"Michael R. Real is one of our best writers in the arena of critical studies in mass communication, and he has made his most significant contribution to date with Exploring Media Culture. The book is insightful, thought-provoking, and authoritative yet is highly accessible to undergraduate and graduate students alike. Professor Real knows where to find his college readers, and he meets them where they live. His explanations are candid, his examples timely, and his positions compelling. The case studies afford some of the best exemplars of the intersection of ritual participation and media texts in everyday life ever published. Exploring Media Culture is no ordinary textbook. It is a primer for life in the information age. In fact, this may be the first media criticism book that students will want to keep on their bookshelves long after they have graduated from college." --Robert K. Avery, Professor of Communication, University of Utah "Exploring Media Culture is a beautifully written, intellectually challenging, and highly readable exploration of the mysterium of contemporary mass media and popular culture. Michael R. Real does a masterful job of empowering his readers--teaching them how to make sense of everything from Madonna to postmodernism. Students will find this book - which deals with texts that many of them are familiar with -- fascinating, and in some cases terrifying." --Arthur Asa Berger, Broadcast & Electronic Communication Arts Department, San Francisco State University Providing a timely, fresh interpretation of media analysis, Exploring Media Culture is an engaging alternative to the typical mass communication text. Expanding on the approach used in his previous work, author Michael R. Real examines the interplay between popular culture and the media. Each chapter uses an aspect of popular culture to explicate a variety of complex topics such as ritual, postmodernism, identity, and political economy. Real includes analysis of such cultural phenomena as: - Hollywood films, the Superbowl, and presidential elections - MTV, video games, and the Internet - Music, aerobics classes, and the Olympics By staying close to texts, narratives, interpretations, and rituals of actual people, readers can "lay open" great ranges of media culture without getting lost in the most esoteric, though important of scholarly debates today. Exploring Media Culture is a guide for those who expect to attend to film, television, popular music, and similar media culture or conduct formal research on media. Students in communication, media studies, mass communication sociology, cultural studies, and popular culture will find this text is ideal for the classroom; it synthesizes a wide range of recent scholarship in an understandable format.

'A beautifully written, intellectually challenging, and highly readable exploration of the mysteries of contemporary mass media and popular culture. Real does a masterful job of empowering his readers. Students will find this book fascinating, and in some cases terrifying' - Arthur Asa Berger, San Francisco State University

From Donald Trump’s use of Twitter, to social media mourning, to cyber-bullying: the evidence of media influence today is all around us. As such, good media research is more important than ever, and crucially, is something all students can and should do. Exploring Media Research is an eye-opening exploration of what it means to understand and do media research today. Carefully balancing theory and practice, Andy Ruddock demystifies the process, showing you don’t need huge amounts of time or money to do meaningful media analysis. The book: Introduces students to the scope and seriousness of media influence Shows them how to tie their own interests to academic concepts and research issues Explains how to use this understanding to develop proper research questions Translates key theoretical concepts into actual research methods students can use to explore the media texts, events, markets and professionals that interest them. Bringing theory to life throughout with a range of contemporary case studies, Exploring Media Research is a thoughtful and practical guide to gathering and analysing media data. It is essential reading for students of media, communication and cultural studies.

An introduction to the study of visual culture, this book offers a view of 'visual culture' that includes not only images, but also other visual media and forms of expression, from architecture to fashion, design and the human body. The book is organised around three broad themes, exploring key ideas and debates that have occurred during the last 20 or so years: *the meanings of the term 'visual culture' and of the various practices that form its basis*conceptual approaches to the contemporary analysis of visual culture*the cultural, social and historical contexts informing its production, distribution and consumption.Drawing on a wide range of examples from the last 100 years, the book adopts a cross-disciplinary perspective; it also explores, however, the limits of visual culture as an interdisciplinary field of study, engaging in current debates about the uses and value of the study of visual culture. It will therefore be of value both for readers new to the subject and also for those seeking fresh interventions into contemporary discussions within the field.Features*Accessibly written by a team of experts in the field*Illustrated throughout*Includes chapters on a wide range of visual forms, including architecture and urban design, film, crafts, fashion, design, fine art and the media.

A study of Everquest that provides a snapshot of multiplayer gaming culture, questions the truism that computer games are isolating and alienating, and offers insights into broader issues of work and play, gender identity, technology, and commercial culture. In Play Between Worlds, T. L. Taylor examines multiplayer gaming life as it is lived on the borders, in the gaps—as players slip in and out of complex social networks that cross online and offline space. Taylor questions the common assumption that playing computer games is an isolating and alienating activity indulged in by solitary teenage boys. Massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs), in which thousands of players participate in a virtual game world in real time, are in fact actively designed for sociability. Games like the popular Everquest, she argues, are fundamentally social spaces. Taylor's detailed look at Everquest offers a snapshot of multiplayer culture. Drawing on her own experience as an Everquest player (as a female Gnome Necromancer)—including her attendance at an Everquest Fan Faire, with its blurring of online—and offline life—and extensive research, Taylor not only shows us something about games but raises broader cultural issues. She considers "power gamers," who play in ways that seem closer to work, and examines our underlying notions of what constitutes play—and why play sometimes feels like work and may even be painful, repetitive, and boring. She looks at the women who play Everquest and finds they don't fit the narrow stereotype of women gamers, which may cast into doubt our standardized and preconceived ideas of femininity. And she explores the questions of who owns game space—what happens when emergent player culture confronts the major corporation behind the game.

The mass media open our private lives to the world around us. They are central to economic, cultural and political processes, through words, images and music. They address us in innumerable genres - from advertising to news journalism, from soap operas to sports coverage, from political debates to feature films and novels. This refreshingly different introduction to media studies offers an understanding of the mass media which is critical but which does not deny the pleasures they offer. Reflecting the trends of today's media and cultural studies courses, it introduces students both to social scientific approaches and those of the humanities and aesthetics. The central debates of media and communication studies are presented, starting from the individual's relation to the mass media and exploring questions of identity, influence and social differences. It then introduces the different methods used in analysing media texts, and concludes with a discussion of the public sphere and democracy, media technology, institutions and production. Each topic is presented in such a way as to encourage the reader to take part in discussions and further work. Understanding Media Culture is written in an engaged and engaging way and offers an invitation to a deeper understanding for anyone interested in the field.

Contributors from diverse backgrounds explore a range of issues in relation to the media and journalism's role in ascribing meaning to tourism practices. This fascinating account offers a thoroughly international and interdisciplinary perspective on an increasingly important field of journalism scholarship.