Everette E. Dennis

American communication research : the remembered history

Contents: E.E. Dennis, Preface. Part I: The Schools of Thought. K. Lang, The European Roots. J.W. Carey, The Chicago School and Mass Communication Research. W.J. McGuire, The Yale Communication and Attitude-Change Program in the 1950s. E. Katz, Diffusion Research at Columbia. H. Himmelweit, Children and Television. T. Peterson, The Press as a Social Institution. Part II: Eyewitness Accounts. H.M. Beville, Fashioning Audience Ratings -- From Radio to Cable. D.L. Sills, Stanton, Lazarsfeld, and Merton -- Pioneers in Communication Research. R. Bartos, A Conversation With Frank Stanton. W. Schramm, The Master Teachers. L. Bogart, Research as an Instrument of Power. D. Cater, Addressing Public Policy. Part III: Reassessment. G.J. Robinson, Constructing a Historiography for North American Communication Studies. E. Wartella, The History Reconsidered. Appendix: Biographic Sketches of 65 Contributors to the Field of Communication Research.

Out of Sight and Out of Mind The Media Literacy Needs of Grown-Ups

With few exceptions, media literacy programs typically are aimed at children and youth in elementary and high schools, although the term media literacy, as defined generally, could apply to persons of any age. This article considers the range and scope of media literacy conceptually and operationally while suggesting there is a case for media literacy for adults. The expanding concept of literacy in relationship to media platforms and technologies is considered, as are college-level and postcollege approaches. Benefits to individuals and society are considered along with potential barriers. The locus of responsibility for media literacy, it is argued, ought to be with educators, media industries, and other institutional interests—as well as individuals themselves.

Radio—The Forgotten Medium

Although television is now dominant, radio surprisingly remains a medium of unparalleled power and importance. Worldwide, it continues to be the communications vehicle with the greatest outreach and impact. Every indicator--economic, demographic, social, and democratic--suggests that far from fading away, radio is returning to our consciousness, and back into the cultural mainstream. Marilyn J. Matelski reviews radios glory days, arguing that the glory is not all in the past. B. Eric Rhoads continues Matelskis thoughts by explaining how and why radio has kept its vitality. The political history of radio is reviewed by Michael X. Delli Carpini, while David Bartlett shows how one of radios prime functions has been to serve the public in time of disaster. Other contributors discuss radio as a cultural expression; the global airwaves; and the economic, regulatory, social, and technological structures of radio. Collectively, the contributors provide an intriguing study into the rich history of radio, and its impact on many areas of society. It provides a wealth of information for historians, sociologists, and communications and media scholars. Above all, it helps explain how media intersect, change focus, but still manage to survive and grow in a commercial environment.

Prospects for a big idea - is there a future for convergence?

(2003). Prospects for a big idea ‐ is there a future for convergence? International Journal on Media Management: Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 7-11.

Doing Digital: An Assessment of the Top 25 U.S. Media Companies and their Digital Strategies

Abstract This study examines how major U.S. media companies are developing their digital strategies in the context of earlier work on convergence. Through rare interviews with media leaders and other sources, the ways that media corporations have coped with digital innovation following the dot-com crash are explored, including its delivery and the styles of leadership. The authors posit that media firms fall into three categories: leaders, learners and laggards.

Toward a taxonomy of new media - management views of an evolving industry

Within the media and entertainment industries the term, ”New Media,” generally associated with the Internet and digital communication, has emerged in recent years to describe and identify websites with a wide range of content, advertising and marketing information. While technologists, scholars and entrepreneurs use the term in different ways, this paper is based on the assumption that the views of high-ranking executives in self-described ”New Media” firms can be especially instructive. As with earlier new media forms from radio and facsimile newspapers to television, cable and satellite technologies, having a common language for

Requiem for a Think Tank The Life and Death of the Gannett Center at Columbia, 1984-1996

For twelve years, the Gannett Center for Media Studies (subsequently named the Freedom Forum Media Studies Center) operated a unique media “think tank” billed as “the nation’s first institute for the advanced study of media and technological change” at Columbia University. It attracted leading professionals and scholars to its fellowship, technology, and media research programs. The result was a distinctive interaction between media industries and the academy that produced many major books, studies, and other intellectual products including a journal that informed the media-society relationship. A joint venture of a university and a media foundation with special links to journalism education and media industries in the United States and internationally, the program decamped from Columbia in 1996 and was phased out two years later.

A Linchpin Concept: Media Studies and the Rest of the Curriculum: Introducing Unique Literature for General Education of All

Connecting the content of journalism and mass communication courses to the rest of the academic enterprise is a continuing dilemma for teachers and students. No where is this challenge more evident than in the introductory course in mass communication or media studies, and no where is it more needed. Typically such courses called “Introduction to Mass Communication” or some similar name, attract both freshmen and sophomores, some of whom are already determined to major in the field, while for others it is a service course, either fulfilling a social science or other requirement. Professors in such a course must cover a wide territory, typically including a general introduction to communication theory as well as inventories of the several media industries and their consequences for society. Most standard texts also make reference to the history of journalism and mass communication, media economics, sociology, law and regulation, and other aspects. In scores of conversations with teachers of the introductory course as well as hundreds of responses from students to our introductory text, Understanding Mass Communication (4th Ed., Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1991), it is clear to us that connecting this wide ranging and complex material to a student’s general education is virtually an impossibility for most teachers. After all, how can a teacher survey the field and give the student specific examples of how the history of media fits into general American history, let alone economic, intellectual, or cultural history, or the arts and sciences generally. A lecture on media economics covering issues of ownership and advertising, for example, might be calibrated to a student’s course work in economics, but there is little time for this and most teachers we consulted readily admitted that they can hardly keep up with their own field, let alone the current state of diverse disciplines that make up the social sciences, humanities, sciences, and various professional fields. Yet, this is just what a student needs: a clear link between knowledge in mass

Doing What Comes Naturally-Suggestions for Supporting Research

Expanded from remarks given on acceptance of the Eleanor Blum Award for Support for Research at the AEJMCs 2004 convention in Toronto, 6 August 2004.

Basic Books on Mass Media

RESHAPING THE MEDIA: MASS COMMUNICATION IN AN INFORMATION AGE by Everette E. Dennis (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1989—