July 31, 2024

History of Media Studies Newsletter July 2024

History of Media Studies Newsletter July 2024

Welcome to the 40th edition of the History of Media Studies Newsletter. The monthly email, assembled by Dave Park, Jeff Pooley, and Pete Simonson, maintains a loose affiliation with the new History of Media Studies journal and the Working Group on the History of Media Studies. Please contact us with any questions, suggestions, or items.

1. Working Group on the History of Media Studies

Join us for the next remote session devoted to discussing working papers with authors. Hosted by the Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine (CHSTM). Open to anyone interested in the history of the media studies fields. Instructions to join are here.

Wednesday, September 18

Wednesday, September 18, 14:00-15:00 UTC (10am-11am EDT)

Reading for discussion:

• Jülide Etem, “Physics Film Experiments in the United States and Turkey, 1956–1978” (working paper)

For the Zoom link and the reading download, visit the Working Group page. Instructions for joining the group are here. Questions? Contact us

2. Conferences, Calls & Announcements

If you have a call or announcement relevant to the history of media studies, please contact us.

1. CFP: Reimagining Canadian Communication Thought

• Almost 25 years after the publication of Robert Babe’s Canadian Communication Thought, we propose a special issue of the Canadian Journal of Communication devoted to the reassessment of, and perhaps more importantly, reimagining of the intellectual project of “Canadian Communication Thought.” This bilingual special issue will gather two types of contributions: 1) full-length research articles (7000-8000 words) that reflect on/problematize epistemic and ontological features of Canadian communication thought and 2) shorter interventions (2500-3000 words) that offer a synthesis of a certain stream of theory or conceptual work, a “school of thought” or a specific approach that is representative of Canadian communication thought in its diversity.
• Deadline: 30 September 2024
• More details

3. The Journal

History of Media Studies recently published a special section on “History of Communication Studies across the Americas,” which features six articles tracing transnational vectors within and across North and South America. These are preceded by an introduction by the editors.

• “Coloniality and Resistance: The Revolutionary Moment in Communication Study in the Anglophone Caribbean,” by Nova Gordon-Bell
• “Elizabeth Fox: Intellectual Biography and History of a Field of Study,” by Yamila Heram and Santiago Gándara
• “Borderline Cases: Crossing Borders in Canadian Communication Studies, 1960s-1980s,” by Michael Darroch
• “Notes for Historicizing the Disintegrated Internationalization of Communication Studies in Latin America,” by Raúl Fuentes-Navarro
• “‘Western Communication’: Eurocentrism and Modernity: Marks of the Predominant Theories in the Field,” by Erick R. Torrico Villanueva
• “Media, Intellectual, and Cultural Imperialism Today,” by Afonso Albuquerque

The special section is based on a 2022 workshop organized in cooperation with two leading Latin American journals, MATRIZes and Communicación y Sociedad. We are honored to publish our special section alongside parallel sections from MATRIZes and Communicación y Sociedad.

HMS encourages submissions (en español) on the history of research, education, and reflective knowledge about media and communication—as expressed through academic institutions; through commercial, governmental, and non-governmental organizations; and through “alter-traditions” of thought and practice often excluded from the academic mainstream.

4. New Publications

Works listed here are newly published, or new to the bibliography.

The History of Communication Research Bibliography is a project of the Annenberg School for Communication Library Archives (ASCLA) at the University of Pennsylvania.

1. Fuchs, Christian.. "Ibn Khaldûn and the Political Economy of Communication in the Age of Digital Capitalism." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 727--45. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231206488.

   ABSTRACT: Ibn Khaldûn (1332--1406) was a philosopher, historian and sociologist. This paper asks: What elements of the Political Economy of Communication are there in Ibn Khaldûn's work and how do they matter in digital capitalism? It presents relevant passages from Khaldûn's main work Muqaddimah and points out parallels between the Muqaddimah and works in Political Economy, especially Karl Marx's approach of the Critique of Political Economy. The comparison of Khaldûn to Marx is not an arbitrary choice. Several scholars have pointed out parallels between the two's works with respect to general Political Economy. It, therefore, makes sense to, also, compare Khaldûn and Marx in the context of the Political Economy of Communication. The paper analyses the relevance of Khaldûn's ideas in digital capitalism. Khaldûn's works are situated in the context of media and communication theory, digital automation, Facebook, Google, labour in informational and digital capitalism, Amazon, the tabloid press, fake news and post-truth culture. The analysis shows that Khaldûn's Muqaddimah is an early work in Political Economy that can and should inform our contemporary critical analysis of communication in society, communication in capitalism and class society, ideology and digital capitalism. What connects Marx and Khaldûn is that they were critical scholars who although living at different times in different parts of the world saw the importance of the analysis of class and communication. Their works can and should inform the Political Economy of Communication and the analysis of digital capitalism.

2. Albuquerque, Afonso. "Media, Intellectual, and Cultural Imperialism Today." History of Media Studies 4 (July 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.048bbc6b.

   ABSTRACT: Cultural imperialism was once the subject of a vibrant debate in international scholarship. Yet, the debate on cultural imperialism has lost much of its previous influence and centrality. This does not mean that cultural imperialism has lost its relevance. On the contrary, in the wake of the neoliberal globalization process, cultural imperialism is now stronger than ever. This article argues that cultural imperialism comprises two dimensions: media imperialism and intellectual imperialism, and it is important to understand how they interact. To illustrate how their interplay works and what consequences follow, the article examines how US academic institutions educated and organized Brazilian media elites who helped to legitimate Lava Jato, a politically driven judicial operation that led to the downgrade of Brazilian democracy, and ultimately paved the way to the rise of Jair Bolsonaro to the presidency. | En un tiempo el imperialismo cultural fue tema de debate acalorado en los estudios internacionales. Sin embargo, dicho debate ha perdido gran parte de su anterior influencia y centralidad, lo que no quiere decir que el imperialismo cultural carezca hoy de relevancia; al contrario, como secuela del proceso neoliberal global se ha fortalecido más que nunca. En este artículo se argumenta que el imperialismo cultural abarca dos dimensiones--el imperialismo mediático y el imperialismo intelectual--y que es importante entender cómo interactúan. Para ilustrar dicha interacción y sus consecuencias, se analiza cómo las instituciones académicas estadounidenses formaron y organizaron a las élites mediáticas brasileñas que ayudaron a legitimar Lava Jato, una operación jurídica con fines políticos que terminó degradando la democracia brasileña y allanando el camino para que Jair Bolsonaro llegara a la presidencia.

3. Bilić, Paško, and Thomas Allmer. "Critical Sociology of Media and Communication: Connecting a Disconnected Field." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 581--88. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205241239888.

   ABSTRACT: The sociology of media and communications was never explicitly defined -- nor was there ever an explicit debate about the sub-field. Not having a clear anchor makes it hard to define what its critical component should be. Nonetheless, a rich yet disconnected tradition of sociology and critical political economy allows flexibility to reconsider communication and social relations in the broader societal dynamics of capitalism. Specifying a critical sociological approach to communication can help better define the role of communication at the micro, mezzo and macro levels of society. The multi-paradigmatic heritage of sociological theory can provide new ways of criticising communication power in contemporary society. Diverse contemporary developments in the critique of political economy give a breadth of understanding of the capitalist mode of production and its internal dynamics. Sociology can add depth to understanding social relations within and beyond the production, distribution and consumption process. This introduction sets out the framework for the special issue.

4. Bilić, Paško. "Frankfurt School Legacy and the Critical Sociology of Media: Lifeworld in Digital Capitalism." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 615--28. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231201386.

   ABSTRACT: Just as the Frankfurt School responded to the radicalisation of the working class in Germany and the rise of post-war consumerism in the United States, today, we are confronted by platform monopolies, automated hyper-consumption and technological control. Critical approaches to digital media have exposed the structural coupling of Internet use and capital accumulation for almost two decades. However, many authors building on this tradition can struggle to understand how online social interaction is controlled beyond the worn-out critique of false consciousness or beyond conceptualising all digital activity mediated by data as labour. This paper will attempt to theoretically untangle the Marxian ontology of labour and the Frankfurt School-inspired critique of everyday life. This is not just theoretical nit-picking. Society becomes completely dominated if we accept no difference between wage labour and lifeworld activities. Each contains its internal struggles. The value form regulates both in different ways.

5. Darroch, Michael. "Borderline Cases: Crossing Borders in Canadian Communication Studies, 1960s--1980s." History of Media Studies 4 (July 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.f76fdf03.

   ABSTRACT: Communication studies has been shaped by the affective contexts of border cultures and bordering practices. Human experiences of living in borderlands, of migrating across borders, and the concomitant bridging of cultural and linguistic contexts have influenced theories, metaphors, and methods within communication and media studies. The multicultural and multilingual contexts of Canada and Quebec provide an important case study for a history of communication and media studies across the Americas. This paper explores the history of these fields in the Canadian context through the lens of bordering practices: Canada--US relations, but also the cultural and linguistic borderlines between English Canada, Quebec, and beyond. I develop these themes by exploring specific cases and considerations of early Canadian scholars and programs, as well as key organizations and publications. If 1950s and 1960s new media, including primarily television, promised to de-emphasize official borders, where circuits of media accessibility began to knit US and Canadian cultural practices together, we should not neglect the forces of national concerns on media industries or use. My goal in this paper is not to contribute another institutional study, but rather to offer an interpretative lens on intersecting histories of the field in the context of Canadian pluralisms. | Los estudios en comunicación se han visto configurados por los contextos afectivos de las culturas fronterizas y las prácticas fronterizantes. Las experiencias humanas de vivir en las zonas fronterizas y de migrar a través de fronteras, así como los puentes que se tienden entre contextos culturales y lingüísticos, han incidido en teorías, metáforas y métodos dentro de los estudios de comunicación y medios. Los contextos multiculturales y multilingües de Quebec nos proporcionan un importante caso de estudio para una historia de los estudios de comunicación y medios en las Américas. En este trabajo se explora la historia de estos campos en el contexto canadiense, con la mirada puesta en las prácticas fronterizantes: las relaciones entre Canadá y Estados Unidos, pero también las fronteras culturales y lingüísticas entre la Canadá anglófona, Quebec y más allá. Desarrollo estos temas explorando casos concretos, teniendo en cuenta las consideraciones específicas de algunos de los primeros investigadores y programas de estudio canadienses, así como analizando organizaciones y publicaciones clave. Si bien los nuevos medios de las décadas de los 50 y 60, sobre todo la televisión, prometían desdibujar las fronteras oficiales, donde los circuitos de acceso mediático empezaron a fundir las prácticas culturales de Estados Unidos y Canadá, no debemos subestimar las fuerzas de los intereses nacionales y su impacto en las industrias mediáticas y los usos de los medios. Mi objetivo con este trabajo no es generar otro estudio institucional, sino aportar un enfoque para interpretar las historias entrecruzadas del campo en el contexto de los pluralismos canadienses.

6. Fuchs, Christian. "Ibn Khaldûn and the Political Economy of Communication: A Reply to Graham Murdock." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 757--65. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231201382.

   ABSTRACT: [first paragraph, in lieu of abstract] I appreciate Graham Murdock's thoughtful reflections on my paper 'Ibn Khaldûn and the Political Economy of Communication in the Age of Digital Capitalism'. They very well complement and enhance situating Ibn Khaldûn in the context of the Political Economy of Communication. Graham Murdock especially points out biographical and contextual aspects of Khaldûn's works, the role of the state in society and the economy, the de-Westernisation of Media and Communication Studies, ideology, and aspects of neoliberalism. There is much Graham Murdock and I agree on in general as well as in respect to Ibn Khaldûn. We both see Khaldûn as an important contributor to Political Economy who thought holistically, historically, dialectically and morally and who advanced ideology critique, the analysis of merchant's capital, and the analysis of the value created by labour. Both of us see the importance of engaging with the ideas of non-Western thinkers. Naturally, there are also some points where we disagree. Khaldûn's work is eclectic and non-systematic. In my article, I focused on some aspects that I find interesting sources of reflection for a contemporary Critique of the Political Economy of Communication. My interpretation focused deliberately on selected topics, namely the labour theory of value, merchant's capital, ideology, communication in society and communication in class society, which is a rich range of topics.

7. Fuentes-Navarro, Raul. "Notes for Historicizing the Disintegrated Internationalization of Communication Studies in Latin America." History of Media Studies 4 (July 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.112788b7.

   ABSTRACT: This essay characterizes a "disintegrated internationalization" as the main trend in the development of communication studies in Latin America. This hypothetical approach is based on critical readings of multiple bibliographical sources generated in the most recent decades and published in Spanish, Portuguese, or English, both in the form of essays and empirical studies, somewhat supporting a historical sociology. The systematic and rigorously analyzed and interpreted documentation, following the methodological example of Luis Ramiro Beltrán, allows us to advance in the recognition of some factors that separate national "academic fields" from their integration in broader scales--Latin American or global. The conclusion proposes what the elaboration of a historical narrative needs to recognize to be more useful: the complexity and multiplicity of the historical-social processes that have been interwoven and interdetermined in each of the spatiotemporal stages that it is pertinent to define as Latin America's own. | Este ensayo caracteriza una "desintegrada" como la principal tendencia en el desarrollo de los estudios de comunicación en América Latina. Este planteamiento hipotético se basa en lecturas críticas de múltiples fuentes bibliográficas generadas en las décadas más recientes y publicadas en español, portugués o inglés, tanto en forma de ensayos como de estudios empíricos, apoyándose en cierto modo en una sociología histórica. La documentación sistemática y rigurosamente analizada e interpretada, siguiendo el ejemplo metodológico de Luis Ramiro Beltrán, permite avanzar en el reconocimiento de algunos factores que separan los "campos académicos" nacionales de su integración en escalas más amplias -latinoamericanas o globales. La conclusión propone lo que la elaboración de una narrativa histórica necesita reconocer para ser más útil: la complejidad y multiplicidad de los procesos histórico-sociales que se han entretejido e interdeterminado en cada una de las etapas espacio-temporales que es pertinente definir como propias de América Latina.

8. Genosko, Gary A. "When a Lost Book Manuscript Turns up: The Discovery of Harley Parker's The Culture Box: Museums Are Today." Canadian Journal of Communication, June 13, 2024. https://doi.org/10.3138/cjc-2023-0028.

   ABSTRACT: Background: In 2022, the lost manuscript by Canadian designer and painter Harley Parker (1915--1992), The Culture Box: Museums Are Today, in which he envisions museums as multisensory experiences, was found among his belongings. Analysis: This Research in Brief looks at Parker's contributions to museum exhibition design, both in The Culture Box and throughout his career. Conclusion and implications: By focusing on the role of the designer-communicator, Parker advanced a sensory museology ahead of its time, and, in collaboration with Marshall McLuhan, decoded the characteristics of the museum understood as a medium in terms of how it orchestrates sensory experiences.

9. Gordon-Bell, Nova. "Coloniality and Resistance: The Revolutionary Moment in Communication Study in the Anglophone Caribbean." History of Media Studies 4 (July 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.bd98a921.

   ABSTRACT: This essay discusses the development of communication and media studies in the Anglophone Caribbean. Despite the prolific work of Anglophone researchers and scholars and over half a century of institutional engagement in media and communication education and training, a body of knowledge identifiable as the English-speaking Caribbean's contribution to media and communication study and theory remains unidentifiable. North American, British, and European paradigms and theories constitute the hegemon of Anglophone Caribbean scholarship in media and communication study. This is consistent with the ideological role of education in the historical context of a British colonial legacy, which valorizes knowledge transfer over indigenous knowledge generation and typically elides the mastery of the English language with communicative competence. In response to the demands of the local and regional media industry, training in practical skills for journalism and media production is consistently prioritized over theory and scholarship​ regarding human communication. The paper points to the rich contributions of individual scholars, researchers, and teachers, and the possibilities for a distinctive Caribbean contribution to the study of communication, which could inform production and training for industry and expand theoretical and analytical approaches to research and scholarship. | En este ensayo se rastrea el desarrollo de los estudios de comunicación y medios en el Caribe anglófono. Pese a la nutrida obra de investigadores y estudiosos anglófonos y al más de medio siglo de compromiso institucional con la formación y capacitación en comunicación y medios, no existe todavía un corpus de conocimiento identificable como la aportación del Caribe anglófono al estudio y teoría de comunicación y medios. Los paradigmas y teorías norteamericanos, británicos y europeos ejercen la hegemonía sobre la investigación de medios y comunicación en el Caribe anglófono. Esto no sorprende dado el papel ideológico de la educación en el contexto histórico de un legado colonial británico, que privilegia la transferencia de conocimientos por encima de la generación de conocimientos indígenas, y donde suele identificarse la competencia comunicativa con el dominio del idioma inglés. Ante las demandas de la industria mediática local y regional, se prioriza la capacitación en habilidades prácticas de periodismo y de producción mediática, dejando en un segundo plano la teoría e investigación de la comunicación humana. En este trabajo se señalan las ricas aportaciones de estudiosos, investigadores y maestros individuales, así como las posibilidades de una aportación caribeña propia al estudio de la comunicación, lo que podría incidir en la producción y la capacitación para la industria, y, en última instancia, ampliar los enfoques teóricos y analíticos del campo académico y la investigación.

10. Heram, Yamila, and Santiago Gándara. "Elizabeth Fox: Intellectual Biography and History of a Field of Study." History of Media Studies 4 (June 25, 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.860e9e26.

    ABSTRACT: The aim of this article is to highlight and recognize the contributions of one of the pioneers in Latin American communication studies, Elizabeth Fox, who since the late 1960s in Colombia has investigated media ownership and inequalities in the flow of information in the region. At the same time, the description of her intellectual journey reveals a transnational figure who established relations not only between different countries in the region but also with universities and agencies in the United States and Europe. In order to examine her trajectory, a meta-analysis of her academic publications serves to identify changes, ruptures, and continuities in her research topics and theoretical positions; an interview with the author was also conducted to complement the reconstruction of her trajectory. The main results and conclusions of the article are synthesized in a recovery of the critical traditions of the political economy of communication in her works published in the 1970s. | El artículo tiene por objetivo visibilizar y reconocer los aportes de una de las pioneras en los estudios latinoamericanos en comunicación, Elizabeth Fox, quien desde fines de la década de 1960 en Colombia se ha ocupado de investigar la propiedad de los medios de comunicación y las desigualdades del flujo informativo en la región. Al mismo tiempo, la descripción de su itinerario intelectual nos coloca frente a una figura transnacional que anudó no solo las relaciones entre distintos países de la región sino también con Estados Unidos y Europa, sus universidades y agencias. Para abordar su trayectoria se realiza un meta-análisis de sus producciones académicas, identificamos cambios, rupturas y continuidades en sus temas de investigación y posiciones teóricas; asimismo se realizó una entrevista con la autora que complementa la reconstrucción de su trayectoria. Los principales resultados y conclusiones del artículo se sintetizan en recuperar las tradiciones críticas de la economía política de la comunicación en sus trabajos publicados en los años 70.

11. Lechuga, Michael, and Noor Ghazal Aswad. "'Decolonization' as a Metaphor, Not a Movement, in Communication Studies: A Critical Thematic Meta-Analysis of the Discipline." Communication Studies 75, no. 4 (2024): 407--24. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.2024.2348300.

    ABSTRACT: In this essay, we theorize how terms like "decolonization" and "decoloniality" have entered into the vernacular of the discipline of Communication Studies and remained largely as metaphors. We connect to a conversation among scholars in Indigenous Studies, Cultural Studies, and others who have turned attention to "decolonial" critiques in academic environments, and how they remain detached from their activist origins. We begin with a discussion of metaphor and the cultural and political implications for adopting and misattributing a term like decolonization. Moreover, this study develops a critical method to make sense of the rapid and vast uptake of the term decolonization as a harmful metaphor in the discipline's most widely read journals. Our critical thematic meta-analysis is driven by a quantifying tool -- we turn our research lens to the body of literature written by the collective of scholars in the discipline who refer to or rely on decolonization in their research to reveal the way in which the term is connoted over the last decade. Our analysis reveals "decolonization" is often used as a liberal abstract concept divorced from material contexts. We critique this reductionism, noting how decolonization becomes a buzzword for institutional change without genuine engagement with anti-colonial movements. We end by inviting scholars to reconsider the study of colonization and those materially resisting it with new energies and orientations.

12. Leduc, Claude, Maxime Ouellet, and André Mondoux. "The Dialectical Sociology of Michel Freitag and the Critique of Communication Society." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 779--93. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231201253.

    ABSTRACT: Michel Freitag developed a ground-breaking sociological theory synthesizing the thought of sociology's founders into the form of a dialectical sociology that conceives of the symbolic as ontological to social reality. After outlining his conceptualization of the historical evolution of society through its 'modes of reproduction', we will see how his analysis of contemporary societal transformations rests on a critical theory of communication and technology that, while entering a dialogue with the works of the Frankfurt school, especially those of Habermas, seeks to overcome their inherent contradictions. According to Freitag, the development of capitalist globalization alters the very substance of society as it tends to morph itself into a self-regulating cybernetic system. His sociology allows us to apprehend phenomena tied to the development of contemporary digital technologies such as the drive towards a new form of algorithmic governmentality fueled by digital oligopolies that increasingly dominate globalized capitalism, the rise of fake news in the era of post-truth and the transformation of subjectivity. Finally, his critique enables potent reflection on the dialectical possibilities of overcoming the dynamics of contemporary alienation.

13. Lugo-Ocando, Jairo, and Monica Marchesi. "Contesting Power from the Periphery: The Latin American Sociological Imagination and the Media." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 767--78. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231221233.

    ABSTRACT: Although today media and communication studies across Latin America are closely linked to critical sociology, this was not always the case. In this article, we explore how the interaction between social communication (which includes communication and media studies) and critical sociology, in the Latin American context, evolved over time. In so doing, we examine how, and in which directions, media theory has developed and how it relates profoundly with critical sociology. This piece is an attempt to summarize this process and look at current contributions that propose more inclusive and participatory media. The key argument that it took a long time for Latin America's media studies to link itself with critical sociology but once that happened, it produced a distinctive school of thought that is counter-hegemonic and directs itself towards the contestation of power and oppression by linking itself with the popular.

14. McQuire, Scott. "Medium Rare. Photography and Media Theory." Media Theory 8, no. 1 (June 11, 2024): 19--52.

    ABSTRACT: Photography's definition as a distinctive medium has often been contested, but seems increasingly challenged in foundational terms in the 21st century. This article will explore photography's rather unsettled relation to media and media theory by drawing on the writings of Vilém Flusser, Friedrich Kittler, and Bernard Stiegler, who have all -- albeit in different ways -- positioned the emergence of photography in the 19th century as a signal event in the history of media. Photography marks the point at which cultures long organized around 'writing' began to cede ground to cultures in which 'technological images' play a growing role. In the 21st century it has become increasingly common to ask whether photography remains faithful to its past or has become something else. My approach here is slightly different: what does the historical transformation of photography tell us about how we understand 'media' in the present?

15. Mudambi, Anjana, and Amy N. Heuman. "Expanding upon Critical Methodologies and Perspectives in Communication Studies." Communication Studies 75, no. 4 (2024): 377--89. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.2024.2350255.

    ABSTRACT: Within this special issue, we turn our attention to critical perspectives within the communication discipline and seek to illuminate the implementation of critical methods across its broader contexts. While the communication discipline has historically been grounded in the normativity and centering of whiteness, critical perspectives, which are characterized by attention to communicative practices that attend to systems of power and hierarchy across social spheres, have been broadly integrated into and meaningfully shaped the study of communication contexts such as rhetoric, intercultural communication, and performance studies. We argue, however, that the incorporation of critical perspectives within the larger discipline remains underdeveloped. Therefore, in this special issue, we present articles that employ critical methodological approaches to offer important new ways of studying and centering marginalized identities, positionalities, and epistemologies across a range of contexts. Ultimately, we argue for a more expansive approach to thinking and teaching about methodology in general, and critical methods specifically, that inspires further "play" among communication scholars who value the need for social justice imperatives and epistemic delinking across all facets of communication studies.

16. Murdock, Graham. "Ibn Khaldun and Critical Inquiry: A Response to Christian Fuchs." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 747--56. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231201050.

    ABSTRACT: [first paragraph, in lieu of abstract] Introducing Khaldun's economic thought Joseph Spengler has argued that what he has to say is important not so much because . . . he came in time to be looked upon as one who had anticipated a variety of "modern" notions. It is important rather because had a deep insight into. . . the culture of his day. (Spengler, 1964: 269) This suggests two contrasted approaches to re-reading Khaldun under present conditions. The first closes the gap between his time and ours, demonstrating that he anticipated key concepts which remain relevant and central to contemporary analysis. This is the approach Christian Fuchs takes in the present issue as he teases out the continuities between Khaldun and Marx and applies them to communication under digital capitalism.

17. Park, David W., Jefferson Pooley, Peter Simonson, and Esperanza Herrero. "The History of Communication Studies across the Americas: An Introduction." History of Media Studies 4 (July 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.a8f26bf1.

    ABSTRACT: This special section investigates the history of communication and media studies across national and linguistic contexts in the Americas. It maps transnational entanglements that have shaped communication inquiry in the multiple forms it has taken in South and North America and the Caribbean. At the same time, the section's articles attend to political, institutional, and cultural dynamics that shaped the field in different national and local contexts. In so doing, the special section throws light on topics and regions that have received little attention in English-language literature, and draws attention to historic lines of hegemony, exclusion, resistance, and alternative traditions of research across the hemisphere. In this editors' introduction, we outline the origins of the collective effort, connect it to parallel projects in two Latin American journals, and introduce the outstanding essays that follow. | Esta sección especial investiga la historia de los estudios sobre comunicación y medios en los diferentes contextos nacionales y/o lingüísticos de las Américas. Para ello, mapea los múltiples enlaces transnacionales que han dado forma a la investigación de la comunicación en sus vertientes norte y sudamericanas, así como en el Caribe. A la vez, los artículos de esta sección prestan atención particularmente a distintos contextos nacionales y locales. De esta manera, esta sección especial nos permite iluminar algunos de los temas y algunas de las regiones que han permanecido oscurecidas por la literatura anglofona, prestando especial atención a las líneas históricas de hegemonía, exclusión y resistencia, así como a las tradiciones de investigación alternativas que se han dado en el hemisferio. En esta introducción a cargo de los editores, señalamos los orígenes de este esfuerzo colectivo, lo conectamos con otros proyectos similares que se han dado en dos revistas latinoamericanas y, finalmente, introducimos los maravillosos ensayos que conforman esta sección especial.

18. Parks, Tim. "Reading against the Novel." The New York Review of Books, July 18, 2024. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2024/07/18/reading-against-the-novel-james-fitzjames-stephen/.

    ABSTRACT: In hundreds of essays and reviews, the nineteenth-century lawyer and judge James Fitzjames Stephen considered the novel's effects on society at a time when it was becoming the dominant form of entertainment.

19. Slaček Brlek, Sašo, and Boris Mance. "The Strictest Taboo: The Marginalization of Marxism in Mainstream Communication Studies." Critical Sociology 50, no. 4--5 (July 2024): 589--614. https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205231213281.

    ABSTRACT: Our study uses big data analysis to examine the influence of Marxism on communication studies throughout its history. We track citations of Marxist authors and the use of Marxist concepts in the titles, keywords, or abstracts of publications in the Web of Science scholarly database in the category of communication. We find that Marxian authors and ideas were almost completely absent from the mainstream of media studies until the end of the Cold War. The end of the Cold War and the Great Recession of 2008 significantly increased citations of Marxist authors. We use network analysis to identify different currents of thought or paradigmatic appropriations of Marxism within communication studies and identify five clusters of appropriation of Marx's ideas within communication studies: Theories of Democracy, Political Economy of Communication, Critique of Power Relations, Feminism and Antiracism, and Critical Discourse Analysis.

20. Villanueva, Erick R. Torrico. "'Western Communication': Eurocentrism and Modernity: Marks of the Predominant Theories in the Field." History of Media Studies 4 (July 2024). https://doi.org/10.32376/d895a0ea.2097c669.

    ABSTRACT: The main communication theories in use have been developed primarily by American and European authors, reflect the characteristics of the industrialized societies of the North, and are framed within the parameters of scientificity as established by modernity. They focus on mass communication, its technological means and its effects. Thus, with a framework constituted above all by positivist epistemology, empirical-quantitative research strategies, and functionalist sociological theory, communication, as a field of knowledge, has structured its profile of scientificity to conform to modern procedural requirements as well as the expansionist objectives of the civilizational model in which it was born. Such theories have reached, in practice, a "universal" scope, a "canonical" recognition and level, and are reproduced in the most diverse latitudes in both training processes and professional practice, as well as in mainstream discourse. Faced with the predominance of this "Western" communication, Latin American critical communicational thought is challenged to seek a new understanding of the phenomenon of communication and its study in the perspective of its de-Westernization. | Las principales teorías de la Comunicación en uso han sido fundamentalmente desarrolladas por autores estadounidenses y europeos, responden a las características de las sociedades industrializadas del Norte y se enmarcan en los parámetros de cientificidad establecidos por la Modernidad. Están focalizadas en la comunicación masiva, sus medios tecnológicos y sus efectos. De esa forma, con una armazón constituida ante todo por la epistemología positivista, las estrategias investigativas empírico-cuantitativas y la teoría sociológica funcionalista, la Comunicación, en cuanto campo de saber, estructuró su perfil de cientificidad a la medida de las exigencias procedimentales modernas como también de los objetivos de expansión del modelo civilizatorio en que vio la luz. Tales teorías han alcanzado, en la práctica, un alcance "universal", un reconocimiento y un nivel "canónicos" y son reproducidas en las más diversas latitudes tanto en los procesos de formación como en el ejercicio profesional, lo mismo que en el sentido común. Ante el predominio de esa "Comunicación 'occidental'", el pensamiento comunicacional crítico latinoamericano está desafiado a buscar un nuevo entendimiento del fenómeno de la comunicación y de su estudio en la perspectiva de su desoccidentalización.

21. Kennerly, Michele. “Cybernetics in the Republic.” History of the Human Sciences 36, no. 1 (2023): 80–102. https://doi.org/10.1177/09526951221134478.

    ABSTRACT: Plato’s Republic lurks in cybernetics, a word popularly attributed to US American mathematician Norbert Wiener (1894–1964). In his accounts of how he came up with it, however, Wiener never mentions Plato, though he does note it was formed from the ancient Greek word kubernētēs (navigator). Among the earliest popular books about the cybernetics craze are three published in France, and their authors show a special interest in the origin of cybernetics. In something like learned rebukes to Wiener, all three books credit Plato with significant use of kubernē-based terms. This article presents evidence, one, that Wiener knows well he has chosen a word with a Platonic history and, two, that Wiener deems the technical and social climate of ancient Athens (and of the Republic) instructive only as an anti-model for the mid-20th-century United States and so does not feel compelled to associate cybernetics with Plato. Instead, Wiener focuses on the challenges cybernetics and automation pose for his own engineering-oriented, capitalist, multiracial, democratic republic. Wiener’s decisions not to use Plato as an authorizing force and not to put ancient Athens on a pedestal merit recognition, since subsequent writers link ancient Athens with cybernation via a presumption that cybernation will enable and fully democratize the sort of leisure activities, including thinking and participation in public life, deemed by some to be emblematic of ancient Athens.