrations are full of zest. Turow’s dry wit engages students in a conversational narrative that prompts them to connect what they read to their own experience of contemporary media trends."—Edward M. Clift, Woodbury University

"Media Today skillfully weaves together all the core components needed for an introductory media course: basics of media literacy and criticism, details about a wide range of the most current media, and an uncommonly thorough integration of the functioning of media industries. Accessible and smart in its writing style and full of useful illustrations and tables, Media Today, is not only up-to-date in its information, but its perspective prepares the future of media studies."—Amanda Lotz, University of Michigan

Contents

Preface

To the Student

PART I: Understanding the Nature of Mass Media

Chapter 1: Understanding Mass Media and the Importance of Media Literacy

Chapter 2: Making Sense of the Media Business

Chapter 3: Formal and Informal Controls on Media Content: Government Regulation,

Self-Regulation, and Ethics

Chapter 4: Making Sense of Research on Media Effects and Media Culture

PART II: Media Giants and Cross-Media Activities

Chapter 5: A World of Blurred Media Boundaries

Chapter 6: Understanding the Strategies of Media Giants

PART III: The Print Media

Chapter 7: The Book Industry

Chapter 8: The Newspaper Industry

Chapter 9: The Magazine Industry

PART IV: The Electronic Media

Chapter 10: The Recording Industry

Chapter 11: The Radio Industry

Chapter 12: The Motion Picture Industry

Chapter 13: The Television Industry

Chapter 14: The Internet and Videogame Industries

PART V: Advertising and Public Relations

Chapter 15: The Advertising Industry

Chapter 16: The Public Relations Industry

Epilogue

Notes

Credits

Author Bio

Joseph Turow is Robert Lewis Shayon Professor of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication. A former Chair of the Mass Communication Division of the International Communication Association, he is the author of more than 50 articles and 8 books on mass media industries.

Related Subjects

1. Mass Media & Communication
2. Communication Studies
3. Mass Communication