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Sensing the Grim Reaper lurking nearby, I had neither the time nor inclination to pursue a traditional publisher. While getting critiques from scholars around the country is worthwhile, the process invariably involves publisher pressure to put the material into a worn-out mold resulting in a media text bearing little difference from what’s already abundantly available. Writing with no one looking over my shoulder with the bottom line in mind proved liberating, freed, as it were, from the descriptive approach most leading publishers demand. The abundance of details in most of the significant selling media texts overwhelms rather than enlightens. And little in them requires scrutiny and contemplation, provoking students to think critically or allowing for substantive discussion of issues in a wide range of areas relevant to the rapidly changing media environment. The requisite format severely restricts analysis by treating each medium and related matters in fifteen distinct chapters ranging from digital gaming and newspapers to media economics, legal controls, and media effects without any unifying theme. Treating these interrelated areas separately with no more than a week to discuss them in a typical semester does a disservice to the students, providing a shaky foundation for the kind work done in advanced classes in the field these days. Insights from analytical approaches like structuralism, cognitive psychology, and social neuroscience receive little consideration or application. Despite its appearance in titles and subtitles, the concept of culture—an integral part of media studies—gets short shrift after the opening chapter. For the most part, the focus remains on mass communication. This historical anomaly no longer reflects how public discourse or the media studies discipline has changed over the decades.Some of these books met a need when first published but are now out of step with the way media studies moved in recent years. As personal experience made apparent, sticking with the same book often results from inertia rather than satisfaction, having worked with several primary texts over many semesters because they required very few changes. Although tackling a new approach is no small endeavor, the switch to an introductory orientation that broadly defines the communications media, opening up many new avenues of inquiry for further investigation should make the whole process rewarding and worthwhile. An exploration of the interactions among media, meaning, culture, and history at the foundation course level has taken on ever greater urgency as the country increasingly moves into cyberspace’s cultural cocoons that foster often disembodied divisive communities along with social separation and fragmentation.Responses to the author’s Making Sense of Movies:“For me, the best thing... is its readability. It deals with a wide range of material in an intelligent, literate way.” -- Arthur Fried, Plymouth State College“A lively, intelligent book that, on its own, will inspire ambitious courses and provoke interesting discussions.” -- Linda Mizejewski, Ohio State University“The coverage of early censorship is marvelous, as good as I’ve read anywhere in summary form.” -- Robin Matthews, Golden West College“The real strength... is its conception of the `movie idiom’... bridging production, history, and textual analysis.” -- Amy Villarejo, Cornell University“I couldn’t be more impressed with this book. I especially love its scope and its ability to cover a great deal of territory in a small amount of space.” -- Tom Isbell, University of Minnesota, Duluth“Because of the stories, because of the writing, because of the problem-solving examples, I think this book could be a loved piece of reading....” -- Robin Bates, St. Mary’s College of Maryland
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- Title: Making Sense of Media: A Cultural-Historical Approach
- Author : Robert Henry Stanley
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- Genre: Books,Humor & Entertainment,Radio
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