Communication and Citizenship addresses a question which is increasingly at the centre of academic and journalistic debate: to what extent are the media in modern societies able to help citizens learn about the world, debate their responses to it and reach informed decisions about what courses of action to adopt? Can the media play a role in the formation of a public sphere at a time when public service broadcasting is under attack, and the popular press plays to the market with an output of celebrity gossip and sensationalized reporting?

This book integrates four distinct topics: young people, citizenship, new media, and learning processes. When taken together, these four topics merge to define an arena of social and research attention that has become compelling in recent years.

The general international concern expressed of declining democratic engagement and the role of citizenship today becomes all the more acute when it turns to younger people. At the same time, there is growing attention being paid to the potential of new media - especially internet and mobile telephony - to play a role in facilitating newer...

In counterpoint to conventional examinations of images of journalism which tend to concentrate on its informational role in the political process, this book provides a lively analysis of journalism in its other guise - as entertainment.

In a series of interrelated studies, the authors examine the theoretical problems in assessing popular journalism and consider common examples of its manifestations - its relationship to media stars, the coverage of sport, and the presentation of news in a popular' form.

One of the most difficult problems facing Western democracy today is the decline in citizens political engagement. There are many elements that contribute to this, including fundamental socio-cultural changes. The book summarizes these contexts and situates itself within them, while focusing on the media s key role in shaping the character of civic engagement. In particular, it examines the new interactive electronic media in terms of their civic potential. Looking at the evolution of the media landscape, the book interrogates key notions such citizenship, public sphere, agency, identity,...

This book integrates four distinct topics: young people, citizenship, new media, and learning processes. When taken together, these four topics merge to define an arena of social and research attention that has become compelling in recent years.

The general international concern expressed of declining democratic engagement and the role of citizenship today becomes all the more acute when it turns to younger people. At the same time, there is growing attention being paid to the potential of new media - especially internet and mobile telephony - to play a role in facilitating newer...

As democracy encounters difficulties, many citizens are turning to the domain of alternative politics and, in so doing, making considerable use of the new communication technologies. This volume analyses the various factors that shape such participation, and addresses such key topics as civic subjectivity, web intellectuals, and cosmopolitanism.