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Some readers have wondered what exactly it is I do here in graduate school. To be honest, I do too, but I probably frame the question in more postmodern terms. Anyway, I got the take-home exam questions for RTF 395, a required class for all incoming grad students that exposes us a variety of theoretical approaches to studying media. This semester could be summarized as "Social Science for Lit Majors"; next semester will emphasize more textual approaches to media scholarship. I've pasted the questions below - although you probably won't be familiar with the authors, they may give you a sense of the kinds of topics we discuss here in the department of Radio-TV-Film.

Final Take-Home Exam, RTF 395 December, 2002
Please respond to the following questions as succinctly as possible. Be brilliant and provocative! The exam should be turned into my mailbox in CMA 6.118 by 5:00 pm next Tuesday.

1. One way to characterize many of the theoretical approaches we have considered this semester is in terms of mainstream, American-centric theories (Katz, Lazarsfeld, Merton, cultivation theory, uses and gratifications, media systems dependency theory, agenda setting, technological determinism) as opposed to critical theories (Canclini, Gramsci and hegemony theory, Schiller, Horkheimer and Adorno and the Frankfurt school, Martin-Barbero, Benjamin, Streeter, Garnham and political economy) many of them Latin American or European in origin. The former have been criticized as empiricist, unreflective, and underdeveloped, while the latter are criticized for their totalizing emphasis on media systems’ relationship to power institutions, sacrificing attempts to grapple with audiences or textual meanings. Choose one reading from each set and contrast how they deal with each of the following concepts: The State; democracy; individual agency; decoding or interpretation, as with an active audience; and the masses. (The readings you choose for this question should be a ones that you do not draw on for a primary response to any of the remaining three questions here.)

2. How would diffusion theory account for the spread of DVD players? How would James Carey use a cultural studies approach to discuss the same phenomenon?

3. The political economy analysis of broadcast policy offered by Thomas Streeter and the broader topic of communication and cultural production explored by Nicholas Garnham both comment on the roles of private capitalist accumulation as well as the State in structuring (or destroying) the public sphere. Discuss the operations and significance of the public sphere (in the Habermasian sense) in their arguments.

4. How does the concept of popular culture intersect development or globalization processes? (To respond to this question, please use the readings addressing globalization or those addressing development (the classical, i.e., Schramm, Lerner, or the critical readings, i.e., Freire, Beltran, and so forth).)