The objective of this course is to introduce students to the main theories and basic concepts related to mass media, from the beginning of the 20th century
to the present. The perspective is not historical, but genealogical: it is assumed that the current media system can only be understood from an
structural and dialectical perspective of mass media.
Program:
1. Technologically mediated communication as object of science.
2. Media and mass culture
3. Propaganda and war
4. Persuasion and the media
5. Opinion leaders and the nature of influence
6. The functionalist approach
7. The Frankfurt School and the "cultural industry"
8. Structuralism, semiotics and mass communication
9. The medium as a message
10. Cultural studies and media
11. Mass media and social construction of reality
12. Internet and the digital environment
13. Towards a society without spectacle?
14. Post-truth, fake news and the reinvention of the mediated past.