Independent study in special subjects.

Independent study in special subjects.

What is Ethnography? What is Performance (auto) Ethnography? How can we think about Performing Ethnography? This performance-based seminar will focus on the implications of decolonizing emancipatory epistemologies for critical, interpretive inquiry. Drawing heavily in the works of Dwight Conquergood, Norman Denzin, and D. Soyini Madison, we give a rest to traditional forms of qualitative inquiry as we disrupt the notion of "business as usual" in the academic space. We will examine the interpenetrating relationships among performance, ethnography, and culture.

This course introduces students to network theory and analysis across the social sciences. Students will learn key concepts such as social capital, weak ties, homophily, and opinion leadership by exploring their applications in contemporary literature in communication and related fields. The course emphasizes both theoretical foundations and hands-on skills for collecting and analyzing network data through no-code software. Students will study digital networks like hyperlinks, retweets, and hashtags to examine topics like information spread, organization, politics, and identities.

"Race" has and continues to play an important role in American politics.

This seminar examines how communication policy has addressed social equity issues in light of domestic and global structural and technological transformations of the last two decades. We will focus on how notions of access, diversity, expression, control and development have evolved within the structure of the U.S. and global communication policy regimes, discussing their implications for social exclusion.

Qualitative approaches to research, conceptualizations of problems, questions, and methodologies for the field of communication. Emphasis on, interpretive, feminist, critical, and cultural approaches. Introduction to methodological specialties of departmental faculty. Required of all Communication graduate students.

This course provides a historical and critical framework for understanding the literature and research traditions within the field of media studies. Starting from the history of "mass society" as a concept in social thought, we will examine media as institutional actors, technological artifacts, systems of representation, and meaningful cultural objects. We will discuss the links between media, culture, and power from a broad range of perspectives, including political economy, media effects, cultural studies, racial capitalism, postcolonialism, and technology studies.

Process of theory construction, theory testing, and paradigmatic change in communication. Theory relationships among normative and scientific studies. Theory types and their causal mechanisms, units of analysis, and research methodologies. Major theories compared in terms of their theoretical and metatheoret-ical bases. Required of all Communication graduate students; taught in fall.

The Commonwealth Honors College thesis or project is intended to provide students with the opportunity to work closely with faculty members to define and carry out in-depth research or creative endeavors. It provides excellent preparation for students who intend to continue their education through graduate study or begin their professional careers. The student works closely with their 499Y Honors Research sponsor to pursue research on a topic or question of special interest to them in preparation for writing a 499T Honors Thesis or completing a 499P Honors Project.