Universität Wien

124263 KO Critical Media Analysis (2025S)

Activist Media Practices from Banners to the Barbie Liberation Organisation

6.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 12 - Anglistik
Continuous assessment of course work
Moodle
Fr 20.06. 12:15-13:45 Raum 5 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-17

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

max. 30 participants
Language: English

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

  • Friday 07.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 14.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 21.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 28.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 04.04. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 11.04. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 02.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 09.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 16.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 23.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 30.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 06.06. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 13.06. 12:15 - 13:45 Helene-Richter-Saal UniCampus Hof 8 3G-EG-21
  • Friday 27.06. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 5 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-17

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

From protest movements such as Occupy Wall Street to fourth-wave feminism, social media has been a crucial component in effecting social change in addition to on-the-ground activism in the form of protest marches, gatherings, or sit-ins. In this course, we will look beyond the immediate context of social media to uncover different forms of media activism employed in political protest, including "culture jamming", artivism, hacktivism, and performance. Focussing on a range of representative examples (e.g. WikiLeaks, #BlackLivesMatter, Occupy Wall Street, #MeToo and others), we will examine various aspects surrounding the course topic, for example: media activism and social change; questions of accessibility and power structures; the representation of activists in popular culture, etc.

Throughout the course, we will discuss and revise central concepts and methods of cultural studies, including the concepts of "participatory culture" (Henry Jenkins), media activism, networked activism, visual semiotics, multimodality, (feminist) film theory and film analysis, addressing issues of positionality, intersectionality, and "produsage" (Burns). At the end of this course, students will be familiar with different tools and methods for analysing a range of media, critically reflecting on their own practices as consumers and "produsers" of culture in the process.

Assessment and permitted materials

- Portfolio (consisting of 4 tasks, to be submitted throughout the semester: 2 analyses of two different cultural texts; blog post; creative task): 50p
- Regular attendance and in-class participation, incl. group work: 30p
- acting as one of the experts for one session (selecting visual material and coming up with 2 discussion questions for one of the sessions and leading a small-group discussion about them): 20p

The course requirements will be discussed in detail during the first session.

As the focus of this course lies on training your critical writing skills and developing analyses of cultural texts yourselves, generative AI tools may not be used in this course for the writing of the portfolio tasks. Its use, reproduction of biases and suggested connection to "data colonialism" (Couldry and Mejias), as well as other impacts on today's cultural landscape will be discussed as part of the course's commitment to critically reflecting on and investigating our own media usage and responsibility as "produsers" of culture. (If you are interested in exploring this question before class starts, the following article is a good starting point: https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/19/1049592/artificial-intelligence-colonialism/)

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

Students must fulfill and pass each of the 3 course requirements (portfolio, regular attendance and participation, acting as expert) and score at least 60 points altogether in order to pass this course.

Grading scale:
1: 100-90 points
2: 89-80 points
3: 79-70 points
4: 69-60 points
5: 59-0 points

The course requirements will be discussed in detail during the first session.

Examination topics

This is an interactive course with continuous assessment ("prüfungsimmanente Lehrveranstaltung"). In addition to handing in a written portfolio, participants are expected to read all set texts and actively participate in class throughout the semester as well as hand in tasks and assignments on time.

There will be no written exam.

Reading list

Texts to be read and dicussed in this course will consist of book chapters and articles relating to visual methodologies (Stuart Hall, Gillian Rose); media activism (Pickard and Yang); an article relating to "networked feminism" (Rosemary Clark-Parsons); chapters from the edited collection Gender, Race, and Class in the Media (eds. Dines, Humez, Yousman, Binding Yousman)

All texts will be made available via Moodle.

Films to be watched (screenings can be organised during additional time slots in case of issues with accessing the films):
* The Fifth Estate (2013, dir. Bill Condon)
* excerpts from Snowden (2016, dir. Oliver Stone)
* Bombshell (2019, dir. Jay Roach)
* excerpts from She Said (2022, dir. Maria Schrader)

Association in the course directory

Studium: BA 612, BEd 046/407
Code/Modul: BA07.3; BEd 08a.2, BEd 08b.1
Lehrinhalt: 12-4260

Last modified: Fr 11.04.2025 13:26