Media Today: An Introduction to Mass Communication Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I teach a course in Mass Media and this is the text we use. Regarding the other review left here for the book.. it is really not meant to be casual or 'easy' reading -- it is meant to be an in depth exploration of (often) complicated issues.
Things I like about the text:
- important vocabulary is pulled out to the margins for easy identification
- the importance of media literacy and cultural implications are explored
- various types of media are addressed *as well as* important tangental issues like conglomerates, advertising, etc.
- modern examples that are easily recognizable to students are used
Things I'd like to see done differently:
- The questions at the end of each chapter/unit could be better. Many of them are purely reading comprehension.. which is fine.. but I'd also like to see questions that require more synthesis or depth of understanding.
- It would be great if there could be some sort cross-reference done within the text.
Overall, I give this book high marks for solid information well presented.

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Media Today puts mass communication students at the center of the profound changes in the twenty-first century media world - from digital convergence to media ownership - and gives them the skills to think critically about what these changes mean for the role of media in their lives. Comprehensive and engaging, Media Today features:an interactive companion website featuring a full range of instructor and student materials including study podcasts at www.routledge.com/textbooks/mediatodaya three-pronged media systems approach focused on media literacy, convergence, and emerging trends in today's media cultureup-to-date coverage of the latest political, economic, technological, and cultural issues affecting media industriesexciting new resources including an enclosed free DVD with media examples. Completely revised with updated examples, case studies, and media resources, the third edition of this innovative mass communication textbook is built upon a media systems approach that gives students an insider's perspective on how mass media industries operate. By making students more knowledgeable about the influences that guide media organizations, Media Today builds media literacy skills to make students sensitive to ways of seeing media content as a means of learning about culture. Joseph Turow emphasizes throughout the many ways in which media convergence has blurred distinctions between and among various media. Each chapter of Media Today will:guide students through the essential history of media industriesexamines the current forces shaping their creation, distribution and exhibitionexplores the impact of emerging trends in media and society from globalization to social networking to video games. Media Today is designed to be used independently, but can also be used with the supplemental textbook edited by Brooke Erin Duffy and Joseph Turow, Key Readings in Media Today.

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Milestones in Mass Communication Research (3rd Edition) Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Students of the theoretical side of mass communications, and who are looking for a historical angle, will find this textbook quite informative. A strong opening chapter outlines the traditions and techniques of communications research, and then the book goes into a collection of influential studies. Some are quite famous, like the case study of the War of the Worlds panic or various government-sanctioned studies on the effects of TV on children. The authors do a good job of introducing each study and explaining its influences on communication theory, and that goes double for some studies that didn't even start out in the communications paradigm but had an unexpected influence, such as the study on diffusion of innovations among Iowa farmers. But those strong points can't quite hold up the entire book, as the writing style tends toward hyperbolic statements of importance, and the individual studies are so painstakingly explained that the book starts to appear extraneous, as one could just read the individual studies themselves and gain almost the same amount of knowledge. And finally, this book is docked one star due to the monstrously excessive retail price. This is a function of forced scarcity in the college textbook market. Paying that much for a paperback book with about 400 pages is beyond obscene. Buy a used copy, so at least you're giving a percentage back to some poor sap who already got soaked by the publisher. [~doomsdayer520~]

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