Education
Hello and welcome! My name is Gabby, and I am one of the hosts of the UMASS “Media Industry Podcast,” your trusted companion and source of information for “COMM 122: Introduction to Media Industries & Institutions.”I am a Comm undergrad and am passionate about social media and community engagement. In the fall of 2018 I took this class and it provided me with a great insight into the media industry and also helped me discover what topics I wanted to focus on during my studies and professional career. In this episode, we will talk about “media industry studies,” and look at some of the questions and problems you’ll explore in class this semester.Have you ever asked yourself: “Why did your favorite TV show get cancelled if it was so popular? How could concentration of media ownership threaten freedom of expression? Why does advertising investment in big media events such as the Super Bowl matter for our views of diversity and social inclusion? How state-run and private media can operate as propaganda machines? Or if global, video-streaming websites like Netflix will kill or democratize national film industries? ” Well, these are examples of problems commonly explored by media industry studies.As explained in this week’s readings, Media Industries Studies (MIS) is a subfield in communication and media studies that seeks to understand the works of industrial structures, processes, and labor practices behind the production, distribution, and consumption of different forms of media content. Why is this knowledge necessary? Why do we need to know how media industries operate, and what factors influence their operations? Well, media are not simple, “neutral tools” we use for entertainment and communication. In the 21st century, media (“new-and-old” or “digital-and-analog”) have become powerful actors in the shaping of social life. Media industries are not only multi-billion-dollar businesses that contribute to our economy; they also are systems specialized in the creation of social meaning that can enable or disable social communication, and influence our understanding of the world. If we want to understand today’s communication ecology, we need to know: why media industries produce and distribute some contents and not others; how people’s media preferences are shaped by their ability to access and consume information; and how “we” as consumers and citizens can collectively influence the decision-making of communication services and media corporations. These are central problems we need to address in order to understand under what circumstances the media can promote a more inclusive and better world, or when they become a vehicle to spread misinformation and reproduce social inequalities. Media Industries Studies (MIS) is an intra-disciplinary and interdisciplinary field because it goes beyond media, film and television studies and borrows insights from multiple disciplines, including economics, sociology of culture, law, public policy, and business and management.... (Complete script available on the class Moodle website)