CCOMM 2520 Media Analysis
This course provides students with new perspectives on various kinds of mass media, including radio, television, print, social media, and recorded music. By reading essays from media scholars and critics, and watching videos, commercials, and episodes of popular programs, you will learn to deconstruct media products, identify media messages, and evaluate the validity of common criticisms directed at the media. You will also utilize key communications theories to critique, evaluate, and analyze media, and discuss the impact of this mass media on a culture. Among the topics to be considered are whether the mass media shape, or simply reflect, a culture's beliefs and attitudes; what role advertisers play in construction of media messages; an analysis of media representations of "the other;" and current controversies involving the media.