News Archive 2015

Gregory Asmolov, PhD Researcher in the Department of Media and Communications, has been published in the Oxford Internet Institute’s  Policy and Internet blog. The article, entitled  Controlling the crowd? Government and citizen interaction on emergency-response platform  discusses the use of crowdsourcing tools and practices in emergency situations.

Dr Bart Cammaerts, Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communications will give a keynote lecture on 2 December in Sorbonne, Paris at the Institut des Sciences de la Communication (CNRS/Paris Sorbonne/UPMC) Times and Temporalities of the Web conference. His lecture is entitled “The Resistant Shaping of Technologies of Self-Mediation: hacking print, telecoms, broadcasting and the internet”.

This presentation will be focusing not only on digital technologies, but also on what are commonly  called traditional media, print cultures, audio and broadcasting, especially radio, but also on the  role of telecommunication. The temporal dimension in my intervention will thus relate to a historical  dimension and the various ways in which counter-cultures and activists have over time  appropriated and subsequently perverted information and communication technologies to suit their  particular needs and to shape the media and communication technologies at their disposal into  tools of resistance. At the same time, we can also observe that the powers-that-be do everything  they possibly can to disrupt, regulate, impede, limit, the impact of resisting groups appropriating  their own means of communication, … not always successfully. In fact, the creativity of activists to  bypass the multiple repressive tactics by the state and the corporate sector is quite astonishing  and consistent over time; very often activists use or deturn – to use a Debordian term – the system  against the system, which amounts to a hack.

Besides this historical perspective at an empirical level, I will also mobilize Foucault’s notion of  Technologies of the Self to make sense of the various ways in which the self-mediation practices of  activists and social movements feed into the construction of their collective identity as well as the  enactment of their protest mobilizations and actions. The Technologies of the Self also serves  theoretically to understand how this process, which has a symbolic as well as a material side, is  characterized by simultaneously operating and ever changing agentic as well as constraining  dynamics. The interplay between these dynamics tends to give rise to productive and innovative  activist interventions when it comes to the shaping of media and communication technologies for activist needs

Charlie Beckett, Professor and Director of Polis has been appointed as Special Advisor on broadcasting to the House of Commons Select Committee for Culture, Media and Sport.

Professor Beckett  says: "This is a critical time for broadcasting in Britain and I look forward to contributing some insights from my time both as a journalist and academic to the policy-making process."

Dr Shani Orgad, Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communications spoke at the Public Policy Exchange Symposium Towards Gender Equality: Supporting Women in the Workplace  on 10 November.  Her talk was entitled Heading Home: What can workplaces learn from the women who left them?

César Jiménez-Martínez, PhD Researcher in the Department of Media and Communications, participated in the colloquium 'Trauma and Memory: Europe and Latin America', which took part in the Embassy of Argentina. The colloquium is part of the European Union funded project MEMOSUR: Lessons for Europe from Argentina and Chile. 

New book:

Youth Participation in Democratic Life: stories of hope and disillusion (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015)

Bart Cammaerts, Michael Bruter, Shakuntala Banaji, Sarah Harrison, Nick Anstead

This book analyses and assesses the contexts, nature and the diversity of young people's participation in European democratic life. The authors provide an interdisciplinary conceptual framework addressing participation, power, democracy, efficacy and media. Using dynamic, original data collected in surveys, focus groups, interviews and a field experiment, Youth Participation in Democratic Life address young people's attitudes towards voting, participation and representation in policy processes and politicians. Democracy is, however, much more than voting, so volunteering and contentious politics are also elaborated upon. Examining the role of traditional and new media in facilitating youth participation in democratic life, as well as the complex dynamics of youth exclusion from economic, educational and social spheres, the book reveals that most young people are far from apathetic about democracy but rather they are critical of current representative democratic systems and the political elites who appear to run these.

A new online Digital Exclusion Heatmap tool which shows, for the first time, a single nationwide measure of the likelihood of digital exclusion across the UK was launched today by Go ON UK in partnership with LSE, the BBC and Local Government Association

The Department's Dr Ellen Helsper who developed the methodology behind the map, said: “The heat map is a wake-up call. It shows clearly how social and digital exclusion are closely related. The lack of basic digital skills and access in already disadvantaged areas is likely to lead to an increase in inequality of opportunity around the UK.”

Professor Charlie Beckett has been appointed as Special Advisor on broadcasting to the House of Commons Select Committee for Culture, Media and Sport. He will be advising the committee on its inquiries into the future of Channel 4 and the BBC's Charter renewal as well as identifying future topics for the committee to address.

The European migration crisis and the media

The Department of Media and Communications has launched a major research project about the effect of the media on public understanding of the migration and refugee crisis.

The research is led by Professor Lilie Chouliaraki and Dr Myria Georgiou, and builds on the Department’s earlier work on migration and the media, and on the effects of media ethics on human wellbeing.

"British parents are among the most fearful and confused when it comes to allowing their children to access the internet", says Professor Sonia Livingstone in Daily Telegraph article Cyber safety: How protected are your children online?

13 October 2015 saw the launch of Confronting Gender Inequality, the final report of the LSE Commission on Gender, Inequality and Power. Professor Nick Couldry and Dr Shani Orgad were Commissioners for the section on Gender and Media/Culture, which gave four key recommendations:

• Establish a standing committee to monitor media representation of gender.
• Foster critical media literacy skills in schools.
• Training on gender to be part of professional qualifications for journalists.
• Implement the Leveson Report to allow action on third party complaints, eg from women’s groups

'Thank you Shanghai', video by LSE-Fudan MSc alumnus Ariel Margalith, goes viral in China, reaching over 60 million views. The video has been covered by media in China, Israel and the United States, and has been shown on outdoor screens all over Shanghai. The video is available here. 

PhD Researcher César Jiménez-Martínez  was invited to present his work 'Between the streets and the stadiums: looking at the international image of Brazil through the eyes of a Chilean' at the conference 'Remapping Brazilian Cultural Studies', organised by the European Network of Brazilianists working in Cultural Analysis, Rebrac, at Senate House, in London.

Shani Orgad, Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communications, gave a talk at the Global Imaginations Symposium in Leiden (the Netherlands), and participated in a dialogue with artists whose work was displayed at the Global Imaginations exhibition.

Nick Couldry, Professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory and Head of Department is to be awarded an honorary doctorate by Södertörn University in Stockholm, Sweden.

Professor Couldry will be giving a public lecture “The Social Construction of Reality - Really!” on 27 November, at the university’s annual Commencement Ceremony.

Dr Shakuntala Banaji, Lecturer in the Department of Media and Communications, has been selected as recipient of the fourth annual European Award for Excellence in Teaching in the Social Sciences and Humanities. See more here. Dr Banaji discusses her teaching methods in a Times Higher Education interview How to be a better teacher: ‘madness’ and media mash-ups.

USC Annenberg School of Journalism and Communication was rated #1 in the 2015 QS World University Rankings, with LSE's Department of Media and Communications rated #1 outside of the US. The two institutions collaborate on a double degree in MSc/MA Global Media and Communications, as well as joining forces to research the profound implications of media and communications technologies for our shared futures. See more here.

Nick Couldry, Professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory and Head of the Department of Media and Communications has launched a brand new website nickcouldry.org, which features information on Nick's work, with regular updates on events, books and research activities.

Digital technology advances are opening up new ways to communicate, with the potential to enhance student–teacher relationships. Professor Sonia Livingstone followed a class of London teenagers for a year to find out more about how they are, or in some cases are not, connecting online. Read more about The Social Network here.

Nick Couldry, Professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory, has been appointed as a lead coordinating author for the International Panel on Social Progress 2017 Report 'Rethinking Society for the 21st Century'. Professor Couldry will work with Professor Chua Beng Huat    (National University of Singapore) to coordinate a chapter on Media, Communication and Languages. See a full list of authors here.

Dr Shani Orgad was one of the keynote speakers of the conference 'Myth(s) in the Social Sciences and Humanities', on 13th May 2015, at the University of York. The name of her talk was ‘The Others are Coming: Ambivalent and incomplete imaginings beyond dreams and nightmares’. 

Ahead of the UK General Election 2015, Charlie Beckett argues in The Guardian that the UK party political newspapers should be using their journalists to drive real election debate, not drum up party support. Read ‘Our party political newspapers need to grow up’ here’

We are proud to announce that Media and Communications faculty have been recognised by LSE students in the LSE Teaching Excellence Awards Congratulations. Dr Shakuntala Banaji won the Award for Exceptional Contribution to Teaching, with Dr Sally Broughton-Micova also receiving an award for her contribution to teaching this year.

In 2014, Polis and StockWell Communications launched a research prize open to LSE post-graduate students. Applicants were asked to submit original research proposals on the topic of ‘Corporate Reputation, Media and Society’.

The winner was Nina Chung who worked with StockWell and interviewed a broad range of people on the topic of corporate apologies to produce the research paper 'A Way With Words: Chasing a Definition for Corporate Public Apologies'. 

This week's Gearty Grilling: Sonia Livingstone on keeping children safe online

Professor Livingstone is the latest LSE academic to undergo a Gearty Grilling, a series of short video debates from LSE’s Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) on key issues affecting the world today. Here, Professor Livingstone discusses the challenges of keeping children safe online.

Radio 4 Documentary - No News is Good News

Charlie Beckett documentary explores whether there is an unrelenting negativity in the mainstream news agenda, preoccupied with violent crime, human accident, misfortune and disaster. In addition, you can read his article for The Guardian.

REF 2014

We are delighted to announce that the Department has been ranked first in the UK in its Unit of Assessment in the 2014 Research Excellence Framework assessment: 47% of our outputs were world-leading as were both impact case studies, our impact environment and our general research environment.

Claire Milne, Visiting Senior Fellow in the Department of Media and Communications, has been awarded an MBE for services to the telecommunications sector in the 2015 New Year's Honours list. Many congratulations to Claire, who has had a long and varied career with telecommunications policy as its central theme. Read more here.