Media Analysis and Criticism: Readings

Developed by Rianne Subijanto, Department of Communication Studies, Baruch College, CUNY

Professor Subijanto uses documentary films as important pedagogical materials, integrating them in most of her media classes including COM 3060: Media Analysis and Criticism.

Teaching with OER

Professor Subijanto was having trouble finding texts that contained recent developments in the Communications field and up-to-date case studies. The few textbooks she could find were often monotonous, rigid, and repetitive. Because of this she usually assigns students a bricolage of reading materials usually relying heavily on journal articles. However, journal articles are usually written for scholars in the field and not necessarily for students, so the language can be filled with jargon and the content can include references to concepts/debates students are not familiar with.

Though much of her reading list still consists of non-OER journal articles,Professor Subijanto plans to continue assigning students a mixture of reading materials that contain OER. She also plans to expand her collection of OER textbooks and chapters.

The OER

When Professor Subijanto explored OER materials, she started to find openly licensed textbooks that were up-to-date with the recent development in the field and gave an introductory overview of some of the important debates and concepts in the field, such as the University of Minnesota textbook, listed below.. She also found several publicly-available journal articles hosted by universities, such as the London School of Economics.

University of Minnesota’s Understanding Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication, Chapter 13: Economics of Mass Media

Course Artifacts

The activities below demonstrate how Professor Subijanto integrates OER texts into her Media Analysis and Criticism course.

Activity 1: Read Understanding Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication, Chapter 13: Economics of Mass Media.

Visit the Columbia Journalism Review’s “Who Owns What?” web page: http://www.cjr.org/resources/index.php

Choose a company from the drop-down menu. Make a chart of all the company’s different media outlets and complete the following activities:

Choose two subsidiaries of the parent company and discuss how they might be able to use vertical integration to their advantage.
How might the larger corporation be using an economy of scale?
How might the company be attempting to lessen switching costs? For example, does the company offer the same content on multiple platforms in order to reach customers who may have only one of these platforms? Give an example.
How might the three founding pieces of antitrust legislation affect the company’s decisions?
Use the concepts you find in section 13.5 in your explanation.

Activity 2: Read Sonia Livingstone, “Media Audiences, Interpreters and Users” This article is available publicly online through LSE website.Then watch Beyond Good and Evil after reading this article.