Media and Society
Code
722011060
Academic unit
Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas
Department
Ciências da Comunicação
Credits
10
Weekly hours
3 letivas + 1 tutorial
Teaching language
Portuguese
Objectives
a) to understand the phenomenon of communication nowadays in a social perspective (the specificity and the relation of the economic, political and cultural dimensions)
b) to reach a global theoretical standpoint on the major research topics in the area of media and communication studies
c) raise a critical thought on the most important schools and theoretical orientations in this field of study
d) master the fundamental knowledge of the field and demonstrate proficiency on its critical analysis (theories, concepts, methodologies, tools and research techniques)
e) demonstrate the ability to critical reading (from a set of required texts)
f) demonstrate capacity to apply knowledge in solving research problems (formulation of problems and research projects, development of research field)
Prerequisites
None.
Subject matter
Public Sphere and Democracy, in the context of complex societies and the pluralistic culture of nowadays, is the central subject in this Seminar.
For the discussion are convened some main lines of research of the social studies of communication: 1. the current forms of Public Sphere and Public Opinion 2. the Ethics and Moral of Public Communication 3. the new Social Movements and Identities and the Politics of Recognition 4. Communication and Power 5. Deliberative Democracy and Civil Society in the context of Networks and the New Technologies of Information and Communication.
The media deserve a special attention as a result of their increasing presence in our social life. Its double dimension, as functional instruments of processing information and as symbolic mediation devices of production of communication, will be considered as revealing a fundamental ambivalence which marks the societies of nowadays and the current development process.
Bibliography
- P. Dahlgren, (2009), Media and political engagement, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press
- C. Fuchs (2011), Foundations of critical media and information studies, London:
Routledge
- C. Fuchs (2008), Internet and society, London: Routledge
- L. Dahlberg e S. Phelan (2011), Discourse theory and critical media politics, London:
Palgrave Macmillan
- J. Curran (2011); Media and democracy, London: Routledge
- T. Gitlin (2007), Media unlimited, N. York: Holts Paperbacks
- J. Habermas (1992), Facticidad y validez, Madrid: Trotta
- J. Bohman (1996), Public deliberation, Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press
- A. Honneth (1995), The fragmented world of the social, N. York: State Univ. N. York
Press
- S. Splichal (1999), Public Opinion, N.York: Rowman & Littlefield Pub.
- J. Pissarra Esteves (2003), Espaço público e democracia, Lisboa: Colibri.
- J. Pissarra Esteves (2012), Sociologia da comunicação, Lisboa: FCG
Teaching method
Oral presentation of the fundamental contents of the syllabus, after the previous readings performed by the students of the reference texts, in order to provide a deeper questioning of knowledge and its group discussion.
Monitoring of individual research plans (approval of projects and of the other research tasks to perform).
Evaluation method
The individual research projects should be structured as a development of one of the topics of the syllabus and in accordance with the personal goals/interests of each student (the theme of its final dissertation), and will be presented in the form of a paper (20-30 pp.), complying with the requirements of scientific publication.