Media and the Public Sphere

Catalog description

This course explores theories of and debates about the public sphere, with a particular focus on the role of media in shaping power an democracy. Taking canonical theorists such as Hannah Arendt and Jürgen Habermas as our starting point, we explore the rich potential and the limitations of classic conceptualizations of the public sphere for understanding contemporary politics. We consider the role played by dynamics such as public debate, gender, sexuality, race, crowds, mass culture, political paranoia, and fake news in shaping twentieth and twenty-first century political ideals and practices, examining the similarities and difference in how these dynamics work in global contexts from capitalism to state socialism, in the Global North and in the Global South. We also consider what insights might be gained by an interdisciplinary approach to questions of the public sphere.