From Frank's Place through Soul Food and Girlfriends, the increased involvement of African Americans in the production of television images has impacted the way television portrays the diversity of American life. Yet little research has been done to explore how minority television workers see their role as creators. This book explores television and race from the perspective of industry writers, producers, directors, and executives. Listening to those directly involved in bringing diversity to television helps uncover the process whereby difference is created and recreated in both the workplace, and on the television screen. Suitable for classes in race, gender, media, media culture, diversity and the media, and African Americans and popular culture, the book will also be of interest to those wishing to enter the television industry, providing insight from workers who have succeeded in an increasingly competitive business.

Films as Rhetorical Texts: Cultivating Discussion about Race, Racism, and Race Relations presents critical essays focusing on select commercial films and what they can teach us about race, racism, and race relations in America. The films in this volume are critically assessed as rhetorical texts using various aspects and components of critical race theory, recognizing that race and racism are intricately ingrained in American society. Contributors argue that by viewing and evaluating culture-centered films-often centered around race-and critically analyzing them, faculty and students can promote the opportunity for genuine open discussions about race, racism, and race relations in the United States, specifically in the higher education classroom. Scholars of film studies, media studies, race studies, and education will find this book particularly useful.

Ten years after Hurricane Katrina, outsiders will have two versions of the Katrina experience. One version will be the images they recall from news coverage of the aftermath. The other will be the intimate portrayal of the determination of New Orleans residents to rebuild and recover their lives. HBO's Treme offers outsiders an inside look into why New Orleanians refused to abandon a place that many questioned should not be rebuilt after the levees failed. This critically acclaimed series expanded the boundaries of television making in its format, plot, casting, use of music, and realism-in-fictionalized-TV. However, Treme is not just a story for the outside gaze on New Orleans. It was a very local, collaborative experience where the show's creators sought to enlist the city in a commemorative project. Treme allowed many in the city who worked as principals, extras, and who tuned in as avid viewers to heal from the devastation of the disaster as they experimented with art, imitating life, imitating art. This book examines the impact of HBOs Treme not just as television making, but in the sense in which television provides a window to our worlds. The book pulls together scholarship in media, communications, gender, area studies, political economy, critical studies, African American studies and music to explain why Treme was not just about television.

Ten years after Hurricane Katrina, outsiders will have two versions of the Katrina experience. One version will be the images they recall from news coverage of the aftermath. The other will be the intimate portrayal of the determination of New Orleans residents to rebuild and recover their lives. HBO's Treme offers outsiders an inside look into why New Orleanians refused to abandon a place that many questioned should not be rebuilt after the levees failed. This critically acclaimed series expanded the boundaries of television making in its format, plot, casting, use of music, and realism-in-fictionalized-TV. However, Treme is not just a story for the outside gaze on New Orleans. It was a very local, collaborative experience where the show's creators sought to enlist the city in a commemorative project. Treme allowed many in the city who worked as principals, extras, and who tuned in as avid viewers to heal from the devastation of the disaster as they experimented with art, imitating life, imitating art. This book examines the impact of HBOs Treme not just as television making, but in the sense in which television provides a window to our worlds. The book pulls together scholarship in media, communications, gender, area studies, political economy, critical studies, African American studies and music to explain why Treme was not just about television.

College Media: Learning in Action is a unique resource for journalism educators and students, media advisors, student personnel administrators, and students at any level - undergraduate or graduate - interested in learning theory and practice. Sixteen original, scholarly and diverse chapters encompass a wide range of methodologies that detail how students involved in college media organizations have formative experiences in a variety of different forms of publication and electronic media broadcasting. In part, the volume is assembled to help students and educators alike justify their practice and involvement at a time of change when new forms of social media, pressure to quantify learning outcomes, and budget issues in higher education are reshaping the undergraduate media landscape. This volume offers insight into how many journalism and media professionals began their careers and in doing so affirms the value of learning through direct experience and involvement.

The popularity of cable news, satire, documentaries, and political blogs suggest that people are often absorbing and dissecting direct political messages from informational media. But entertainment media also discusses the important political issues of our time, though not as overtly. Nonetheless, consumers still learn, debate, and form opinions on important political issues through their relationship with entertainment media. While many scholarly books examine these political messages found in popular culture, very few examine how actual audiences read these messages. Parasocial Politics explores how consumers form complex relationships with media texts and characters, and how these readings exist in the nexus between real and fictional worlds. This collection of empirical studies uses various methodologies, including surveys, experiments, focus groups, and mixed methods, to analyze how actual consumers interpret the texts and the overt and covert political messages encoded in popular culture.

Films as Rhetorical Texts: Cultivating Discussion about Race, Racism, and Race Relations presents critical essays focusing on select commercial films and what they can teach us about race, racism, and race relations in America. The films in this volume are critically assessed as rhetorical texts using various aspects and components of critical race theory, recognizing that race and racism are intricately ingrained in American society. Contributors argue that by viewing and evaluating culture-centered films—often centered around race—and critically analyzing them, faculty and students can promote the opportunity for genuine open discussions about race, racism, and race relations in the United States, specifically in the higher education classroom. Scholars of film studies, media studies, race studies, and education will find this book particularly useful.