Transmedia Genre

This book brings genre back to the forefront of the current transmedia trend. Genres are perhaps the most innately transmedial of media constructs, formed as they are from all kinds of industrial, technological and discursive phenomena. Yet, few have considered how genre works in a multiplatform context. This book does precisely that, making a uniquely transmedial contribution to the study of genre in the age of media convergence. The book interrogates how industrial, technological and participatory transformations of digital platforms and emerging technologies reshape workings of genre. The authors consider franchises such as Star Wars, streaming platforms such as Netflix, catch-up services such as ITV Hub, creative technologies such as virtual reality, and beyond. In setting the stage for the revival of genre theory in contemporary transmedia scholarship, this book pushes forward understandings of multiplatform media and the emerging form and function of genre across contemporary culture.

This book sets forth a pedagogy for renewing the liberal arts by combining critical thinking, media activism, and design thinking. Using the StudioLab approach, the author seeks to democratize the social and technical practices of digital culture just as nineteenth century education sought to democratize literacy. This production of transmedia knowledge—from texts and videos to comics and installations—moves students between seminar, studio, lab, and field activities. The book also wrestles with the figure of Plato and the very medium of knowledge to re-envision higher education in contemporary societies, issuing a call for community engagement as a form of collective thought-action.

This book argues that the examination of sports media within cultural and media studies is organized around more than just a shared topic: mediated sports. What count as "sports media" in journals, books, and conferences are extremely diverse; they can cover athlete expression on social media, shoe commercials, gender in sports commentary, Indigenous name change activists, and fantasy sports. Besides being mediated and, in some cases, loosely connected to sports events and leagues, it is hard to see what they all share that could serve as the foundation for a unified field of study. Jason Kido Lopez argues that sports media are defined by genre, which is reflected in their industries, within their content, and by their audiences. Throughout the media and cultural complex, sports and sports media are built on the genre of live and real competition and, therefore, to study sports media is to study that genre. Each chapter will explore how the genre is constructed in commodification of mediated sport, representation within sports media, athlete expression, sports fandom, and gaming around sports. This book will be of interest to those studying sports media as well as media and cultural studies, but also can be used as an introductory survey of the research on sports media from a media and cultural studies perspective.

This book confronts the question of why our culture is so fascinated by the apocalypse. It ultimately argues that while many see the post-apocalyptic genre as reflective of contemporary fears, it has actually co-evolved with the transformations in our mediascape to become a perfect vehicle for transmedia storytelling. The post-apocalyptic offers audiences a portal to a fantasy world that is at once strange and familiar, offers a high degree of internal consistency and completeness, and allows for a diversity of stories by different creative teams in the same story world. With case studies of franchises such as The Walking Dead and The Terminator, Transmedia Storytelling and the Apocalypse offers analyses of how shifts in media industries and reception cultures have promoted a new kind of open, world-building narrative across film, television, video games, and print. For transmedia scholars and fans of the genre, this book shows how the end of the world is really just the beginning...

In this new edition of The Television Genre Book, leading international scholars have come together to offer an accessible and comprehensive update to the debates, issues and concerns of the field. As television continues to evolve rapidly, this new edition reflects the ways in which TV has transformed in recent years, particularly with the emergence of online streaming services such as Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max and Amazon Prime. It also includes a new chapter on sports TV, and expanded coverage of horror, political thrillers, Nordic noir, historical documentary and docu-drama. With analyses of popular shows like Stranger Things, Killing Eve, The Crown, Chernobyl, Black Mirror, Fleabag, Breaking Bad and RuPaul's Drag Race, this book offers a comprehensive understanding of television genre for scholars and students alike.

"What a magnificent invitation to the field of media and communication - full of lively debate and relevant examples yet carefully balanced, comprehensive in scope and thoughtfully explained.“ - Professor Sonia Livingstone, London School of Economics and Political Science "This informative, important and readable volume should populate the shelves of all those wanting to understand more fully how the media and mass communication operate today." - Professor Barbie Zelizer, Annenberg School for Communication Now in its seventh edition, this landmark text continues to define the field of media and mass communication theory and research. It is a uniquely comprehensive and balanced guide to the world of pervasive, ubiquitous, mobile, social and always-online media that we live in today. New to this edition: Explores mass communication and media theory in an age of big data, algorithmic culture, AI, platform governance, streaming services, and mass self-communication. Discusses the ethics of media and mass communication in all chapters. Introduces a diverse and global range of voices, histories and examples from across the field. Ties theory to the way media industries work and what it′s like to make all kinds of media, including journalism, advertising, film, television, and digital games. This book is the benchmark for studying media and mass communication in the 21st century.

Volume 4 of 6 of the complete premium print version of journal forum for inter-american research (fiar), which is the official electronic journal of the International Association of Inter-American Studies (IAS). fiar was established by the American Studies Program at Bielefeld University in 2008. We foster a dialogic and interdisciplinary approach to the study of the Americas. fiar is a peer-reviewed online journal. Articles in this journal undergo a double-blind review process and are published in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish.

Authoring, its tools, processes, and design challenges are key issues for the Interactive Digital Narrative (IDN) research community. The complexity of IDN authoring, often involving stories co-created by procedures and user interaction, creates confusion for tool developers and raises barriers for new authors. This book examines these issues from both the tool designer and the author’s perspective, discusses the poetics of IDN and how that can be used to design authoring tools, explores diverse forms of IDN and their demands, and investigates the challenges around conducting research on IDN authoring. To address these challenges, the chapter authors incorporate a range of interdisciplinary perspectives on ‘The Authoring Problem’ in IDN. While existing texts provide ‘how-to’ guidance for authors, this book is a primer for research and practice-based investigations into the authoring problem, collecting the latest thoughts about this area from key researchers and practitioners.