The Media Studies Reader

The Media Studies Reader is a broad and accessible anthology that addresses the key topics, debates and theoretical perspectives associated with the interdisciplinary field of media studies.

Emphasizing critical and cultural approaches, the collection provides an up-to-date survey of the major sub-areas of Media Studies including:

• 1) media and power,
• 2) media technologies,
• 3) media institutions,
• 4) advertising and commercialism,
• 5) signification and representation,
• 6) identity and self-fashioning,
• 7) audiences and social practices
• 8) media and citizenship.

The Media Studies Reader presents foundational essays by leading scholars alongside the most influential new writing in the field today. Defining media in the widest sense, the chapters address traditional mass media (film, television, print) as well as new media technologies and practices (interactive games, file-sharing, social networking sites). The collection encompasses a wide range of conceptual vantage points, including political economy, semiotics, ideological and myth analysis, cultural studies, audience and fan studies, identity and representational politics, public sphere theory and newer work on interactivity, governmentality and self-fashioning.

Critical introductions for each section and headnotes for each reading are used to help students place the material in context and highlight key issues, and longer pieces are selectively edited for conciseness and accessibility.

The Media Studies Reader provides an entry point into the critical media studies tradition ' as well as a timely account of new theoretical moves and technological developments. A map of a rapidly growing ' and changing ' field, it will be an invaluable resource to students as well as established scholars.