Title: The Media and Communications in Australia
Editors: Cunningham, S and Turner, G
Publication Date: 20 November 2009
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Format: 362 pages Textbook
RPP: $55 AUD
To write a review for a book in its third edition should be simple. If it works the first two times, then it should work again. What makes this text, edited by Stuart Cunningham and Graeme Turner, so popular? It is a textbook, with no colour plates, no glossary, and appears to speak in the esoteric parlance of academia. What convinces the people in charge of book lists at the various education institutions around the country to continue to purchase it?
Firstly, let me paraphrase from other reviews. The Media and Communications in Australia introduces this dynamic and bewildering field in a reliable, comprehensive and systematic manner. The text is perfect for students and a wonderful reference for teachers and those interested in the industry. Cunningham & Turner have written numerous texts in this field. The book includes significant contributions from the best in Australia, and the text details the move from traditional media into digital technologies and the consequent connections between them. It embraces the influence of radio that escapes many other texts.
When I was a child … and I am not old at 45 … the world was rife with space invaders and pinball machines, morning and afternoon newspapers, several editions each, minimal children’s television, minimal live television, alarm clocks with bells, big bands in hotels, only AM radio, Countdown, music videos with the band playing on stage, 12 inch 33 rpm vinyl records, seven inch 45rpm singles, with the huge 78’s to use as paperweights, print media competed against each other, the vegemite commercial not yet vintage advertising. Since then, so many changes, MTV to iPods, CDs, DVDs, infotainment, reality shows, cash for comments, Bluetooth, Internet banking, a proliferation of the i-prefix, media becomes multimedia, commentators advertise between shots, cricket or tennis, digital cameras, mobile phones, thumb drives around necks, nothing escapes the watchful eyes of the paparazzi, and other journalists.
Media and Communications could be labelled the fourth Reich, so goes their powerful influence in society, here, abroad, in the way we think, choose, live, speak, debate, learn, and collectively, communicate. That is why media and communications cannot be separated as a subject; they form the two parts of a colossal whole.
Media and Communications in Australia addresses all of the above. After the introduction the book divides into three sections. First, Approaches, deals with the traditions, policy, analysis and the audience. Second, Industries covers the various sections that encompass this vast field. The third section, Issues, reveals how cultural diversity, sport, sex, politics, online networks and celebrity, are omnipresent.
The book contains an extensive list of abbreviations and acronyms, which is tantamount to a glossary for this industry replete with its own alphabet stream. It also has an extended, detailed reference list, and index. Twenty significant contributors, including the editors, have worked broadly in the study of media and communications in Australia. Cunningham and Turner provide a preface and introduction that traverses the need for this text, the structure, definitions of media, change, plus convergence – refers to the disappearing lines of distinction between the different media systems, and competition. The front jacket is laid out similar to Google’s homepage, from the Internet, uses many textual fonts and styles to symbolise the multitude of influences on this expansive subject material.
The promotional points of this book are its currency, comprehensiveness, and authenticity. It is Australian, handling world topics that influence Australian society greatly, including students. If you want to study media and communications in Australia, then add it to your reading list.
reviewed by John P. Newbury
This entry was posted by jpnewbury on Monday, March 1st, 2010 at 12:00 am and is filed under Book Reviews.
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