Journalism and Global Change 5 SOCIO5107

  • Academic Session: 2024-25
  • School: School of Social and Political Sciences
  • Credits: 20
  • Level: Level 5 (SCQF level 11)
  • Typically Offered: Semester 2
  • Available to Visiting Students: Yes
  • Collaborative Online International Learning: No

Short Description

This course seeks to explore issues of global change in journalism, with a focus on climate change and inequality. Students will be expected to produce both discursive academic essays and journalistic exercises as part of their assessment, focusing on one of the core topics of climate, capital or technology. Students will encounter sociological concepts such as modernity, the Anthropocene and globalisation in the context of journalism and media practice.

Timetable

10 x 2 hour seminars once a week

Requirements of Entry

None

Excluded Courses

None

Co-requisites

None

Assessment

The summative assessment consists of two components which students will be expected to produce in tandem, weighted at fifty per cent each.

The first of these is a 1500 word feature article.

 

The second component is a 2000 word essay critically engaging with theory taught on the course, exploring the issue they have chosen to cover in their media output.

Course Aims

The aims of the course are:

 

■ To explore ways of seeing global developmental problems through media and speculate on changes to journalistic practice

■ To equip students with the skills to author media texts/material in alternative ways in light of academic discussions of climate, inequality and technology

■ To enhance students' understanding of the complexities of climate journalism and other forms of global journalism practice

Intended Learning Outcomes of Course

By the end of this course students will be able to:

 

■ Critically assess the presentation of global problems in the media, and contextualise these in the broader social, political and technological developments of recent years

■ Apply social science research to the production of media material and content which actively seeks to explain global developmental challenges

■ Identify and critically engage with the core issues around climate change, inequality and technological development worldwide

■ Identify and critically assess the key academic literature in the areas of environment, social inequalities and media and communications

Minimum Requirement for Award of Credits

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment. In reality this will entail submitting both parts of the final assignment.