To most Westerners, the Iranian revolution was a shocking spectacle, a distant mass upheaval suddenly breaking into the daily news. It was, in fact, a revolution of the television era, as this book demonstrates. This account of the role of culture and communication in the Iranian revolution also considers revolution as communication in the modern world. Co-authored by participants in the revolutionary upheaval, this study reflects a wide perspective. Drawing on ten years of research, the authors vividly show how the processes and products of modernization actually helped to undermine the very foundation of modernity in Iran. Their work reveals how deeply embedded cultural modes of communication coupled with crucial media technologies were able to mobilize a population within a repressive political context. Tracing the use of small media (audio and video cassettes) to disseminate the revolution, the authors challenge much of the theory that has dominated international communication studies and, in doing so, question the credibility of the established media. Their book also examines the dilemmas of cultural policymaking based on Islamic principles in a media-saturated domestic and international environment. Annabelle Sreberny-Mohammadi and Ali Mohammadi are co-editors of "Questioning the Media".

The protests unleashed by Iran's disputed presidential election in June 2009 brought the Islamic Republic's vigorous cyber culture to the world's attention. Iran has an estimated 700,000 bloggers, and new media such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube were thought to have played a key role in spreading news of the protests. The Internet is often celebrated as an agent of social change in countries like Iran, but most literature on the subject has struggled to grasp what this new phenomenon actually means. How is it different from print culture? Is it really a new public sphere? Will the Iranian blogosphere create a culture of dissidence, which eventually overpowers the Islamist regime? In this groundbreaking work, the authors give a flavor of contemporary Internet culture in Iran and analyze how this new form of communication is affecting the social and political life of the country. Although they warn against stereotyping bloggers as dissidents, they argue that the Internet is changing things in ways which neither the government nor the democracy movement could have anticipated. "Blogistan "offers both a new reading of Iranian politics and a new conceptual framework for understanding the politics of the Internet, with implications for the wider Middle East, China, and beyond.

Rumor and speculation in Iran have been rife for generations that the BBC has had a hand in every political upheaval in the country. In this vein the BBC has become a notable element in the complex and tortured narrative of Anglo-Iranian relations. The BBC Persian Service was initially developed in 1940 to prepare and broadcast British war-time propaganda. And it has since been seen by many in Iran as an integral part of British policy-making in the region. Thirty years ago, the Shah of Iran regarded the BBC Persian Service radio as his 'enemy number one' and held it responsible for promoting the revolution of 1979. Only a couple decades earlier, the BBC Persian Service was widely accused for having been complicit in the CIA-led 1953 coup against Prime Minister Mohammad Musaddiq. And a decade earlier, the BBC Persian Service was strongly linked to the British-planned removal of Reza Shah in 1941. The BBC Persian service has frequently been perceived as an entity which was not simply a vehicle to record the changes occurring in Iran and throughout the Middle East, but rather an active agent of change. In this book, Annabelle Sreberny and Massoumeh Torfeh track the history of the BBC Persian Service, critically analyzing both the assumptions that the BBC is a standard bearer for objective reporting and representations of it as a simple tool of Western interests. Also examining the history of relations between the Foreign Office and the BBC Persian Service, they demonstrate that these have never been pre-defined or rigid. Instead, they explore how both institutions have moved from an interest in what can crudely be called state-orchestrated 'propaganda' to a more subtle advocacy of fair and balanced journalism as the best agent of British values and influence. This book is thus a significant contribution to understanding the changing nature of British diplomacy and the broader implications of the nexus between government and international broadcasting during the rise of diplomatic strategies aimed at winning the 'hearts and minds' of populations.

The protests unleashed by Iran's disputed presidential election in June 2009 brought the Islamic Republic's vigorous cyber culture to the world's attention. Iran has an estimated 700,000 bloggers, and new media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube were thought to have played a key role in spreading news of the protests. The internet is often celebrated as an agent of social change in countries like Iran, but most literature on the subject has struggled to grasp what this new phenomenon actually means. How is it different from print culture[unk] Is it really a new public sphere[unk] Will the Iranian blogosphere create a culture of dissidence, which eventually overpowers the Islamist regime[unk] In this groundbreaking work, the authors give a flavour of contemporary internet culture in Iran and analyse how this new form of communication is affecting the social and political life of the country. Although they warn against stereotyping bloggers as dissidents, they argue that the internet is changing things in ways which neither the government nor the democracy movement could have anticipated. "Blogistan" offers both a new reading of Iranian politics and a new conceptual framework for understanding the politics of the internet, with implications for the wider Middle East, China and beyond.

Globalisation is one of the most potent concepts informing academic debates across many disciplines on the threshold of the 21st century. Issues of communication, culture and media lie close to the heart of this contested concept which variously refers to the collapse of time and space as obstacles to human activity, to processes of economic and cultural expansion, to the undermining of the nation state as a critical building block for any transnational activity, to parallel tendencies towards both uniformity and fragmentation. This Reader combines classic work in the field with a series of overview essays written by leading scholars, to offer a comprehensive and illuminating overview of this key area in contemporary media studies.

Contemporary theorising about globalisation processes has only recently come to acknowledge the crucial role of media systems, a theme long familiar to researchers within communications. Thus this volume situates media forms and processes as central foci of globalisation processes and gives communications researchers a chance to respond to the theories often devised by those without any intimate involvement in communications theory or practice. The responses are loud and varied. The first half of the book clusters theoretical critiques and embellishments of globalisation theory as well as offers some alternative theoretical models for examining current communications and cultural practices in the unfolding new world system. Considerable attention is paid to unpacking notions of a ""transnational public sphere"", ""global civil society"", and ""solidarity"", and examining the role that media play in structuring both potentially hegemonic practices as well as alternative practices. The second half clusters a variety of case studies exploring different facets of the dynamics of globalisation. Three chapters focus on specific media forms such as the examination of music, language, and news. A last chapter explores the notion of solidarity in a different way: how international organisations such as Amnesty can try to influence the news agenda to mobilise transnational public sympathy for an oppressed group, specifically street children in Brazil. The introduction and conclusion, each written by one of the editors, provide contextualisation and development of the debates, and focus on further issues for theoretical development and empirical research.

The Islamic Republic of Iran has entered its fourth decade, and the values and legacy of the Revolution it was founded upon continue to have profound and contradictory consequences for Iranian life. Despite the repressive power of the current regime the immense creativity of popular cultural practices, that negotiate and resist a repressive system, is a potent and dynamic force. This book draws on the expertise and experience of Iranian and international academics and activists to address diverse areas of social and cultural innovation that are driving change and progress. While religious conservatism remains the creed of the establishment, this volume uncovers an underground world of new technology, media and entertainment that speaks to women seeking a greater public role and a restless younger generation that organises and engages with global trends online.