This assignment relates to Topics 5–7: Cultural Studies, The Toronto School and Critical Theory.
Question
The setting – eConference: ‘Media and the War in Iraq’
The setting for this assignment is a virtual academic conference, set up in a learning module in the DSO site for this unit, where scholars will present their work and where you and other conference attendees will form groups to discuss and question the presentations.
The ̳keynote address‘ of the conference is the video documentary Weapons of Mass Deception, provided as part of the unit materials on DSO.
The three topics under study (Topics 5, 6 and 7) will be covered in three ̳sessions‘ of this virtual conference, where you should consider the readings for each topic as ̳conference papers‘ presented by various learned scholars. Therefore, the sessions are:
Session A: Topic 5, Cultural Studies—Reading 5.1, John Fiske (1992) Session B: Topic 6, The Toronto School—Textbook Chapter 12, Glenn Sparks (2009) and
Reading 6.1, Marshall McLuhan (1969)
Session C: Topic 7, Critical Theory—Reading 7.1, Lawrence Grossberg (1991) and Reading 7.2, Kevin Kawamoto (2003).
DSO Discussion
Once you have ̳attended‘ the keynote address and all three sessions (ie watched the video and read the papers), you should sign up for a discussion group in DSO. You should use your group‘s discussion area to examine the issues relating to media effects on audiences and society both raised in and evident in the keynote address, and answer the question ̳how does the keynote address fall or not fall under each of the three paradigms presented in the three sessions?‘
That is: Cultural Studies: How does the keynote address fall/not fall under the cultural studies
paradigm? Discuss the issues with reference to story telling and master narratives; dominant and subordinate groups; hegemony, polysemy (provide examples); dominant (preferred), negotiated and resistant (oppositional) reading of the video content (you may select one scene from the video for this part of the analysis); social power; the nature and role of ideological social apparatuses. Provide examples to illustrate how these concepts are embedded in the keynote address.
The Toronto School: How does the keynote address fall/not fall under the Toronto School paradigm? Discuss the issues related to technological determinism; the ̳global village‘; globalisation; use of the mass media by politicians and others and for propaganda. Provide examples to illustrate how these concepts are embedded in the keynote address.
Critical Theory: How does the keynote address fall/not fall under the Critical Theory paradigm? What is the dominant ideology embedded in the mainstream media coverage of the Iraq War as discussed in the keynote speech and how does it affect audiences and society? What alternative ideologies or explanations can be proposed? Discuss the issues related to war coverage by the mainstream media as infotainment or part of popular culture; the advocacy role of the keynote speaker and others featured in the speech; the political agendas of various social groups embedded in, as well as exposed by, the keynote address; how the new media technologies empower and liberate as well as dis-empower and oppress various powerless groups in society; how these new technologies challenge as well as reinforce the status quo. What abuses of power and violations of rights are discussed in the keynote address? How would media policy-making and regulations affect the media coverage of the Iraq War? Provide examples to illustrate how these concepts are embedded in the keynote address.
Examples of topics you could consider in your discussions are: mainstream media coverage of the war in Iraq alternative media coverage of the Iraq war the media and patriotism after September 11, 2001 media cheerleading of the US involvement in Iraq mainstream and alternative media coverage of anti-war protests the Fox News Effect
embedded journalism government power and media control media censorship/self-censorship during the Iraq War war coverage as infotainment communication technologies used in the reporting of the Gulf War misinformation during the Gulf War Changes to the mainstream media‘s coverage of the war since 2006; within the context
of the 2008 US Presidential campaign; and since President Barack Obama took office in
2009. Changes to how we receive information about the war with new media technologies
such as social networking sites, blogs, Wikileaks etc. in recent times.
You should use the keynote address and session papers as a starting point for your discussions, but you are free to agree or disagree with the keynote speaker or other presenters, and draw on any other sources of information when arguing a point. However, your arguments need to be supported by evidence, factually accurate, based on official figures and statistics, and valid from the point of view of the discipline of communication studies. For example, the arguments should be based on the basic concept that the media in democratic nations should be free, and journalists have a responsibility to society as members of the fourth estate.
Your ‘e-conference debrief’ paper
Your final task is to write a formal, 1500-word ̳e-conference debrief‘ paper for a journal, analysing the keynote address in terms of the approaches described in the three sessions. You are required to quote 200 words of your own and 200 words of other students‘ postings to DSO as you develop your arguments.
Electronic submission of your ‘e-conference debrief’ paper
Your ̳e-conference debrief‘ paper should be submitted electronically via the assignment submission tool in the e-conference learning tool in the DSO site for this unit by the due date. Your unit chair, with
help from other ̳reviewers‘ (assignment markers), will review your paper and provide ratings (marks and grades) for the following aspects:
Fulfilment of overall task intent use of information (including evidence and examples) application of theories and/or concepts dealt within the unit structure and organisation of the essay language use.
You will also be given feedback (marker‘s comments) for improving the paper for publication in the journal.
Every time a grammar mistake gets printed a kitten dies.
Teachers just clump a bunch of people together with different schedules, different ways of doing things, varying degrees of work ethic... and expect things to go well? 
It's sucked monkey balls in SO many ways. Hopefully next week will be better.
Off to shower, go too an appt., have lunch with my daughter, and then go back to work today. Tomorrow. Monday....
He died eventually.
