Dictionary of Media and Communication Studies, 8th edition

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Preface to the 8th edition


Looking on the bright side, it could be said that the diff erence is that new technology has
greatly loosened up patterns of hierarchy and may even have made inroads on hegemony. Students
of communication would do well to carefully scrutinize competing visions of the future of the
‘networking society’, in particular the role of information and knowledge in a context driven by
economics and ‘must have it now’ public attitudes.
Above all, the case must be made and remade that in the information age the communications
industry is, in Tim Wu’s words, ‘fundamental to democracy’, needing to be resistant to wholesale
appropriation and to the controlling ambitions of governments.


Th e 8th edition of the Dictionary of Media and Communication Studies has over 100 new entries.
Th e main labour has been the revision and updating of existing entries, a task that affi rms just how
much has changed on the media and communication scene since 2006. For example, in the light of
the growth of the Internet, entries such as agenda-setting, gatekeeping, effects of the mass
media and news values have not only had to be updated but also reinterpreted; and it has been
worth asking whether they might have undergone such shifts in practice that they need to be placed
within inverted commas or deemed anachronisms.
Th e Dictionary opens its columns to new kids on the block – assertive, expansionary; Davids
intent on becoming Goliaths (if they are not these already), risk-taking and fl eet of foot. In come
entries on facebook, google, myspace, twitter, yahoo! and youtube (and belatedly apple
macintosh, amazon and microsoft windows). Social networking commands its own substan-
tial entry and its impact permeates many other new and revised entries.
What has not changed in this edition is the alphabetic format, a detailed Topic Guide (useful for
linking subject-related topics; handy for essay-writing, we feel), ample cross-referencing and plenty
of end-of-entry suggestions for further reading. In book references, partly to make space, we have
dropped the inclusion of country of origin.
A note on the terms text, texts and texting. Except when referring to texting specifi cally, we write
of text and texts in the broadest sense, using the terms to describe all forms of communicative
content from a poem to a newspaper report, painting, poster or fi lm (see text). Equally, every
message we text on our mobiles is a text, even if it is reduced to a smiley (no entry).
As writers committed to the principle of open source, we express a soupçon of disappointment
at the charges publishers make for models/diagrams which have been as familiar as road signs to
students of communication, sometimes for generations. Where an actual model does not appear
with its analysis, the reason is either that we consider an accompanying diagram not strictly neces-
sary, or that we baulk at the publisher’s fee. Authors who feel as we do about open source and who
wish their work to be given the public attention it deserves should contact their editors.
Our Appendix: Chronology of Media Events aims to provide readers with a time-line of discov-
eries, inventions and developments from 105 ad when paper from pulp was introduced to the world
in China. A quiz of media history we once gave to new undergraduates during Freshers’ week had
a rather depressing number of them opting for the eighteenth century as being the period when
moveable type was introduced in Europe.
Old John of Gutenberg (1450) can, at least for readers of this book, cease to turn in his grave,
though whether he would have been among the fi rst to mail a birthday card to Rupert Murdoch
(80 in March 2011) or a note of commiseration to the News of the World (deceased 12 July 2011) is
anybody’s guess.
James Watson and Anne Hill

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