Anthropology of Mass Media – Syllabus SAMPLE (01:070:368 – 3.0 credits - Spring 2012) When: Thursdays, 2:15-5:15pm Where: Hickman, Room 113 Course Instructor: Andrew Brooks Email: [email protected] (start ALL email headings with ‘070:302’) Office hours: by appointment (email me for an appointment) Course Description anthropology” and understand how anthropological approaches to media Treating ‘mass media’ not as a monolithic differ from other disciplinary efforts. entity to be confronted, but an assemblage of 2. Complicate our understanding of “The culturally and spatio-temporally specific Media”; recognizing the value in more entities and practices to be examined, this nuanced discussions around how media course will draw heavily on ethnographic is produced and consumed while examples and contemporary theory in examining the kind of discourse used by exploring how anthropological inquiries of media to discuss media. mass media differ from approaches in other 3. Understand how mass media is disciplines such as mass communications, contextually created and situated; cultural studies and media studies. observe the impact that cultural and geographical specificity, political The course will explore topics including but not processes and social power have on the limited to media ownership/concentration, production and consumption of media impact of technology on how and what media is while noting that ‘media’ cannot be produced, distributed and consumed and the viewed as separate from ‘culture’ but role of media in co-constructing and contesting mutually constituted and embedded personal and political identities, political within one another. viewpoints, national sentiments, religious 4. Through various writing assignments / practices and gender outlooks. exercises, become familiar with the Throughout the semester, students will have an “writing-to-learn / learning-to write” opportunity to voice their opinion as well as philosophy which believes writing is an construct thoughtful critiques of media integral part of the learning process. infrastructure and content across the globe. Required Reading Course Objectives There is no required textbook for this course; 1. Gain insight into the cultural however, there are required weekly readings. anthropology subfield of “media All readings can be found as pdf files on Sakai. Rutgers University | Anthropology of Mass Media (070:368) | Spring 2012 Page | 1 Course Grade Breakdown Please note: This is a preliminary outline of class assignments that are subject to change prior to the start of semester. Details of each assignment will be discussed in-class and provided as separate hand- outs. Cross-Cultural Media Comparison 20% Media Blog 30% 10 entries@ 3% each Critical Research Paper 50% Proposal 5% Creative 10% Draft Paper 20% Final Paper 15% TOTAL 100% Sample Readings The following are examples of readings students can expect to be assigned. In a typical week, students should expect 2-3 journal articles or book chapters with an average page length of 50 pages / week (remember this class meets only once a week). Baudrillard, Jean. “Requiem for the Media”. Available at: http://www.calarts.edu/~bookchin/mediatheory/essays/19-baudrillard-03.pdf Powdermaker, Hortense. 2002. “Hollywood and the USA” in Askey, K, and Richard Wil (Eds) The Anthropology of Media: A Reader. Oxford: Blackwell. 161-171. Davila, Arlene. 1998. “El Kiosko Budweiser: The Making of a ‘National’ Television Show in Puerto Rico.” American Ethnologist 25 (3): 452-470 Rutgers University | Anthropology of Mass Media (070:368) | Spring 2012 Page | 2 .