Libros

This collection investigates the publics of the hashtag. Taking cues from critical public sphere theory, contributors are interested in publics that break beyond the mainstream – in other publics. They are interested in the kinds of publics that do politics in a way that is rough and emergent, flawed and messy, and ones in which new forms of collective power are being forged on the fly and in the shadow of loftier mainstream spheres.
Hashtags are deictic, indexical – yet what they point to is themselves, their own dual role in ongoing discourse. Focusing on hashtags used for topics from Ferguson, Missouri, to Australian politics, from online quilting communities to labour protests, from feminist outrage to drag pop culture, this collection follows hashtag publics as they trend beyond Twitter into other spaces of social networking such as Facebook, Instagram, and Tumblr as well as other media spaces such as television, print, and graffiti.

This book examines the notions of ethics and equity in relation to language and communication in intercultural relations. Although these notions are often discussed, they are not always addressed with regard to specifi c subjects. Much intercultural discourse and dialogue in recent times has been coloured by the clash of civilizations (as described by Samuel Huntington), terrorist attacks such as 9/11, and the indelible effects which these events have had on dealings between different peoples, cultures and religions. This book discusses ethics and equity with regard to marginalized and privileged minorities, victims of abuse and of confl ict, researchers and practitioners, and language learners and speaker/users. It opens up spaces for a critical discourse of ethics and equity in language and intercultural communication as ‘new’ knowledge. This book was originally published as a special issue of Language and Intercultural Communication.

Why do some TV genres have the label feminine or masculine? Why do we worry about boys playing video games too much while girls play just as often? Is the TV show Sex and the City empowering or not? Why are recent television shows like Desperate Housewives post-feminist television?

Gender and Media explores these and other complex questions by offering a critical overview of the contemporary debates and discussions surrounding gender and mediated communication, and by providing student’s with an overview of the current academic research on these topics.

The book is divided into three parts: representing, producing, and consuming with each section made up of three chapters. The first chapter of each section attempts to answer the most basic questions: ‘Who is represented?’, ‘Who produces what?’ and ‘Who consumes what?’. The second chapter of each section draws attention to the complexity of the relationship between gender and media, concentrating on the "why." The third and final chapter of each section addresses the latest debates in the fields of media and gender, adding a vital layer of understanding of the topic at hand.

This process is aided by text boxes, which provide some additional information on the most important concepts and topics and exercises, which help bridge the gap between theory and everyday life media practices.

This will be an ideal textbook for students studying gender and media, and for general courses on gender studies, sociology, cultural studies and women’s studies.