Media and Power: Introduction
Nov. 22nd, 2025 08:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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I'm going through the free university mini-course Media and Power from the University of Iowa, and am going to try and take notes as I go. (Yes I do intend to get back to the Ursula K LeGuin book. One day. Shh)
So far there has been A Lot of focus on US political reporting, which is very reasonable but is not actually my preferred area of focus.
The course is called "Media and Power" rather than "Media Literacy" because they want students to understand the social context and power of media.
There's a link to the video Politics, Propaganda, and the Use and Abuse of Sound-Bites. The first four minutes are all kinda boring introduction to the speaker etc and can be skipped, though it is amusing how she, as a classics major, seems to see powerpoint slides as an Exciting Modern Rhetorical Tool.
From the video:
Gives examples of snappy direct successful politician George W Bush vs woolly bland unsuccessful Al Gore, because the republicans had better speech writers.
Soundbites are easy to remember, like ad slogans or memes: You hear it, it sticks in your memory, and you carry it around with you. Gives the ironic example of "Substance not Soundbites" being a soundbite constructed to have this quality. And like memes, when most successful, they transcend authorship and become "common knowledge".
In Ancient Greece, the same word "gnome" was used for both a maxim/principle/"soundbite" like "know thyself", and "judgement" as in what a judge/jury etc would do. (Could not find this word online might have misunderstood this part)
Aristotle argued that the way to judge if a politician is good by seeing if they have good and consistent maxims, with the argument that you can extrapolate their entire worldview from there using logic.
Old maxims get judged and turned into cliche that forms part of how society judges things, only for new political thought to add new ones.
Soundbites are a kaleidoscope of pleasure: they agree with our values, sound good via alliteration etc, easy to understand via things like metaphor and imagery, etc. Using reason and thinking things through is less fun and thus less appealing.
Exploitation:
She talks about the positives and negatives of the internet from a 2008 perspective, she's right that people CAN fact check more easily these days but lolll
"there's been no force that has encouraged an interested in the skill of close reading than the internet" because people gather to dissect the meanings of speeches etc. HMMM.
At 54 minutes she starts taking questions.
Someone asks how you can tell when hatespeech is tending towards genocidal rhetoric, she said it tends to involve collective guilt, separate to the judicial system or the actions (or any possible restitution) of any individual. The use of unlimited force is justified by removing the focus on individual actions and formal legal process.
How do we keep the engine of critical thought going in the face of attempts to brainwash people with propaganda? Freedom of expression, always be vigilant and don't expect politics to ever "end".
The goal of a soundbite is generally for it to be repeated and so memetic is transcends authorship, and absolutely not to be original.
Someone pointes out that some soundbites are not memetic maxims but, say, a promise specific to the speaker, like "read my lips, no new taxes".
Rhetoric is just a tool. How do we encourage good use, and good listening?
End of video.
sight bites: choreographed and orchestrated actions meant for uptake by visual media. When you ask whether something is “Instagram worthy,” that is an example of media power and sight bites in your own life.
political figures often employ people whose job it is to find the perfect backdrop for the media, Reagan's said “public brought up on television was more impressed with how things looked than how things sound.”
Media content exists in a capitalist economy, and needs to make money and serve power.
```Power, at its most basic, means “the ability to get things done.” It is not an innately bad thing, hence people’s search for empowerment. Here, though, you might begin to sense a distinction between “power to” and “power over.” Power over occurs when one person or entity has more power than another, and uses that power over others to coerce or force them to act, hence depriving those others of power and agency. Power refers to when a person possesses agency, an ability to do things that does not rely on the use or abuse of others. When people refer to those in power, they usually are referring to people who have power over others. When people refer to empowerment, they usually are referring to the power to be a change agent in the world.```
Four types of power:
There's an extended example about a journalist referring to Joe Biden's wife Dr Joe Biden as "Madame First Lady — Mrs. Biden — Jill — kiddo" and the various forms of power at play, which was all very interesting but I don't feel like thinking about US politics that deeply so moving on!
"This Handbook is about helping you identify the power others have in controlling language, imagery, and storylines, but also in helping you harness power yourself"
Module 1: Construction of Meaning
Module 2: Construction of Gender, Race, and Ethnicity
Module 3: Construction of Truth
I'm going through the free university mini-course Media and Power from the University of Iowa, and am going to try and take notes as I go. (Yes I do intend to get back to the Ursula K LeGuin book. One day. Shh)
This handbook guides students through concepts, content, and exercises that help them develop media literacy by understanding media and power. The authors want students to not only gain the ability to critically analyze the languages and discourses – textual, visual, audio, and code – that people use to create and interpret media content, but also to understand the overarching context: media possess immense power in contemporary societies around the world.
So far there has been A Lot of focus on US political reporting, which is very reasonable but is not actually my preferred area of focus.
The course is called "Media and Power" rather than "Media Literacy" because they want students to understand the social context and power of media.
Although sound bites have been part of the western tradition since the time of Homer, the length of soundbites has changed. Consider the average length of time a television news story would give to a sound bite when reporting on political speeches:
1968 43 seconds
1972 25 seconds
1976 18 seconds
1980 12 seconds
1984 10 seconds
1988 less than 9 seconds
2012 between 7 to 9 seconds
There's a link to the video Politics, Propaganda, and the Use and Abuse of Sound-Bites. The first four minutes are all kinda boring introduction to the speaker etc and can be skipped, though it is amusing how she, as a classics major, seems to see powerpoint slides as an Exciting Modern Rhetorical Tool.
From the video:
Gives examples of snappy direct successful politician George W Bush vs woolly bland unsuccessful Al Gore, because the republicans had better speech writers.
Soundbites are easy to remember, like ad slogans or memes: You hear it, it sticks in your memory, and you carry it around with you. Gives the ironic example of "Substance not Soundbites" being a soundbite constructed to have this quality. And like memes, when most successful, they transcend authorship and become "common knowledge".
In Ancient Greece, the same word "gnome" was used for both a maxim/principle/"soundbite" like "know thyself", and "judgement" as in what a judge/jury etc would do. (Could not find this word online might have misunderstood this part)
Aristotle argued that the way to judge if a politician is good by seeing if they have good and consistent maxims, with the argument that you can extrapolate their entire worldview from there using logic.
Old maxims get judged and turned into cliche that forms part of how society judges things, only for new political thought to add new ones.
Soundbites are a kaleidoscope of pleasure: they agree with our values, sound good via alliteration etc, easy to understand via things like metaphor and imagery, etc. Using reason and thinking things through is less fun and thus less appealing.
Exploitation:
- The phrase "separate and equal" is from the US constitution, referring to America becoming equal via separation from England. The similar and thus positively associated "separate but equal" was used to justify segregation.
- Confusing/incoherent soundbites make people feel bad and unable to figure out what's going on, which can be exploited to obfuscate eg what exactly is National Health Insurance vs Central Health Insurance?
She talks about the positives and negatives of the internet from a 2008 perspective, she's right that people CAN fact check more easily these days but lolll
"there's been no force that has encouraged an interested in the skill of close reading than the internet" because people gather to dissect the meanings of speeches etc. HMMM.
At 54 minutes she starts taking questions.
Someone asks how you can tell when hatespeech is tending towards genocidal rhetoric, she said it tends to involve collective guilt, separate to the judicial system or the actions (or any possible restitution) of any individual. The use of unlimited force is justified by removing the focus on individual actions and formal legal process.
How do we keep the engine of critical thought going in the face of attempts to brainwash people with propaganda? Freedom of expression, always be vigilant and don't expect politics to ever "end".
The goal of a soundbite is generally for it to be repeated and so memetic is transcends authorship, and absolutely not to be original.
Someone pointes out that some soundbites are not memetic maxims but, say, a promise specific to the speaker, like "read my lips, no new taxes".
Rhetoric is just a tool. How do we encourage good use, and good listening?
End of video.
sight bites: choreographed and orchestrated actions meant for uptake by visual media. When you ask whether something is “Instagram worthy,” that is an example of media power and sight bites in your own life.
political figures often employ people whose job it is to find the perfect backdrop for the media, Reagan's said “public brought up on television was more impressed with how things looked than how things sound.”
Media content exists in a capitalist economy, and needs to make money and serve power.
```Power, at its most basic, means “the ability to get things done.” It is not an innately bad thing, hence people’s search for empowerment. Here, though, you might begin to sense a distinction between “power to” and “power over.” Power over occurs when one person or entity has more power than another, and uses that power over others to coerce or force them to act, hence depriving those others of power and agency. Power refers to when a person possesses agency, an ability to do things that does not rely on the use or abuse of others. When people refer to those in power, they usually are referring to people who have power over others. When people refer to empowerment, they usually are referring to the power to be a change agent in the world.```
Four types of power:
- Interpersonal power: the power people have over others in personal or professional relationships
- Disciplinary power: the power people collectively have over each other and how people internalize social norms and enforce them on themselves. Like social peer pressure?
- Cultural power: the way socially accepted ideas and messages transmitted across media have power over people. The focus of this course.
- Structural power: how groups, institutions, and laws exert power over people.
There's an extended example about a journalist referring to Joe Biden's wife Dr Joe Biden as "Madame First Lady — Mrs. Biden — Jill — kiddo" and the various forms of power at play, which was all very interesting but I don't feel like thinking about US politics that deeply so moving on!
ACTIVITY
Honoring Honorifics
How do you want to be referred to in a formal or professional setting?
What options do you have?
Why do you have these options?
If you decide to get married (or have already decided), would you change the honorific, or expect your spouse to? Why or why not? And what does this have to do with power?
"This Handbook is about helping you identify the power others have in controlling language, imagery, and storylines, but also in helping you harness power yourself"
Module 1: Construction of Meaning
Module 2: Construction of Gender, Race, and Ethnicity
Module 3: Construction of Truth
no subject
Date: 2025-11-24 05:32 am (UTC)Oh, this looks potentially relevant to my studies. I will open the tab and hopefully come back to it in a sensible amount of time.
no subject
Date: 2025-11-29 10:56 pm (UTC)