I teach in both the graduate and undergraduate programs in the Department of Communication at UMass Amherst in the areas of media and cultural studies. Here I list brief summaries of each of my classes with links to the syllabi.

Consumer Culture – Graduate Level

Download the Syllabus (126 KB) 

The notion that contemporary times are characterized in part by a “consumer culture” permeates many vernacular as well as scholarly analyses. In this course we examine what people mean by the label “consumer culture” and what particular kinds of social arrangements, or social pathologies, this term attempts to capture for analysis or critique. We aim for empirical and theoretical comparison across historical, cross-cultural, and disciplinary perspectives. Some of the subtopics that are considered include: consumerism and/as citizenship, consumerism and media, globalization of consumerism, consumption and identity, ritual and consumption, and the commercialization of ostensibly non-market spheres.

Audience Research & Cultural Studies – Graduate Level

Download the Syllabus (PDF 135 KB)

An interest and concern for the audience is at the foundation of much media and communication research. Beginning with a brief historical survey of the dominant theoretical and methodological approaches to studying audiences of media, this course focuses on the approaches that inspired and became associated with cultural studies traditions. Topics will include the active audience and debates about audience power and resistance; taste and cultural hierarchies; fandom; audience pleasure and identity; the social contexts of media consumption; audiences and citizenship; and audience interaction with changing media technologies. Readings will reflect research on audiences that are diverse in terms of nationality, race and ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class background, and the type of media being consumed.

Qualitative Methods in Communication Research - Graduate Level

620 Syllabus (PDF 160 KB)

This course is designed to a) introduce students to the logic and epistemological underpinnings of qualitative methods, including relationships among research questions, theory, methods, and findings, and b) expose students to practical issues in using qualitative methods. Topics to be discussed include but are not limited to: textual analysis, participant observation, interviewing, focus groups, visual analysis, discourse and conversation analysis, case studies, qualitative computing, and research ethics. 

Consumer Culture – 300 Level

Download the Syllabus (PDF 117 KB)

It’s practically a cliché to say that we live in a “consumer culture,” an observation that is often shorthand for saying that our society has become increasingly superficial and homogenized, or that we have wasted the leisure time and wealth that our modern economy provides for some members of our society. In this course we look deeper at critiques of consumer culture, as well as at those who praise and defend it, and discover what assumptions about society and ideals of the “good life” underlie different ideological approaches to making sense of our culture of consumption. We consider how consumer goods are used as a form of communication, and further, how our systems of media and communication are impacted by the dominance of commercial interests in our culture. 

Media Audiences – 300 Level

Download the Syllabus (PDF 125 KB)

“Media audiences” are constructions that can never be fully known, but that get described and measured in particular ways to serve particular ends. In this course we will explore different ways of conceptualizing audiences – as commodities, victims, or consumers. We will consider whether audiences are powerful and active, or weak and passive, and question how audience power and activity should be defined. As members of audiences we can be counted as members of large groups generated by statistical modeling, or examined up-close and in context, taking into account how our identities and preferences shape our media consumption and interpretation. With topics ranging from audiences of news, to how audiences are responding to emerging media technologies, to how audiences practice fandom, we will consider the vastly different behaviors and representations that fall under the category “media audiences.”

History and Theory of Freedom of Expression – 400 Level

Download the Syllabus (PDF 106 KB)

This course examines the theoretical and historical underpinnings of how we think about freedom of expression and its importance to societies organized around the idea of democracy. The course contrasts two approaches to the role of expression in society: the Classical Liberal and the Romantic. We explore the historical development of these ideas, analyze how they were applied in landmark cases, as well as challenge ourselves to apply these systems of logic to contemporary speech controversies.  

Visual Communication – 200 Level

Syllabus not yet available.

The goal of this course is to give students theoretical tools to analyze the mass-mediated visual environment, and to consider visual media not only in terms of the images themselves, but to consider the context surrounding these images, particularly the conditions of their production and reception.