COMS201-20S1 (C) Semester One 2020

Media Audiences

15 points

Details:
Start Date: Monday, 17 February 2020
End Date: Sunday, 21 June 2020
Withdrawal Dates
Last Day to withdraw from this course:
  • Without financial penalty (full fee refund): Friday, 28 February 2020
  • Without academic penalty (including no fee refund): Friday, 29 May 2020

Description

How does our media consumption shape our opinions, actions, identities and lives? How do audiences influence the production and circulation of media? How do we create our own media presence online, and act as an audience for each other? This course will examine the relationship between audiences and media. We will discuss theory and research that represents audiences as passive consumers of media products, active decoders of media texts, producers of our own representations online, and participants in interactive media production. The course will look at a broad range of media forms (such as television, radio, film, the Internet, social networking, home theatre, cell phones and videogames), and content (including violence, music, reality television, soap operas, news, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs). “Media Audiences” will encourage you to reflect on your own relationship with media, and to consider the broader contexts that shape your listening, viewing, reading, and interaction. We will also be intertwining the theory of audiences with a ‘live' research exercise which will guide you through the necessary steps to conducting your own research.

How does our media consumption shape our opinions, actions, identities and lives? How do audiences influence the production and circulation of media? How do we create our own media presence online, and act as an audience for each other? This course will examine the relationship between audiences and media. We will discuss theory and research that represents audiences as passive consumers of media products, active decoders of media texts, producers of our own representations online, and participants in interactive media production. The course will look at a broad range of media forms (such as television, radio, film, the Internet, social networking, home theatre, cell phones and videogames), and content (including violence, music, reality television, soap operas, news, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs). “Media Audiences” will encourage you to reflect on your own relationship with media, and to consider the broader contexts that shape your listening, viewing, reading, and interaction.

We will also be intertwining the theory of audiences with a ‘live' research exercise which will guide you through the necessary steps to conducting your own research.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, you should be able to:
- understand how audience studies and research fits into the field of media & communication studies.
- describe a range of theories of the audience
- apply these theories to contemporary media issues and debates
- use audience research to discuss the relationship of media and culture
- reflect critically on your own media use
- use audience research methodologies to design and conduct your own research.

University Graduate Attributes

This course will provide students with an opportunity to develop the Graduate Attributes specified below:

Critically competent in a core academic discipline of their award

Students know and can critically evaluate and, where applicable, apply this knowledge to topics/issues within their majoring subject.

Employable, innovative and enterprising

Students will develop key skills and attributes sought by employers that can be used in a range of applications.

Biculturally competent and confident

Students will be aware of and understand the nature of biculturalism in Aotearoa New Zealand, and its relevance to their area of study and/or their degree.

Engaged with the community

Students will have observed and understood a culture within a community by reflecting on their own performance and experiences within that community.

Globally aware

Students will comprehend the influence of global conditions on their discipline and will be competent in engaging with global and multi-cultural contexts.

Prerequisites

Any 15 points at 100 level from COMS or CULT, or
any 60 points at 100 level from the Schedule V of the BA.

Restrictions

Equivalent Courses

Course Coordinator

Zita Joyce

Assessment

Assessment Due Date Percentage  Description
Participation 5%
Responses to Danah Boyd's Book 20% Due throughout course, 4x500 word reflections on chapters of danah boyd's book, 'It's Complicated: The Social lives of Networked Teens'
Literature Review 03 Apr 2020 20% 1500 words
Collaborative research report 25 May 2020 35% 3000-3500 words
Exam (online) 20% Take-home exam tasks will be given out at end of semester. There will be a 24-hour window to submit your take-home exam on Learn during the official examinations period.

Textbooks / Resources

There will be a compulsory reading set for each week of this course, and it is expected that you will read it before the lecture. The Learn page also contains extra material for each week, which will be referred to in the lectures, and should be useful for your own research and exam questions.

The course readings will be available as PDFs on Learn.

Indicative Fees

Domestic fee $777.00

International fee $3,375.00

* All fees are inclusive of NZ GST or any equivalent overseas tax, and do not include any programme level discount or additional course-related expenses.

For further information see Language, Social and Political Sciences .

All COMS201 Occurrences

  • COMS201-20S1 (C) Semester One 2020