Terms list of all content from both the literature and the lectures

MEDIA INDUSTRIES AND AUDIENCES TERMS

CHAPTER 1

- Multi-tasking  using more than one form of media at a time
- Social Construction of Reality  the process of actively creating meaning of observations / the
process of shaping reality through social interactions
- Different Forms of Mass Media  print medium, sound recording, film medium, broadcast
medium, “new media”
- Relationship within Institution  involves the interaction of individuals occupying their institutional
roles and positions (screenwriter and manager)
- Narrowcasting  a move away from the mass broadcast audience toward smaller, more specialized
niche population
- Sociology  suggests we need to look at the relationships between media and the social world (in
order to understand the media and its impact on our society – seeing the connections between
private troubles and public issues)
- Mass Media in Socialization  the process whereby we learn and internalize the values, beliefs and
norms of our culture and in doing so develop a sense of self
- Three Types of Social Relations  relationships between institutions, relationships without an
institution, relationships between institutions and individuals
- Relationships Between Institutions  the interaction between the media industry and the
government
- Relationships Between Institutions and Individuals  interaction of those who are always part of
larger social groups (use of media products by audiences/readers)
- Structure  constraint on human action; any recurring pattern of social behavior
- Mass Media in Social Relations  media does not only play an important role in almost all aspects
of our daily lives, but it also affects how we learn about the world and interact with others – our
views on life and our knowledge is influences by what we have been told by the media, not
experience
- Relationship Within Institution  involves the interaction of individuals occupying their
institutional roles and positions (screenwriter and manager)

CHAPTER 2

- Production Perspective  highlights the fact most media products are the result of a complex
production process shaped by a variety of social structural forces that operate on various levels,
some affecting the industry as a whole, some affecting particular actors or groups of actors within
the industry
- Conglomerate  a corporation that owns a collection of other companies in mass media
enterprises
- Vertical integration  the process by which one owner acquires all aspects of production and
distribution of a single type of media product
- Horizontal integration  the process by which one company buys different kinds of media,
concentrating ownership across different types of media rather than up and down through one
industry
- Synergy  the dynamic where components of a company work together to produce benefits that
would be impossible for a single, separately operated unit of the company

, - Media Pluralism  the degree to which there is diversity in media content readily available to
audiences
- Hypothesis  a proposition to be studied
- Homogenization Hypothesis  the combination of ownership concentration and growing
horizontal integration leads to the conclusion that the absence of competition in the media industry
will lead to homogeneous media products that serve the interests of the increasingly small number
of owners
- Vertical diversity  refers to the range of actors mentioned and the degree of disagreement within
a single newspaper
- Horizontal Diversity  refers to the differences in content between two newspapers
- Product Placement  the appearance of branded goods and services in different forms of media,
often strategically built into a storyline
- Branded Entertainment  media content that is closely associated with specific brand-name
products
- Brand Integration  when the product placed in the medium is used to market the medium on the
outside, a joint marketing campaign
- Self-Censorship  the ways reporters doubt themselves, tone down their work, omit small items,
or drop entire stories to avoid pressure, eliminate any perception of bias, or advance their careers

CHAPTER 3

- First Freedom  suggests that government should take a hands-off approach toward the media
- Totalitarian System  the structural constraint of the state largely dominates the potential agency
of the media  there is a narrow set of government-sanctioned images and messages
- Democratic Societies  more diverse mix of public and privately-owned media outlet offering a
variety of arts, news, information, etc. More freedom of the press
- Deregulation  the reduction or elimination of government influence over the media
- Selective Deregulation  the removal of government power within particular parts of the media,
yet still leaving in place many of the laws and policies that benefit the media industry
- Two Main Areas of Disagreement About Regulation
o Ownership and control
o Content and distribution
- Micro-broadcaster  illegal unlicensed "pirate" operators
- Commo Carries  industries whose operators must provide equal access in their service of the
public, often because they have some type of protective monopoly
- Net Neutrality  the principle that internet service providers must treat all Internet
communications equally
- National Interest  the goals and ambitions of a nation
- Metadata  include information about source and destination of an electronic communication
exchange
- Reasons for Regulation
o Diversity
o Morality
o Accuracy
o National interest