module specification

This module analyses the relationship between youth culture and the media. It surveys both the historical development and contemporary form of youth cultures, subcultures and lifestyles; and considers their relation to the institutions of media and cultural production.

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None.

The principal graduate attributes focused on in the module are A1 and A2.
This Media Studies optional module aims to:

Enable informed engagement with existing theories of the nature of youth cultures and subcultures.
Facilitate the critical analysis of the relationship between youth culture and the media [A2].
Provide a supportive environment for the development of competence in discussion and oral presentation [A1, A2].

The module’s syllabus is divided into two key thematic blocks - Block One: Markets, Texts and Representations; and Block Two: Meanings, Uses and Identities. Block One concentrates on issues of cultural production, exploring the development of the commercial youth market and its relation to wider patterns of social, economic and political change. Block Two concentrates on issues of cultural consumption, exploring different analytic approaches to young people’s engagement with popular media forms.

Teaching methods include formal lectures, tutorials, seminar discussions and screenings. Students will be expected to attend formal lectures and take notes; read from primary sources as well as secondary sources and comment upon their reading; participate in small group and large group discussions; listen and ask questions; view and respond to audio-visual material; use the scheduled tutorial sessions to seek feedback and advice on assessed material.

Students will study for a total of 150 hours made up in the following ways:

? Timetable sessions:
Lectures: one hour per week.
Seminars: one hour per week.

? Preparation for assessment:
Two and a half hours per week per assessment.

? Self directed study:
Four hours per week.

? Private review of assessment after receiving feedback:
Five hours total.

On successful completion of this module students will be able to:
1. Understand the distinguishing features of the development of media forms geared to youth markets since 1945.
2. Identify and evaluate critical literature dealing with the relation between youth culture and the media.

3. Critically apply theories of youth culture and the media in a case-study of a chosen cultural text.

This is an Honours Level module with assessment exercises appropriate to this level. Through an individual presentation, students will be given the opportunity to demonstrate learning outcomes one and two. This will also allow students to develop transferable skills associated with the delivery of oral presentations, and to receive formative feedback on their work. Through a case-study project, students will be given the opportunity to demonstrate learning outcome three. The case-study will be appropriate to Honours Level work, asking students both to apply and to reflect critically upon, the theoretical perspectives considered during the module.

Cohen, Stanley (1980) (2nd edn.) Folk Devils and Moral Panics: The Creation of the Mods and Rockers, Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Doherty, Thomas (2002) (2nd edn.) Teenagers and Teenpics: The Juvenilization of American Movies in the 1950s, London: Unwin & Hyman.
Fornäs, J. and Bolin, G. (eds) (1995) Youth Culture in Late Modernity, London: Sage.
Hebdige, Dick (1979) Subculture: The Meaning of Style, London: Methuen.
Livingstone, Sonia (2002) Young People and New Media: Childhood and the Changing Media Environment, London: Sage.

McRobbie, Angela (2000) (2nd edn.) Feminism and Youth Culture: From ‘Jackie’ to ‘Just Seventeen’, London: Macmillan.
Miles, Steven (2000) Youth Lifestyles in a Changing World, Buckingham: Open University Press.
Muggleton, David (2000) Inside Subculture: The Postmodern Meaning of Style, Oxford: Berg.
Osgerby, Bill (1998) Youth in Britain Since 1945, Oxford: Blackwell.
Redhead, Steve, Wynne, Derek and O'Connor, Justin (eds) (1997) The Clubcultures Reader: Readings in Popular Cultural Studies, Oxford: Blackwell.
Springhall, John (1998) Youth, Popular Culture and Moral Panics: Penny Gaffs to Gangsta-Rap, 1830-1996, Basingstoke: Macmillan.
Thornton, Sarah (1995) Club Cultures: Music, Media and Subcultural Capital, Cambridge: Polity.