Caroline Bassett
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719073427
- eISBN:
- 9781781700907
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719073427.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This book is a defence of narrative in an age of information. Stressing interpretation and experience alongside affect and sensation, it argues that narrative is key to contemporary forms of cultural ...
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This book is a defence of narrative in an age of information. Stressing interpretation and experience alongside affect and sensation, it argues that narrative is key to contemporary forms of cultural production and to the practice of contemporary life. Re-appraising the prospects for narrative in the digital age, the book insists on the centrality of narrative to informational culture and provokes a critical re-appraisal of how innovations in information technology as a material cultural form can be understood and assessed. It offers a careful exploration of narrative theory, a critique of techno-cultural writing, and a series of tightly focused case studies. All of which point the way to a restoration of a critical — rather than celebratory — approach to new media.Less
This book is a defence of narrative in an age of information. Stressing interpretation and experience alongside affect and sensation, it argues that narrative is key to contemporary forms of cultural production and to the practice of contemporary life. Re-appraising the prospects for narrative in the digital age, the book insists on the centrality of narrative to informational culture and provokes a critical re-appraisal of how innovations in information technology as a material cultural form can be understood and assessed. It offers a careful exploration of narrative theory, a critique of techno-cultural writing, and a series of tightly focused case studies. All of which point the way to a restoration of a critical — rather than celebratory — approach to new media.
Dave Boothroyd
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719055980
- eISBN:
- 9781781700921
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719055980.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
Never has a reconsideration of the place of drugs in our culture been more urgent than it is today. Drugs are seen as both panaceas and panapathogens, and the apparent irreconcilability of these ...
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Never has a reconsideration of the place of drugs in our culture been more urgent than it is today. Drugs are seen as both panaceas and panapathogens, and the apparent irreconcilability of these alternatives lies at the heart of the cultural crises they are perceived to engender. Yet the meanings attached to drugs are always a function of the places they come to occupy in culture. This book investigates the resources for a re-evaluation of the drugs and culture relation in several key areas of twentieth-century cultural and philosophical theory. Addressing themes such as the nature of consciousness, language and the body, alienation, selfhood, the image and virtuality, the nature/culture dyad and everyday life – as these are expressed in the work of such key figures as Freud, Benjamin, Sartre, Derrida, Foucault and Deleuze – it argues that the ideas and concepts by which modernity has attained its measure of self-understanding are themselves, in various ways, the products of encounters with drugs and their effects. In each case, the reader is directed to the points at which drugs figure in the formulations of ‘high theory’, and it is revealed how such thinking is never itself a drug-free zone. Consequently, there is no ground on which to distinguish ‘culture’ from ‘drug culture’ in the first place.Less
Never has a reconsideration of the place of drugs in our culture been more urgent than it is today. Drugs are seen as both panaceas and panapathogens, and the apparent irreconcilability of these alternatives lies at the heart of the cultural crises they are perceived to engender. Yet the meanings attached to drugs are always a function of the places they come to occupy in culture. This book investigates the resources for a re-evaluation of the drugs and culture relation in several key areas of twentieth-century cultural and philosophical theory. Addressing themes such as the nature of consciousness, language and the body, alienation, selfhood, the image and virtuality, the nature/culture dyad and everyday life – as these are expressed in the work of such key figures as Freud, Benjamin, Sartre, Derrida, Foucault and Deleuze – it argues that the ideas and concepts by which modernity has attained its measure of self-understanding are themselves, in various ways, the products of encounters with drugs and their effects. In each case, the reader is directed to the points at which drugs figure in the formulations of ‘high theory’, and it is revealed how such thinking is never itself a drug-free zone. Consequently, there is no ground on which to distinguish ‘culture’ from ‘drug culture’ in the first place.
Mark O'Brien
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780719096136
- eISBN:
- 9781526121004
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719096136.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This book examines the history of journalists and journalism in twentieth century Ireland. While many media institutions have been subjected to historical scrutiny, the professional and ...
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This book examines the history of journalists and journalism in twentieth century Ireland. While many media institutions have been subjected to historical scrutiny, the professional and organisational development of journalists, the changing practices of journalism, and the contribution of journalists and journalism to the evolution of modern Ireland have not. This book rectifies this deficit by mapping the development of journalism in Ireland from the late 1880s to today. Beginning with the premise that the position of journalists and the power of journalism are products of their time and are shaped by ever-shifting political, economic, technological, and cultural forces it examines the background and values of those who worked as journalists, how they viewed and understood their role over the decades, how they organised and what they stood for as a professional body, how the prevailing political and social atmosphere facilitated or constrained their work, and, crucially, how their work impacted on social change and contributed to the development of modern Ireland. Placing the experiences of journalists and the practice of journalism at the heart of its analysis it examines, for the first time, the work of journalists within the ever-changing context of Irish society. Based on strong primary research – including the previously un-consulted journals and records produced by the many journalistic representative organisations that came and went over the decades – and written in an accessible and engaging style, this book will appeal to anyone interested in journalism, history, the media, and the development of Ireland as a modern nation.Less
This book examines the history of journalists and journalism in twentieth century Ireland. While many media institutions have been subjected to historical scrutiny, the professional and organisational development of journalists, the changing practices of journalism, and the contribution of journalists and journalism to the evolution of modern Ireland have not. This book rectifies this deficit by mapping the development of journalism in Ireland from the late 1880s to today. Beginning with the premise that the position of journalists and the power of journalism are products of their time and are shaped by ever-shifting political, economic, technological, and cultural forces it examines the background and values of those who worked as journalists, how they viewed and understood their role over the decades, how they organised and what they stood for as a professional body, how the prevailing political and social atmosphere facilitated or constrained their work, and, crucially, how their work impacted on social change and contributed to the development of modern Ireland. Placing the experiences of journalists and the practice of journalism at the heart of its analysis it examines, for the first time, the work of journalists within the ever-changing context of Irish society. Based on strong primary research – including the previously un-consulted journals and records produced by the many journalistic representative organisations that came and went over the decades – and written in an accessible and engaging style, this book will appeal to anyone interested in journalism, history, the media, and the development of Ireland as a modern nation.
Jens Eder and Charlotte Klonk (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781526107213
- eISBN:
- 9781526120984
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526107213.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
Still and moving images are crucial factors in contemporary political conflicts. They not only have representational, expressive or illustrative functions, but also augment and create significant ...
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Still and moving images are crucial factors in contemporary political conflicts. They not only have representational, expressive or illustrative functions, but also augment and create significant events. Beyond altering states of mind, they affect bodies, and often life or death is at stake. Various forms of image operations are currently performed in the contexts of war, insurgency and activism. Photographs, videos, interactive simulations and other kinds of images steer drones to their targets, train soldiers, terrorise the public, celebrate protest icons, uncover injustices, or call for help. They are often parts of complex agential networks and move across different media and cultural environments. This book is a pioneering interdisciplinary study of the role and function of images in political life. Balancing theoretical reflections with in-depth case studies, it brings together renowned scholars and activists from different fields to offer a multifaceted critical perspective on a crucial aspect of contemporary visual culture.Less
Still and moving images are crucial factors in contemporary political conflicts. They not only have representational, expressive or illustrative functions, but also augment and create significant events. Beyond altering states of mind, they affect bodies, and often life or death is at stake. Various forms of image operations are currently performed in the contexts of war, insurgency and activism. Photographs, videos, interactive simulations and other kinds of images steer drones to their targets, train soldiers, terrorise the public, celebrate protest icons, uncover injustices, or call for help. They are often parts of complex agential networks and move across different media and cultural environments. This book is a pioneering interdisciplinary study of the role and function of images in political life. Balancing theoretical reflections with in-depth case studies, it brings together renowned scholars and activists from different fields to offer a multifaceted critical perspective on a crucial aspect of contemporary visual culture.
Diana Holmes and David Looseley
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780719078163
- eISBN:
- 9781781705056
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719078163.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This book, which is about what ‘popular culture’ means in France, and how the term's shifting meanings have been negotiated and contested, represents a theoretically informed study of the way that ...
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This book, which is about what ‘popular culture’ means in France, and how the term's shifting meanings have been negotiated and contested, represents a theoretically informed study of the way that popular culture is lived, imagined, fought over and negotiated in modern and contemporary France. It covers a wide range of overarching concerns: the roles of state policy, the market, political ideologies, changing social contexts and new technologies in the construction of the popular. But the book also provides a set of specific case studies showing how popular songs, stories, films, TV programmes and language styles have become indispensable elements of ‘culture’ in France. Deploying yet also rethinking a ‘Cultural Studies’ approach to the popular, it therefore challenges dominant views of what French culture really means today.Less
This book, which is about what ‘popular culture’ means in France, and how the term's shifting meanings have been negotiated and contested, represents a theoretically informed study of the way that popular culture is lived, imagined, fought over and negotiated in modern and contemporary France. It covers a wide range of overarching concerns: the roles of state policy, the market, political ideologies, changing social contexts and new technologies in the construction of the popular. But the book also provides a set of specific case studies showing how popular songs, stories, films, TV programmes and language styles have become indispensable elements of ‘culture’ in France. Deploying yet also rethinking a ‘Cultural Studies’ approach to the popular, it therefore challenges dominant views of what French culture really means today.
Barrie Gunter
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780719097874
- eISBN:
- 9781526104359
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719097874.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
Brands are introduced into the lives of consumers from an early age. Even before they start school, they can recognise brand names and ask for brands by name. The meaning of brands to children can ...
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Brands are introduced into the lives of consumers from an early age. Even before they start school, they can recognise brand names and ask for brands by name. The meaning of brands to children can vary dramatically with age. As with other aspects of consumer socialisation, children's initial orientation towards brands occurs at a superficial level because their level of cognitive development does not allow them to understand deeper-seated symbolic meanings of brands. This book examines these processes and how they evolve over the different stages of childhood. It considers specific models of cognitive development and how they inform what we know about the way children engage with brands. It also examines the way brands have adopted new promotional platforms in the digital era and in consequence the ways in which they have taken on new forms that often disguise their true purpose. While children can begin the understand the nature and purpose of advertising from well before their teen years, when advertising is less overt and more subtle – as it often is in the promotional techniques used by brands in online social media and virtual environments – this can impede a child's ability to recognise what is going on. This book examines these phenomena and considers their implications for the future regulation of brand promotions.Less
Brands are introduced into the lives of consumers from an early age. Even before they start school, they can recognise brand names and ask for brands by name. The meaning of brands to children can vary dramatically with age. As with other aspects of consumer socialisation, children's initial orientation towards brands occurs at a superficial level because their level of cognitive development does not allow them to understand deeper-seated symbolic meanings of brands. This book examines these processes and how they evolve over the different stages of childhood. It considers specific models of cognitive development and how they inform what we know about the way children engage with brands. It also examines the way brands have adopted new promotional platforms in the digital era and in consequence the ways in which they have taken on new forms that often disguise their true purpose. While children can begin the understand the nature and purpose of advertising from well before their teen years, when advertising is less overt and more subtle – as it often is in the promotional techniques used by brands in online social media and virtual environments – this can impede a child's ability to recognise what is going on. This book examines these phenomena and considers their implications for the future regulation of brand promotions.
Barry Atkins
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719063640
- eISBN:
- 9781781700235
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719063640.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This book is dedicated to the study of computer games in terms of the stories they tell and the manner of their telling. It applies practices of reading texts from literary and cultural studies to ...
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This book is dedicated to the study of computer games in terms of the stories they tell and the manner of their telling. It applies practices of reading texts from literary and cultural studies to consider the computer game as an emerging mode of contemporary storytelling. The book contains detailed discussion of narrative and realism in four of the most significant games of the last decade: ‘Tomb Raider’, ‘Half-Life’, ‘Close Combat’, and ‘Sim City’. It recognises the excitement and pleasure that has made the computer game such a massive global phenomenon.Less
This book is dedicated to the study of computer games in terms of the stories they tell and the manner of their telling. It applies practices of reading texts from literary and cultural studies to consider the computer game as an emerging mode of contemporary storytelling. The book contains detailed discussion of narrative and realism in four of the most significant games of the last decade: ‘Tomb Raider’, ‘Half-Life’, ‘Close Combat’, and ‘Sim City’. It recognises the excitement and pleasure that has made the computer game such a massive global phenomenon.
Peter J. Martin
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719072161
- eISBN:
- 9781781701492
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719072161.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This book explores the interface between musicological and sociological approaches to the analysis of music, and in doing so reveals the differing foundations of cultural studies and sociological ...
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This book explores the interface between musicological and sociological approaches to the analysis of music, and in doing so reveals the differing foundations of cultural studies and sociological perspectives more generally. Building on the arguments of his earlier book Sounds and society, the author initially contrasts text-based attempts to develop a ‘social’ analysis of music with sociological studies of musical activities in real cultural and institutional contexts. It is argued that the difficulties encountered by some of the ‘new’ musicologists in their efforts to introduce a social dimension to their work are often a result of their unfamiliarity with contemporary sociological discourse. Just as linguistic studies have moved from a concern with the meaning of words to a focus on how they are used, a sociological perspective directs our attention towards the ways in which the production and reception of music inevitably involve the collaborative activities of real people in particular times and places. The social meanings and significance of music, therefore, cannot be disclosed by analysis of the ‘texts’ alone, but only through the examination of the ways in which music is a constituent part of real social settings. This theme is developed through discussions of music in relation to processes of social stratification, the collaborative activities of improvising musicians, music as language, music as a ‘cultural object’ and music in everyday social situations.Less
This book explores the interface between musicological and sociological approaches to the analysis of music, and in doing so reveals the differing foundations of cultural studies and sociological perspectives more generally. Building on the arguments of his earlier book Sounds and society, the author initially contrasts text-based attempts to develop a ‘social’ analysis of music with sociological studies of musical activities in real cultural and institutional contexts. It is argued that the difficulties encountered by some of the ‘new’ musicologists in their efforts to introduce a social dimension to their work are often a result of their unfamiliarity with contemporary sociological discourse. Just as linguistic studies have moved from a concern with the meaning of words to a focus on how they are used, a sociological perspective directs our attention towards the ways in which the production and reception of music inevitably involve the collaborative activities of real people in particular times and places. The social meanings and significance of music, therefore, cannot be disclosed by analysis of the ‘texts’ alone, but only through the examination of the ways in which music is a constituent part of real social settings. This theme is developed through discussions of music in relation to processes of social stratification, the collaborative activities of improvising musicians, music as language, music as a ‘cultural object’ and music in everyday social situations.
John Corner
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719082603
- eISBN:
- 9781781703182
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719082603.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This book explores how issues of power, form and subjectivity feature at the core of all serious thinking about the media, including appreciations of their creativity as well as anxiety about the ...
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This book explores how issues of power, form and subjectivity feature at the core of all serious thinking about the media, including appreciations of their creativity as well as anxiety about the risks they pose. Drawing widely on an interdisciplinary literature, the author connects his exposition to examples from film, television, radio, photography, painting, web practice, music and writing in order to bring in topics as diverse as reporting the war in Afghanistan, the televising of football, documentary portrayals of 9/11, reality television, the diversity of taste in the arts and the construction of civic identity. The book is divided into two parts. In the first part, three big chapters on each of the key notions provide an interconnected discussion of the media activities opened up for exploration and the debates they have provoked. The second part presents examples, arguments and analysis drawing on the author's previous work around the core themes, with notes placing them in the context of the whole book. The book brings together concepts both from Social Studies and the Arts and Humanities, addressing a readership wider than the sub-specialisms of media research. It refreshes ideas about why the media matter, and how understanding them better remains a key aim of cultural inquiry and a continuing requirement for public policy.Less
This book explores how issues of power, form and subjectivity feature at the core of all serious thinking about the media, including appreciations of their creativity as well as anxiety about the risks they pose. Drawing widely on an interdisciplinary literature, the author connects his exposition to examples from film, television, radio, photography, painting, web practice, music and writing in order to bring in topics as diverse as reporting the war in Afghanistan, the televising of football, documentary portrayals of 9/11, reality television, the diversity of taste in the arts and the construction of civic identity. The book is divided into two parts. In the first part, three big chapters on each of the key notions provide an interconnected discussion of the media activities opened up for exploration and the debates they have provoked. The second part presents examples, arguments and analysis drawing on the author's previous work around the core themes, with notes placing them in the context of the whole book. The book brings together concepts both from Social Studies and the Arts and Humanities, addressing a readership wider than the sub-specialisms of media research. It refreshes ideas about why the media matter, and how understanding them better remains a key aim of cultural inquiry and a continuing requirement for public policy.
Sarah Daynes
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719076213
- eISBN:
- 9781781702116
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719076213.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
On the basis of a body of reggae songs from the 1970s and late 1990s, this book offers a sociological analysis of memory, hope and redemption in reggae music. From Dennis Brown to Sizzla, the way in ...
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On the basis of a body of reggae songs from the 1970s and late 1990s, this book offers a sociological analysis of memory, hope and redemption in reggae music. From Dennis Brown to Sizzla, the way in which reggae music constructs a musical, religious and socio-political memory in rupture with dominant models is illustrated by the lyrics themselves. How is the past remembered in the present? How does remembering the past allow for imagining the future? How does collective memory participate in the historical grounding of collective identity? What is the relationship between tradition and revolution, between the recollection of the past and the imagination of the future, between passivity and action? Ultimately, this case study of ‘memory at work’ opens up on a theoretical problem: the conceptualisation of time and its relationship with memory.Less
On the basis of a body of reggae songs from the 1970s and late 1990s, this book offers a sociological analysis of memory, hope and redemption in reggae music. From Dennis Brown to Sizzla, the way in which reggae music constructs a musical, religious and socio-political memory in rupture with dominant models is illustrated by the lyrics themselves. How is the past remembered in the present? How does remembering the past allow for imagining the future? How does collective memory participate in the historical grounding of collective identity? What is the relationship between tradition and revolution, between the recollection of the past and the imagination of the future, between passivity and action? Ultimately, this case study of ‘memory at work’ opens up on a theoretical problem: the conceptualisation of time and its relationship with memory.