Studies in Media Topics (298-0-22)

Topic

Media & the Experience Economy

Instructors

Latina Sabinova Vidolova

Meeting Info

Locy Hall 314: Tues, Thurs 11:00AM - 12:20PM

Overview of class

This course will explore historic and contemporary engagements between the media industries and the experience economies, including pop-up and ticketed events, convention spaces, studio or filming location tours, and theme parks. Central questions include: Why are the media industries interested in experiential marketing and what historical precedents does it have? What form of spectatorship do media experiences offer, especially in spatial, embodied, and social dimensions, and how does this connect to digital viewing methods? Through experiences, how do the media industries exert control over their narrative/production worlds and even authorize how one should experience media? What sort of access do experiences provide to audiences/fans and how do audiences/fans challenge, comply, or collaborate within these boundaries? Finally, how do cultural aspects of identity, such as race, gender, sexuality, socioeconomic status, age, and ability layer over the previous questions to influence the creation and population of media spaces?

Teaching Method

Class time will be structured around seminar-style discussion. As major assignments, students will write two short papers and revise one into a final essay. The first short paper will require students to visit a media experience as a participant-observer and reflect on their findings. The second will ask students to analyze either the reception of a media experience, scanning social media for visitor reactions; or the promotion of a media experience, using online sources to understand for whom the event creators are positioning their event.