The Media and Social Theory

Media studies needs richer and livelier intellectual resources. This book brings together major and emerging international media analysts to consider key processes of media change, using a number of critical perspectives. Case studies range from reality television to professional journalism, from blogging to control of copyright, from social networking sites to indigenous media, in Europe, North America, Asia and elsewhere. Among the theoretical approaches and issues addressed are:


critical realism
post-structuralist approaches to media and culture
Pierre Bourdieu and field theory
public sphere theory – including post-Habermasian versions
actor network theory
Marxist and post-Marxist theories, including contemporary critical theory
theories of democracy, antagonism and difference.

This volume is essential reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students and researchers of cultural studies, media studies and social theory.

David Hesmondhalgh is Professor of Media and Music Industries in the Institute of Communcations Studies at the University of Leeds. His books include The Cultural Industries (2nd edition, 2007), Media Production (2006) and Understanding Media: Inside Celebrity (with Jessica Evans, 2005).
Jason Toynbee is Senior Lecturer in Media Studies at the Open University. His books include Bob Marley: Herald of a Postcolonial World? (2007), Analysing Media Texts (with Marie Gillespie, 2006) and Making Popular Music (2000).

1. Why Media Studies Needs Better Social Theory, David Hesmondhalgh and Jason Toynbee Part 1: Power and Democracy 2. Media and the Paradoxes of Pluralism, Kari Karppinen 3. Neoliberalism, Social Movements, and Change in Media Systems in the Late Twentieth Century, Daniel C. Hallin 4. Recognition and the Renewal of Ideology Critique, John Downey 5. Cosmopolitan Temptations, Communicative Spaces and the European Union, Philip Schlesinger Part 2: Spatial Inequalities 6. Neoliberalism, Imperialism and the Media, David Hesmondhalgh 7. One Letter, Two Presidents and a Global Audience: The Shifting Spatialities of Contemporary Communication, Annabelle Sreberny 8. Rethinking the Digital Age, Faye Ginsburg 9. Media and Mobility in a Transnational World, Purnima Mankekar Part 3: Spectacle and The Self 10. Form and Power in an Age of Continuous Spectacle, Nick Couldry 11. Spectacular Morality: Reality Television, Individualisation and the Remaking of the Working Class, Helen Wood and Bev Skeggs 12. Variations on the Branded Self: Theme, Invention, Improvisation and Inventory, Alison Hearn Part 4: Media Labour and Production 13. Step Away from the Croissant: Media Studies 3.0, Toby Miller 14. Sex and Drugs and Bait and Switch: Rockumentary and the New Model Worker, Matt Stahl 15. Journalism: Expertise, Authority and Power in Democratic Life, Christopher Anderson 16. Media Making and Social Reality, Jason Toynbee