Communication 491C - S-Media & Children's Culture

In this seminar, we will consider how children make meaning of and navigate through their complex relationships with media and consumer culture, as well as the implications of those relationships for children?s individual and collective well-being. We will draw on social and cultural theory and research to examine a wide range of topics, including: the nature and politics of children?s programming; gendered toys and games; the sexualization and commodification of children in advertising; psychological, social, and familial impacts of marketing strategies aimed at children; media portrayals of childhood disorders; depictions of race, class, gender, and sexuality in ads, programming, fairy tales, and classroom materials; cultural, environmental, and health consequences of childhood consumerism; the roles of various media in the construction of adolescent identity; the possibilities of early media literacy; and the lived realities of children around the world whose labor creates the products promoted to children in Western cultures. Throughout the course, we will ask ourselves: What is child culture? How have our cultural constructions of childhood shaped our sense of who children are, what they need, and what type of developmental environments we, as a society, should provide for them?

Open to Senior and Junior Communication majors only. Comm 121 is strongly recommended