[ecrea] New Book: What Society Needs from Media in the Age of Digital Communication

NEW BOOK: *What Society Needs from Media in the Age of Digital 
Communication*

Media and communications are changing rapidly and their transformation 
is having a momentous impact on the abilities of individuals communicate 
and how society communicates within itself. These changes are important 
because media convey ideas, opinions, information, social values, 
experiences, and entertainment and those are influenced by social, 
economic, and political forces in society. The changing nature of 
communication is especially important because media and communication 
platforms are increasingly the primary location in which contemporary 
identity, culture, and values and norms are manifest and contested.

This book addresses those issues and considers what society needs from 
media in the contemporary environment. An interdisciplinary group of 
essayists argue that society needs clarity about what his happening in 
the world, what is important, how to find meaning in life, that humans 
need orientation about where they fit, how they are a part of the world, 
and the ways in which they take part. They assert that individuals need 
to belong to communities that locate them within the broader social 
setting and help define identity about who they are and how they are 
represented in the world. The writers stress that media needs to help 
individuals communicate and participate in society and that to do so 
effectively literacy is literacy to understand the changing 
communication environment, media platforms, and technologies. They 
assert that media needs to help fulfil social roles and help individuals 
reflect upon and critically think about events and society. Other 
authors argue that media need to reduce rather than heighten conflict, 
provide expression allowing individuals to take part in debates and 
discussions of society, and that leadership of media that pursues social 
as well as commercial objectives.

The book is by nature normative, informed by the research and knowledge 
derived from the fields of the authors.  The authors hope that it will 
spark deeper thinking and discussion of the roles of media in modern 
society and how society might work to ensure those needs are met.

*Contents:*

Chapter 1 Clarity: Direction in an ambiguous world, Robert G. Picard

Chapter 2 Orientation: participation and disorientation in the new 
environment, Wolfgang Donsbach

Chapter 3 Belonging:  The role of digital media in a fragmented 
community, Esteban López Escobar and Francisco J. Pérez-Latre

Chapter 4 Identity: Language and community in the age of digital 
communication, Tom Morning

Chapter 5 Participation: Women’s Human Right to Communicate in the 
Digital Age,**Aimée Vega Montiel

Chapter 6 Literacy: Advancing understanding of the mediated world,Renee 
Hobbs

Chapter 7 Need fulfilment: Society and community in the age of digital 
communication -- The Indian example,

Chandrika Kaul

Chapter 8 Reflection: The media, democracy and spectacle,**Doug Kellner

Chapter 9 Conflict Transformation: Bearing Witness through the 
Photographer’s Lens, Jolyon Mitchell

Chapter 10 Expression: Limitations of ‘the marketplace of ideas’ in 
serving social needs, Katrin Voltmer

Chapter 11 Leadership: Overcoming overload in the media industry,**Lucy Küng

Published by Media XXI, in conjunction with the Social Trends Institute.

Available through the publisher’s website: 
http://www.mediaxxi.com/loja/what-society-needs-from-media-in-the-age-of-digital-communication-2/?lang=en 
It will be available on Amazon shortly.

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