Rhetoric and Media Studies Department
MEDIA
FRAMING 362
| Dr. Catherine Collins |
370-6281
|
Office Hrs: MWF 8:30-9; MW 2:30-3:30. (SMUL 204) I write or work with student projects Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Please try not to call during these times; if you drop by and the door is open, however, feel free to come in and talk. I am around most days between 6:30 am and 4:30 pm. My other classes and labs meet MWF 9:10-10:10 and12:30-1:30. I have Academic Council every Wednesday from 4:00-6:00 and World Views faculty meetings Fridays from 3:30-4:30.
Text
We have readings available in the library from scholarly journals and I will give you handouts of several papers presented at scholarly conferences. If you do not own Diana Hacker's A Pocket Style Manual, please purchase a copy.
Course Description and Requirements
This course is designed as a collaborative seminar. We
will read and discuss the research on media framing and try to develop
a comprehensive and cohesive approach to analyzing how the media teaches
us what to think about and how to think about those issues, institutions,
or individuals. The Course Catalog description reads:
This course examines news accounts as they construct the meaning of the
events they report. Student explore how reality is shaped when the media
privileges a particular frame for the events; sketches familiar plotlines,
characters, or ideologies; or gives authority to some voices and silences
others. Finally, the course addresses the effect of media conventionalizing,
in the symbolic complexes addressed and the formulaic stories they spawn,
on both the range of interpretations and the range of topics that are
publicly addressed.
I have tried to begin with the familiar--children's stories--to help us
discover narrative frames. What must be told to make it a telling of the
story of The Three Little Pigs? What can the narrator change and still
call to mind that familiar story? In what contexts does that childhood
tale emerge? Why? You will work as a small group on three other tales
to discover the role and constitution of perspective.
We
will read and discuss framing as a theoretical construct and then study
how it has been applied in studies of the mass media, especially media
news stories of ethnic (or other) minorities.
We
do not have a regular text (the options weren't exciting; they were expensive);
rather, we will read articles from scholarly journals written about media
framing and articles using framing as a theoretical perspective for critiquing
news stories and the media in general. If you have never read scholarly
journal articles, this class will help you attain that skill.
This
class is designated as writing intensive. In this case, we will focus
on writing short critical response papers. Each paper is approximately
1000 words. Short critical response papers are designed to teach you to
make an extended argument about the article(s) you have read and the research
you are conducting. You do not have the luxury of making several unrelated
points, reviewing all of the research in the area, or describing (re-telling)
the article(s) to which you are responding. You will be writing a paper
every other week. By mid-semester, everyone should be comfortable with
this form of writing; I expect great essays during the second half of
the semester! Peer critiques will give you additional feedback as you
rework your best early efforts.
Course Policies
1. The department has an attendance policy. Any absences over three (excluding
university excused absences) will result in a lower grade of one mark
per day (4 absences would lower an earned B to a B-; 5 absences to a C+).
2. Plagiarism, the theft of another's ideas or writing is not acceptable.
When in doubt, cite the source. If you paraphrase, cite the source to
indicate that these are not your ideas or arguments. If you plagiarize
a paper you may receive an F on both the paper and in the course. You
may use either MLA or APA guidelines for source citations.
3. Due Dates: We have ten writing weeks this semester (beginning Tuesday
September 8 and ending Tuesday November 12); you are expected to write
at least eight papers; you may write all ten. Papers are due at the beginning
of class each Tuesday. Your papers will be based on new readings since
the last paper, including readings assigned for that day. You may write
every paper or you may choose to skip an occasional paper. If you are
ill, that will be one of your skips. There are no late papers accepted
in this class. If you are going to be gone for more than three days for
university-approved events, your paper for the week may be turned in on
Monday. Papers cannot be turned in earlier than that as they need to reflect
the previous week's material. I will evaluate all of the first papers.
After that you will have every paper evaluated either by a peer editor
or by me; in either case I will note in the grade book that the paper
has been written. I will also evaluate the peer editing. Throughout the
semester I will ask for three papers to be reworked and submitted for
a grade. In preparation, the original paper or a revised draft must be
peer edited before it receives your final editing. This should become
your best work. We will have regular very short quizzes over the readings
at the beginning of class sessions (come on time or you'll miss them!).
Quizzes cannot be made up. I will also be asking one or two people to
lead discussion each day and will evaluate these efforts. Because this
is a writing centered course, you will need to keep a portfolio of all
writing during the course. These materials are submitted to the Writing
Center Committee for their assessment.
4. Paper Expectations: You may have difficulties with some of the articles,
or at least some parts of the articles. You will deal with the issues
as best you can. Your papers should demonstrate carefully thought-out
and written arguments. Take a concept from the articles you are reading
and explore it; how does your chosen concept apply to the discourse we
are examining at the time or how is this concept related to others we
have discussed. Your papers may apply the theoretical concepts to any
subject of media framing; I encourage you to try out a news event that
addresses the focus of your web page as this will save you time. Just
because the papers are short it does not mean they can be last minute
efforts. The paper itself should reflect several rewrites and careful
final editing. To that end, I will circle spelling and typing errors and
expect peer editors to do the same. After the first five the paper will
be returned unread. You must edit the paper and return it within 24 hours.
Peer critiques should serve the more important function of suggesting
improvements in organization and the invention of argument. If you turn
in a “clean” paper (spelling and grammar), the editors will
have more time to do the important assessment, a critique of the arguments
you advance.
5. One of the problems with frequent writing is that most of us do not
spend sufficient time in reworking our ideas. In this class you will be
asked to do so for the final class project. As a class you will be constructing
a web page and following up on earlier papers you have written. I will
give you a model class-constructed web page and explain the assignment
as we get into the semester. Although this is not individual work, it
will be graded. I have tried this kind of media project several times.
I know some problems we will encounter, but other unexpected difficulties
could well arise (we are, after all, dealing with technology). Don’t
worry, we have sufficient time at the end of the semester to make this
a class effort of which all of us can be proud. If you all do good work
on your initial papers and keep an eye out for the concepts we will be
exploring, this will be a very exciting and certainly unique “final
paper” in the class.
Schedule
We have several decisions to make as a class that will influence the schedule of readings for the semester. I will give you the final reading assignments and send the reading packet to the bookstore on Monday (Friday if we work efficiently today).
Unit One: Discovering Narrative Frames
- 8/29 Visual Perception; The Three Little Pigs
- 8/31 Parry-Giles. “Mediating Hillary Rodham Clinton: Television News Practice and Image-Making in the Postmodern Age” handout
Unit Two: Framing as a Construct
- Tu 8 Schudson, M. "The Politics of Narrative Form" Daedalus 3:4 (1982), 97+
- Graber, D. "Content and Meaning" handout
- Gamson, W. "News as Framing" handout
- Th 10 No reading
- Tu 15 Darnton, R. "Writing News and Telling Stories" Daedalus 104 (1975), 175+
- Tuchman, G. "Telling Stories" Journal of Communication 26:4 (1976), 93+
- Th 17 Edelman , M. "Contestable Categories and Public Opinion” Political Communication 10, 231+; buy and bring to class The Statesman Journal for Wednesday October 16; read the first section of the paper before class
- Tu 22 Entman,
R. "Framing: Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm"
Journal of Communication 43:4 (1993), 51+
Unit Three: Media Framing of the Arts
- Th 24 Ryan, J & Simm, D. "When Art Becomes News" Social Forces 68:3 (1990), 869+; Case Study of the new Willamette art museum
Unit Four: Media Framing: Political Responsibility
- Tu 29 Continue case study
- Th 1Hallin,
D. & Mancini, P. "Speaking of the President" handout;
Sullivan, P. "The 1994 Vice-Presidential Debate" Communication
Quarterly 37:4 (1989), 329+; Case Study of Political biographies
- Tu 6 Continue
case study; Hackett, R. "Decline of a Paradigm: Bias and Objectivity
in News Media Studies" Critical Studies in Mass Communication
1:3 (1984), 229+; Collins, C. & Schmid, J., “Privileged Frames:
Frontline's Framing of Clinton and Dole” handout
- Th 8 Wilkie, C. "The Scapegoating of Bruno Richard Hauptmann" Central States Speech Journal 32 (1981, Summer), 100+; Ettema, J. & Glasser, T. "Narrative Form & Moral Force" Journal of Communication 38:3 (1988), 8+
Unit Five: Framing War News
- Tu 13 Katz,
E. "The End of Journalism? Notes on Watching the War"Journal
of Communication 42:3 (1992), 5+; Liebes, T. "Our War/Their
War: Comparing the Intifadeh and the Gulf War" Critical
Studies in Mass Communication 9 (1992), 44+; Collins, C & Clark,
J, "A Structural Narrative Analysis of Nightline's 'This Week in
the Holy Land'" Critical Studies in Mass Communication 9
(March 1992), 25-43
- Th 15 No
reading; Case Study of war coverage by the media
Unit Six:
Framing Science Issues
- Tu 20 Anderson,
R. "Rhetoric and Science Journalism" Quarterly Journal
of Speech (1970), 358); Peterson, T. "Telling the Farmer's
Story" Quarterly Journal of Speech 77 (1991), 289+; Gamson,
W. "Media Discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power: A Constructivist
Approach" American Journal of Sociology 95:1 (1989), 1+
- Th 22 Pan,
Z. & Kosicki, G. "Framing Analysis: An Approach to News Discourse"
Political Communication 10,55+; Case Study of environmental reporting
- Tu 27 Collins,
C, “Media Coverage of the Forest Conference,” handout; Liebler,
C. & Bendix, J. "Old-Growth Forests on the Evening News"
handout
- Th 29 Presentation
by students in RHET 496 of their research on environmental issues
Unit Seven:
Media Framing of Breaking Major Stories
- Tu 3 Begin
Case Study of the Death of Diana
- Th 5 Continue
Case Study
- Tu 10 Begin
Case Study of the Clinton Scandal; last critical response paper due
- Th 12 Continue Case Study
Constructing Web Pages on Media Framing
- November
12-December 7 Constructing the class web pages; essays for the web pages
due
- Final Exam: Tuesday December 11, 8-11: web presentations