Rodger Streitmatter
Professor
Print Journalism

Understanding Mass Media

This course explores the American mass media by looking at major issues involving the most important genres of communication having impact on the nation today.

Students become acquainted with the media’s history, power, impact, economic elements, and ethical dimensions.

Understanding Mass Media is geared toward making students better informed and more thoughtful consumers of—rather than practitioners of—the media.

Particular emphasis is placed on television, the most powerful form of communication in the history of humankind. The course also gives attention to film, music, newspapers, magazines, and radio while also looking at the Internet, advertising, and public relations as important adjuncts to the mass media.

Understanding Mass Media is the first course required of communication majors and also is a foundation-level course in the university’s General Education program.

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