How does the media influence our everyday lives? In which ways do our social worlds change when they interact with media? And what are the consequences for theorizing media and communication? Starting with questions like these, Mediatized Worlds discusses the transformation of our lives by their increasing mediatization. The chapters cover topics such as rethinking mediatization, mediatized communities, the mediatization of private lives and of organizational contexts, and the future perspective for mediatization research. The empirical studies offer new access to questions of mediatization an access that grounds mediatization in life-world and social-world perspectives.

How does the media influence our everyday lives? In which ways do our social worlds change when they interact with media? And what are the consequences for theorizing media and communication? Starting with questions like these, Mediatized Worlds discusses the transformation of our lives by their increasing mediatization. The chapters cover topics such as rethinking mediatization, mediatized communities, the mediatization of private lives and of organizational contexts, and the future perspective for mediatization research. The empirical studies offer new access to questions of mediatization an access that grounds mediatization in life-world and social-world perspectives.

The volume deals with the normative challenges and the ethical questions imposed by, and through, the developments and changes in everyday life, culture and society in the context of media change. It is thus concerned with the questions of whether and how the central concept of (enlightened) ethics must evolve under these premises – or in other words: what form do ethics take in mediatized societies? In order to address this question and to stimulate and initiate a debate, the authors focus on two concepts: responsibility and resistance. Their contributions try to shed light not only on the empirical shreds of evidence of change in mediatized societies, but also on the normative challenges and ethical possibilities of these developments.

What does it mean that we can be reached on our mobile phones wherever we are and at all times? What are the cultural consequences if we are informed about ‘everything and anything important’ via television? How are our political, religious and ethnic belongings impacted through being increasingly connected by digital media? And what is the significance of all this for our everyday lives? Drawing on Hepp’s fifteen-year research expertise on media change, this book deals with questions like these in a refreshingly straightforward and readable way. ‘Cultures of mediatization’ are described as cultures whose main resources are mediated by technical media. Therefore, everyday life in cultures of mediatization is ‘moulded’ by the media. To understand this challenging media change it is inappropriate to focus on any one single medium like television, the press, mobile phones, the Internet or other forms of digital media. One has to capture the ‘mediatization’ of culture in its entirety. Cultures of Mediatization outlines how this can be done critically. In so doing, it offers a new way of thinking about our present-day media-saturated world.

This book introduces and develops the concept of geomedia studies as the name of a particular subfield of communication geography. Despite the accelerating societal relevance of ‘geomedia’ technologies for the production of various spaces, mobilities, and power-relations, and the unquestionable emergence of a vibrant research field that deals with questions pertaining to such topics, the term geomedia studies remains surprisingly unestablished. By addressing imperative questions about the implications of geomedia technologies for organizations, social groups and individuals (e.g. businesses profiting from geo-surveillance, refugees or migrants moving across national borders, or artists claiming their rights to public space) the book also aims to contribute to ongoing academic and societal debates in our increasingly mediatized world.

In religious education, digitization and mediatization processes result in the transformation of conventional media formats. This leads to the development of new media formats, which in turn necessitates a redefinition of the relationship between religious education and the media. Keeping this in mind, this volume first examines the importance of media for specific theological disciplines, and then discusses current media-pedagogical and media-didactic approaches. Later in the book, the authors develop didactic perspectives on various methods; these include internet-based archive work and the use of digital teaching materials. They also deal with current questions regarding religious education, such as inclusion and cyber bullying, etc. Finally, they identify some of the main didactic challenges for religious instruction in a mediatized world. This volume is a plea for a wider understanding of education, and is based in part on a German-Swedish teaching and research cooperation. Following this example, it focuses on a future-oriented networking of plural forms of education. This resource is designed for students of theology and religious sciences as well as for religious education teachers.

This book presents a new perspective on how Russia projects itself to the world. Distancing itself from familiar, agency-driven International Relations accounts that focus on what ‘the Kremlin’ is up to and why, it argues for the need to pay attention to deeper, trans-state processes over which the Kremlin exerts much less control. Especially important in this context is mediatization, defined as the process by which contemporary social and political practices adopt a media form and follow media-driven logics. In particular, the book emphasizes the logic of the feedback loop or ‘recursion’, showing how it drives multiple Russian performances of national belonging and nation projection in the digital era. It applies this theory to recent issues, events, and scandals that have played out in international arenas ranging from television, through theatre, film, and performance art, to warfare.

The relationship between media and the organizations they cover has changed dramatically in the last few decades, which have witnessed a huge expansion of news coverage focusing on different types of organizations and their activities. In parallel, organizations have dramatically increased their investment in public relations and other media-oriented forms of communication. Like other societal developments – globalization, marketization, individualization, scientification – mediatization has become an institutional force. This book analyses the mediatization of contemporary organizations and how individual organizations, industry or markets are scrutinized. It examines its key influence on the actions of organizations, and how it shaptes the entire landscape in which the organizations operate. What such a perspective provides is the accentuation of the interplay between organizations and different parts of the society as embedded in the media and its logic. This will be essential reading for professionals, academics and advanced students in organizational studies, public relations and media studies.

This handbook on Mediatization of Communication uncovers the interrelation between media changes and changes in culture and society. This is essential to understand contemporary trends and transformations. “Mediatization” characterizes changes in practices, cultures and institutions in media-saturated societies, thus denoting transformations of these societies themselves. This volume offers 31 contributions by leading media and communication scholars from the humanities and social sciences, with different approaches to mediatization of communication. The chapters span from how mediatization meets climate change and contribute to globalization to questions on life and death in mediatized settings. The book deals with mass media as well as communication with networked, digital media. The topic of this volume makes a valuable contribution to the understanding of contemporary processes of social, cultural and political changes. The handbook provides the reader with the most current state of mediatization research.

We live in times that generate diverse conflicts; we also live in times when conflicts are increasingly played out and performed in the media. Mediatized Conflict explores the powered dynamics, contested representations and consequences of media conflict reporting. It examines how the media today do not simply report or represent diverse situations of conflict, but actively 'enact' and 'perform' them. This important book brings together the latest research findings and theoretical discussions to develop an encompassing, multidimensional and sophisticated understanding of the social complexities, political dynamics and cultural forms of mediatized conflicts in the world today. Case studies include: Anti-war protests and anti-globalization demonstrations Mediatized public crises centering on issues of 'race' and racism War journalism and peace journalism Risk society and the environment The politics of outrage and terror spectacle post 9/11 Identity politics and cultural recognition This is essential reading for Media Studies students and all those interested in understanding how, why, and with what impacts media report on diverse conflicts in the world today.