Democracy is based on the belief that the media gets the attention of voters. But is this plausible in an age of multiplying media, disillusionment with the political system and time-scarcity? This book addresses this question, and charts experiences of 'public connection'.

The Occupy movement and the Arab Spring have brought global attention to the potential of social media for empowering otherwise marginalized groups. This book addresses questions like what happens after the moment of protest and global visibility and whether social media can also help sustain civic engagement beyond protest.

A state-of-the-art account of what we know and do not know about the effects of digital technology on democracy.

Engaging youth in civic life has become a central concern to a broad array of researchers in a variety of academic fields as well to policy makers and practitioners globally. This book is both international and multidisciplinary, consisting of three sections that respectively cover conceptual issues, developmental and educational topics, and methodological and measurement issues. Broad in its coverage of topics, this book supports scholars, philanthropists, business leaders, government officials, teachers, parents, and community practitioners in their drive to engage more young people in community and civic actions.

Public policy has a dynamic effect on multiple facets of modern society. Methods for managing and engaging the public sphere continue to change conceptually across the globe, impacting the ways that governments and citizens interact both within and across borders. Management and Participation in the Public Sphere is a definitive reference source for the latest scholarly research on the interplay of public affairs and the domestic realm, providing innovative methods on managing public policy across various nations, cultures, and governments. Featuring expansive coverage on a multitude of relevant topics in civic involvement, information technology, and modes of government, this publication is a pivotal reference source for researchers, students, and professionals seeking current developments in novel approaches to public policy studies. This publication features timely, research-based chapters on the critical issues of public policy including, but not limited to, archival paradigms, Internet censorship, media control, civic engagement, virtual public spaces, online activism, higher education, and public-private partnerships.

Gunther Kress, one of the founders of social semiotics and multimodality, has made lasting contributions to these fields through his work in semiotics and meaning-making; power and identity; agency, design, production; and pedagogy and learning; in varied sites of transformation. This book brings together leading scholars in a variety of disciplines, including social semiotics, pedagogy, linguistics, media and communication studies, new literacy studies, ethnography, academic literacy, literary criticism and, more recently, medical/clinical education, to examine and build upon his work. This disciplinary diversity is evidence of the ways in which Kress' work has influenced and been influenced by a wide range of academic work and intellectual endeavors and how it has been used to lay foundations for theory-building and concept development in a varied yet connected range of areas. The individual contributions to the book pick up the threads of the often collaborative work of the authors with Kress; they show how these approaches were subsequently developed and discuss what future trajectories the authors see for them.

How does news circulate in a major post-industrial city? And how in turn are identities and differences formed and mediated through this circulation? This seminal work is the first to offer an empirical examination, and trace a city’s pattern of, news circulation. Encompassing a comprehensive range of practices involved in producing, circulating and consuming ‘news’ and recognizing the various ways in which individuals and groups may find out, follow and discuss local issues and events, The Mediated City critiques thinking that takes the centrality of certain news media as an unquestioned starting point. By doing so, it opens up a discussion: do we know what news is? What types of media constitute it? And why does it matter?

Contributing to a rethink of Public Service Media, this book combines theoretical insights and legal frameworks with practice, examining theory and policy development in a bottom-up manner. It explores the practices of Public Service Media across Europe, assessing the rules that govern Public Service Media at both the EU and the National Member State level, identifying common trends, initiated by both the European Commission and individual countries, illustrating the context-dependent development of Public Service Media and challenging the theories of Public Service Broadcasting which have developed an ideal-type public broadcaster based on the well-funded BBC in an atypical media market. Seeking to further explore the actual practices of Public Service Media and make recommendations for the development of more sustainable policies, this book offers case studies of rules and practices from across a variety of EU Member States to consider the extent to which public broadcasters are making the transition to public media organisations, and how public broadcasters and governments are shaping Public Service Media together. This book is a must-read for all scholars who take an interest in Public Service Media, media policy and media systems literature at large. It will also be of interest to practitioners working in government, Public Service Media and commercial media.

From entertainment to citizenship reveals how the young use shows like X-factor to comment on how power ought to be used, and how they respond to those pop stars – like Bono and Bob Geldof – who claim to represent them. It explores how young people connect the pleasures of popular culture to the world at large. For them, popular culture is not simply a matter of escapism and entertainment, but of engagement too. The place of popular culture in politics, and its contribution to democratic life, has too often been misrepresented or misunderstood. This book provides the evidence and analysis that will help correct this misperception. It documents the voices of young people as they talk about popular culture (what they love as well as what they dislike), and as they reveal their thoughts about the world they inhabit. It will be of interest to those who study media and culture, and those who study politics.

The ebook edition of this title is Open Access and freely available to read online. Filling a gap between classic discussions on everyday media use and recent studies of emergent technologies, this book untangles how media become meaningful to us in the everyday, connecting us to communities and publics.