300387 Media Globalization (S) (WiSe 2011/2012)

The histories of globalization and the media are closely intertwined: Increasing globalization (roughly defined as “world-wide interdependence” and/or “global awareness”) depends upon opportunities for contact and mutual observation unrestricted by the limitations of face-to-face interaction. Vice versa, global interdependence and global awareness may encourage the usage and increase the empirical significance of the media. This relationship took off as early as in pre-modern times with writing and was further strengthened by the printing press from the 15th century onwards. However, it intensified significantly with the introduction of electric and electronic media since the mid-to-late 19th century. In the seminar we focus on this last chapter in the media-globalization relationship which started in the 1840s with the introduction of the electromagnetic telegraph network (that has aptly been called the “Victorian Internet”; Standage 1999). Later, telephone, radio, television, internet and the mobile phone added to the dynamics of this relationship. Recent globalization research has investigated a wide variety of effects of these innovations, ranging from political dynamics (as, for instance, nationalist movements and the foundation of post-colonial states) to the emergence of global markets, the establishment of a world literature, the global news production, the globalization of sports to current perception and reactions to world events, etc. In the seminar we discuss main concepts, historical constellations and current problems of this relationship. The seminar aims at (1) introducing to the core concepts and problems in current debates on globalization and the media by comparing a variety of empirical cases and historical constellations; (2) discussing the consequences of new research on media globalization for a sociological theory of globalization/world society.

Requirements for participation, required level

No specific requirements; basic knowledge of sociological theories will be helpful.

Bibliography

For an overview on media history see Flichy (1995) and Bösch (2011); basic arguments in the theoretical debate on globalization and the media: Giddens (1990) and Tomlinson (1994); for a journalist's view on recent developments: Friedman (2005).

Bösch, Frank: Mediengeschichte. Vom asiatischen Buchdruck bis zum Fernsehzeitalter, Frankfurt a. M.: Campus, 2011

Flichy, P. (1995): Tele. Geschichte der modernen Kommunikation, Frankfurt; New York: Campus

Friedman, Thomas L.: The World is flat. A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005

Giddens, A. (1995): Konsequenzen der Moderne, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp, pp. 28-43

Hannerz, U. (2004): Foreign News: Exploring the World of Foreign Correspondents, Chicago: University of Chicago Pres, ch. 1, 2 & 6

Headrick, D. (2010): A Double-Edged Sword: Communications and Imperial Control in British India, Historical Social Research 35, pp. 51-65

Larkin, B. (2002): Indian films and Nigerian lovers: media and the creation of parallel modernities, in J.X. Inda / R. Rosaldo (Hg.), The Anthropology of Globalization, Malden; MA: Blackwell, pp. 350-378

Lechner, F.J. (2009): The Making of World Society, Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, ch. 4: „Global media and the varieties of globalization“

Standage, T. (1999): Das viktorianische Internet, St. Gallen/Zürich: Midas

Tomlinson, J. (1994): A phenomenology of globalization? Giddens on global modernity, in European Journal of Communication, 9 (2), pp. 149-172

Wenzlhuemer, R. (2010): Globalization, Communication and the Concept of Space in Global History, Historical Social Research 35, pp. 19-47