Media Studies

Video arcades are dying everywhere, incompatible with contemporary
regimes of commercial space. There was a time when video arcades
were considered a threat to the fabric of urban space, and entrepreneurial operators were accused of luring youth into truancy and addiction. Today, it would appear that these moral objections have been eclipsed by simple economic facts. And yet, arcade spaces have not disappeared completely. This paper examines historical sources related to both arcades themselves and the cybernetic theories popular in postwar America, arguing that dominant 20th-century economic systems incorporated and modulated arcade gaming to fit within prevailing circuits of exchange, treating the arcades' controversial qualities like negative feedback in a cybernetic loop.

Qualitative evidence suggests that mass media can play a causal role in the outbreak of civil wars, and at the international level the rapid increase of mass media in recent decades has generally coincided with a similarly dramatic spread of civil wars. Yet, recent quantitative research suggests that mass media decrease the probability of civil war onset by enhancing the power of states and therefore deterring insurgencies. To resolve this puzzling contradiction, I argue that mass media technologies have a non-linear effect on the probability of civil war onset. Mass media technologies should decrease the likelihood of civil war onset only above the threshold at which they constitute a mass communications system. Below that threshold, increases in mass media should increase the likelihood of civil war. The theory is tested with parametric and semi-parametric regressions on cross-sectional time-series data from a recent study (Warren 2014) and historical time-series at the international level. Consistent with the theory, I find evidence of substantial non-linearity in the effect of mass media on civil war onset. Findings are also broadly consistent with additional observable implications pertaining to the relative effects of different media technologies and empirical patterns at the international level since 1816. This research note contributes an important new insight into the causes of civil war and contributes to the burgeoning research agenda on the nexus of information-communication technology (ICT) and political conflict.

Through the text analysis of a hobby magazine and a television series in late-socialist Czechoslovakia, this paper explores how the subtle use of language in state-controlled media helped to domesticate practices that were potentially dangerous to the state -- here, weekending at private cottages -- and to create a distinct public that was incorporated into socialist discourse. The magazine and the series created an image of the cottager as a harmless fool, critiquing in what Michael Herzfeld would term a culturally intimate way (2005) the aspects of cottaging that were undesirable to the socialist state, namely, materialism and individualism. Magazine editorials, meanwhile, helped to reconceptualize the private pursuit of recreation as a public activity. The series and the magazine not only serve as a record of the complex relationship between socialist ideology and everyday practices, but also help to explain aspects of the cottage culture in the present-day Czech Republic.

Papsdorf, Christian (2012). Die Beteiligung an Web 2.0-Phänomenen aus Perspektive des Mediatisierungsansatzes. In: Beyreuther, T./ Duske, K./ Eismann, C./ Hornung, S./ Kleemann, F. (Hg.), consumers@work. Zum neuen Verhältnis von Unternehmen und Usern im Web 2.0, S. 193-205. Frankfurt a.M./ New York: Campus.

I dagens samhälle finns musik överallt – men vad betyder
användningen av musik för människor? Betyder den
olika saker för olika människor? Smittsamt – En kulturstudie
av musikbruk bland tonårstjejer undersöker hur en särskild grupp tjejer
använde sig av musik i sin vardag och hur deras användning formade genusidentitet. Boken bygger på ett medieetnografiskt
fältarbete om musikkonsumtion och musikproduktion bland tjejer mellan fjorton och sexton år i en mellanstor svensk stad. All musik
som de lyssnade på och spelade själva diskuteras: exempelvis studeras betydelsen av genrer som hiphop, R&B och rock. Även fildelning, smak och känslors betydelse för hur musik
ingick i tjejernas vardag och identitetsskapande tas upp. Musik
och identitet överförs på ett ”smittande” sätt mellan
människor genom musikrelaterade medietekniker, känslor och smaker. Men överföringen begränsas också av olika barriärer som återskapar maktrelationer knutna till genus, ålder, klass, etnicitet och sexualitet.

The article analyzes the Walt Disney Company's adaptation of outsourcing and the relationship between the economic of oursourcing, the branded goods thus produced, and transnational corporations' use of a global division of labor. The author details Disney's oursourcing by examining the presence of Disney products in the Tucson market. Analysis includes local market of such products in terms of Disney's global business practices of contracting, subcontracting, and settling the conditions of labor. Results indicate close to half of products were produced by countries outside of the US and other industrialized countries with an annual wage per worker of $3,995. The findings demonstrate a specific way in which a transnational media conglomerate uses the global division of labor to increase its profits.

This paper explores diversity studies in broadcast journalism education and seeks to help answer a question faced by teachers: Does the material discussed in class make a difference in their lives? This research is a case study of university broadcast journalism students who took part in classes that explored the representation of people with disability (PWD) in the media. The research sought to explore whether diversity studies resonated in the post-university lives of journalism students.

Ranging from simple head scarf to full-body burqa, the veil is worn by vast numbers of Muslim women around the world. What Is Veiling? explains one of the most visible, controversial, and least understood emblems of Islam. Sahar Amer's evenhanded approach is anchored in sharp cultural insight and rich historical context. Addressing the significance of veiling in the religious, cultural, political, and social lives of Muslims, past and present, she examines the complex roles the practice has played in history, religion, conservative and progressive perspectives, politics and regionalism, society and economics, feminism, fashion, and art.

The 28-page open letter -- which uses classical religious references and covers 24 issues such as "the killing of innocents," "killing of emissaries," "jihad," "declaring people non-Muslim," "torture," and "the caliphate" -- is a result of deliberations by dozens of experts on Islamic law and offers a point-by-point deconstruction of any claimed religious justification for ISIS's brutal actions.

In its executive summary, the letter notes that Islam forbids the killing of innocent people, including diplomats, journalists and humanitarian aid workers. It also states that any jihad may only be defensive in nature with strict rules of conduct, that it is forbidden to harm religious minorities like Christians and Yazidis, and that it is forbidden to practice slavery, destroy religious shrines or deny the rights of women.

The letter's conclusion states:

"Islam is mercy and its attributes are merciful. The Prophet (peace be upon him), who was sent as a mercy for all the worlds, summarized a Muslim's dealings with others by saying: 'He who shows no mercy, will not be shown mercy;' and: 'Have mercy and you will be shown mercy.' But, as can be seen from everything mentioned, you have misinterpreted Islam into a religion of harshness, brutality, torture and murder. As elucidated, this is a great wrong and an offence to Islam, to Muslims and to the entire world. Reconsider all your actions; desist from them; repent from them; cease harming others and return to the religion of mercy."

To read the entire letter and initial list of signatories, go to: http://lettertobaghdadi.com/index.php

Schauwerte, Blickführung, dramatische Handlung, aufmerksamkeitsfördernde Maßnahmen, Emotionen durch Einstellungsgrößen: Mit diesen und anderen Mitteln setzte der deutsch-amerikanische Psychologe Kurt Lewin neue Maßstäbe im wissenschaftlichen Film. Mit seinen sozialpsychologischen Filmen popularisierte er für die Studierenden experimentelles Wissen. Der Beitrag setzt sich mit intermedialen Aspekten der  experimentalpsychologischen Wissensproduktion am Beispiel der Lewinschen Feldforschung auseinander und wendet sich gegen die weit verbreitete Annahme, dass wissenschaftliches Wissen ein "reines" Wissen ist, das seiner verwertenden Popularisierung vorausgeht. Im Beitrag wird dafür argumentiert, dass sich filmisches, populäres und wissenschaftliches Wissen wechselseitig bedingen und einen Möglichkeitsraum bilden können, in welchem sie aufeinander einwirken und durch ihr Zusammenspiel neue Wissenspraktiken entstehen.

The chapter explores oral history and reflexivity projects in university classrooms in the Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot communities in 1996 and 2010. The experiences are framed within Engaged Pedagogy, a synthesis of critical and feminist pedagogies stemming from the work of Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, which encourages involvement in the world beyond classroom walls for the purposes of personal and social transformation. Dervin’s Sense-Making Methodology provides a means of implementing the principles of Engaged Pedagogy. The experiences indicate that oral histories and related self-reflexive practices served to both validate and challenge personal and cultural experiences through the creation of a student base of ‘legitimate knowledge.’ Reflexive responses by students in Cyprus to their community interviews in 1996 and 2010 suggest that some participants experienced a transformative shift in perspective toward history, politics, and culture.
Self-reflexivity is explored as a lifelong method of promoting personal and social change.

Resumo: As histórias em quadrinhos
(HQs) são mídias de grande influência
na sociedade moderna. Contudo, o uso
pedagógico deste material é polêmico. A
revista Níquel Náusea, um quadrinho underground
brasileiro, traz em suas páginas
temas como evolução biológica, genética
e criacionismo, tratados com humor, ironia
e sarcasmo, características marcantes desta
vertente dos quadrinhos. Neste trabalho,
são discutidos os usos didáticos potenciais
de uma história em quadrinhos específica
(nas tiras da Níquel Náusea) no ensino de
um conteúdo escolar com fortes implicações
sociais: a teoria da evolução biológica.
Também são apontados possíveis
direcionamentos para os usos de histórias
em quadrinhos em sala de aula.

The vision of empowerment espoused by the community television
movement is explored through an interpretive study of producers at a public access cable television facility. The findings address media literacy, the dialectical nature of societal change, and critical pedagogist Paulo Freire's taxonomy of social action. The findings suggest that the application of advanced media technologies to more democratic purposes is possible with a focus on the critical use of the technological tools for social change.