Entertainment media are rife with material that touches on the political. The stories with which we entertain ourselves often show us, for better or worse, that everything can be solved by the rise of an individual hero, and that the “best way” to deal with a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Our stories portray individuals along the lines of gender, racial, and ethnic stereotypes; offer us villains that are one-dimensional characters driven by evil; and show us politicians who are almost always corrupt, self-serving, and/or incompetent. They offer up models for how to deal with oppressive authority and they typically portray worlds that are just, where those who do the right thing come out on top. Entire entertainment genres, with their shared story telling conventions and common plot devices, provide lessons and perspectives that are relevant to how the public sees political issues. The stories that entertain us show us all these things and more, but to what effect? Does the pervasive politically relevant content that can be found not just in political entertainment shows, like House of Cards, but also in entertainment like Game of Thrones, that, on the surface, has nothing to do with modern politics, affect people’s perspectives on the political world? That is the central question of this volume. This book discusses the type of content in entertainment media that has the best chance of influencing political beliefs, draws from the work of scholars in a number of disciplines in order to forge a theory explaining how and when entertainment media will affect political perspectives, and presents a series of empirical studies using experiments and surveys that demonstrate the effect of politically relevant content in shows such as Game of Thrones, House of Cards, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, in genres such science fiction, and through pervasive villain and leader character types.

Now in its second edition, Entertainment & Politics is an essential text for understanding how young people acquire and hold political beliefs over time. In this updated and expanded edition, the author reaches beyond the U.S., including research on Canada, Great Britain, and Ireland to investigate a broader international picture of the effect the entertainment media has on the socio-political beliefs of young people. The book examines the many ways that the entertainment media influence young people, and the extent to which young people's beliefs differ from those of their parents, teachers, and peers. Findings indicate that media's influence does not fit into neat «conservative» and «left/liberal» patterns, but interacts with parental and peer influence in heretofore unexamined ways. This up-to-date text is designed for undergraduates, graduate students, professors, and interested lay readers.

Contrary to arguments that television is detrimental to democracy, Entertaining Politics explores the role of new political television in shaping a changing civic culture. Jeffrey P. Jones shows how viewers understand and make use of the increasingly blurred lines between 'serious' and 'entertainment' programming and argues that alarmist critics who predict the end of politics in the age of television have misconstrued the role of the medium and the commitment of audiences to both TV and public life. Visit our website for sample chapters!

In this completely revised and updated edition (including eight new chapters), Jeffrey Jones charts the evolution and maturation of political entertainment television by examining The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Colbert Report, Politically Incorrect/Real Time with Bill Maher, and Michael Moore's TV Nation and The Awful Truth. This volume investigates how and why these shows have been central locations for the critique of political and economic power and an important resource for citizens during numerous political crises. In an age of Truthiness, fake news and humorous political talk have proven themselves viable forms of alternative reporting and critical means for ascertaining truth, and in the process, questioning the legitimacy of news media's role as the primary mediator of political life. The book also addresses the persistent claims that these programs have cynical effects and create misinformed young citizens, demonstrating instead how such programming provides for an informed, active, and meaningful citizenship. The new edition takes account of the many changes that have occurred in television and political culture since Entertaining Politics' initial release.

Empires of Entertainment integrates legal, regulatory, industrial, and political histories to chronicle the dramatic transformation within the media between 1980 and 1996. Through the use of case studies that highlight key moments in this transformation, Holt skillfully expands the conventional models and boundaries of media history.

This widely used and popular text provides a broad-ranging analysis of the relationship between the media and politics. Revised and updated throughout, this second edition includes coverage of the mediatization of politics; of E-politics and governance; of the impact of 'reality TV'; and of issues raised by the reporting of war in Iraq.

This book investigates how individual politicians and political parties strategically make use of the media to reach their political goals. Looking beyond a purely Americentric viewpoint, the chapters present data from more than ten Western democracies to argue that the media are both a source of information and an arena for political communication. This double functional role of the media is examined from both a theoretical and an empirical perspective, including chapters dealing with different aspects of politics - from campaigning to law making - and within different political contexts. The role of the news media is discussed from the perspective of the political actor, focusing on both the opportunities and the constraints the news media provide, resulting in a multidisciplinary text that will appeal to students and scholars of both communication and political science.