Mass Media
Chapter 12  Summary

The focus of this chapter is on the mass media in a globalised world. It begins by reviewing the shifting concerns of sociological accounts of the mass media tracing contemporary developments in communications technology in order to show how these have massively re -cast the importance of the mass media in our lives. It explores how the 'global village' of communications has emerged and the characteristics of the global media-market place that has resulted, particularly corporations that dominate within it. It then examines the impact of these developments on media content, exploring the contradictions in having mass information at our fingertips one the one hand, and the role of the state, on the other, in trying to control this information. At the end, the chapter turns to the significance of audiences for the global media, looking at differences in approach to the effects of media content on audiences and the different levels of access available to them.