COMMUNICATION MANAGEMENT PRO-SEMINAR

Communication 501 Course Syllabus

The Annenberg School for Communication, USC

Spring Term 2000 (14 weeks)

Seminar	Tuesday, 6:45-9:45 pm, Room ASC 204
Instructor	Director of Communication Management Program,William H. Dutton, Professor
Web Address	http://www-rcf.usc.edu/~wdutton
E-mail	wdutton@usc.edu
Office Telephone or Message	(213) 740-2759
Home Fax or Message	(310) 379-9250
Office Hours at USC	Tuesday, 4.30-5.30 pm; Thursday 10.00-10.50 am inASC 301B
Teaching Assistant	Elizabeth Gutierrez Hoyt
E-mail and phone	elgutier@usc.edu (213) 740-1260
Office Hours at USC	5-6.30 pm in ASC Room 130

This professional seminar introduces students to academic and practitionerperspectives on topics of central importance to the management of communication,ranging from entertainment to technology. The course stresses the need for students toappreciate both theory and practice in a number of disciplines, to use theory andresearch in support of policy and practice, and to attack problems from aninterdisciplinary vantage point. Organized and coordinated this semester by the directorof the Communication Management Program, this seminar features guest speakersand panels drawn primarily from Annenberg faculty, but also from practitioners acrossthe Greater Los Angeles area.

COURSE OBJECTIVE:

Applying Theory, Research and Technique to Policy and Practice

At its best, communication management is concerned with the application of high-quality communication theory and research to policy and practice. Policy and practiceare broadly defined to include the design, implementation, and use of information andcommunication technologies, messages, and other communication products orservices.

The study of communication theory and research is valuable in and of itself if itadvances an understanding of such issues as how people create, construct, or transfermeaning. However, in management fields within business, industry and government,particularly within the communication and entertainment sectors, communicationtheory and research fails often to pass the ‘So what?’ test. Of what value is this newway of thinking to shaping how we do what we do? How does a theoretical concept oridea inform debate about policy or practice?

This course aims to inculcate a positive approach to using theory and research as anapproach to informing policy and practice. Sometimes theory relates to policy orpractice in very straightforward ways, often because researchers develop theories andconcepts for the purpose of informing practice, such as how to influence people. Moreoften, communication managers and professionals face novel problems, situations, orevents that do not come hand in hand with a basket of theories for them to apply. Tothe contrary, as a prospective professional, you need to have a wide repertoire oftheory and research from which you can creatively draw to inform action.

A Selective Survey of the Field : Faculty, Topics, and Areas of Concentration

As one way to begin developing a repertoire of theory and research, this courseprovides students with an introduction to core areas of the communicationmanagement field. It shows how they are inextricably tied together in the mostinteresting problems confronting communication, policy, and practice at all levels –from the local to the global. It will only touch on a wide variety of topics that are treatedmore intensively within particular courses. These areas include:

• managing communications: the social — psychological, sociological, political,cultural, technical, and organizational — dynamics of human communication;
• understanding the role of media in society, including the press, different modesof entertainment, popular culture, and the arts;
• management, business, and communication strategies of organizations;
• the history and future of communication, telecommunications, information, andentertainment industries;
• information and communication technologies (ICTs) and their societalimplications; and
• law, politics, communication in governance and public policy.

These broad areas are critical to students interested in any of the concentrationsavailable within the master’s program. This introduction to faculty and areas ofcommunication management is designed to support further course selection withinand outside a student’s chosen concentration. But the most important reason for thisintroduction is for you to learn how to translate a diverse body of work in ways that willinform policy and practice. As a prospective user and beneficiary of communicationtheory and research, you must be able not only to ask the ‘So what?’ questions, butalso be able to answer them.

Basic Communication Skills and Techniques for Managers and Professionals

A variety of communication technologies(equipment, technique, and know-how), frompublic speaking to Webcasting, are assumed to be known to most managers andprofessionals in the communication field. The seminar will devote some part of mostclasses to introducing or reviewing basic sets of skills and techniques. The skillschosen are those that are likely to be of value to all of the courses students will take atAnnenberg. Students are also encouraged to take courses in social sciencemethodologies, as well as key techniques in business and policy analysis, that are ofmost relevance to their chosen concentration, providing them with a competitive edgeover those without such a background.

For example, managers and professionals in all fields of communication must beresourceful in exploiting all available sources of information. Students need to be wellversed in current approaches to the use of the library, the Internet and Web, andvarious tools for searching and retrieving current and historical information. Therefore,some sessions might involve guest presentations by representatives of USC’s Library,for example, providing hands-on experience in the use of the Internet and World WideWeb, and providing students with key gateways for locating information of directrelevance to their studies in this field. At one level, this skill is trivial. At the highestlevels, it is an art and set of practices that the best professionals continue to developthroughout their career.
REQUIREMENTS

This seminar is a required course for all Communication Management M.A. students. Itis designed to be taken as early as possible after entry into the program.

Grades will be based on ten (10) essays, each anchored in a particular week’spresentation, topic, reading, or field of communication management, an oralpresentation, regular contributions to seminar discussions, and an in-class finalexamination, weighted in the following manner:

Assignment	Pts.	Due
Essays	60	Week afterspeaker
Class participation and discussion	10	Regular
Presentation of one essay	10	Apr 18, 25
Final examination	20	May 2

1. Essays

Each student will write 10 essays. Each essay should be based on a week’spresentation. It could take a presentation, or a topic, issue, or any theme or idea raisedby the speaker(s), to write a brief essay that includes three parts:

1. Description: An early section should provide an overview, description orsynopsis of what the speaker(s) said. (An alternative is to address that week’stopic or assigned reading.) Put this in your own words. Relate this overview torelated readings or literature, such as required readings, when helpful.

2. Translation: An effort to translate or link any aspect(s) of this presentation topolicy or practice. Answer the ‘So what?’ question. You can of course ask thepresenter(s) to develop this answer, but you should try also to put this in yourown words and extend or apply this beyond the work that was discussed.

3. Critique: What are the strengths and weaknesses of the work presented? Howdoes it inform debate? What is left out? Why is it (ir)relevant to what you areinterested in doing in the communication field?

It such ways it should be anchored in this course, and demonstrate that a student canlocate a relevant theory, body of research, or model and apply it to policy or practice.

Each essay should:

1. be 500 words (plus or minus 100), or about two pages, including notes andreferences;

2. be typed, double-spaced with one inch margins;

3. adhere to an accepted style, preferably Harvard, American PsychologicalAssociation (APA), or MLA guidelines. See the following for guidelines(http://www.apa.org/journals/webref.html) and (http://www.mla.org).

4. identify the title, student, style the paper is following (e.g., APA), and the totalnumber of words. (There is no need for a cover page, given the brief length ofthese essays.)

Grading Criteria: Criteria of an excellent essay would include evidence that the studentcan:

o professionally produce a well-written paper that follows accepted guidelines ofgrammar and style;

o draw from and build on the readings, presentations, and discussions of thisseminar, where relevant;

o locate and critically assess historical and contemporary material aboutcommunication and management;

o employ multiple sources to augment the presentation or readings, such asone or more interviews or personal observations, that go beyond the Internet orpurely desk research;

o understand the nature and value of theory and research in communication andmanagement;

o link theory and research with policy and practice in ways that it could be ofvalue to practitioners, managers, or policy-makers.

All essays will be graded both by the instructor and teaching assistant. Students may,and are encouraged to, speak with other faculty members within the AnnenbergSchool, about their essay, and to discuss the presentations and readings with otherstudents. However, their essay must be their own work.

Academic IntegrityThe University is committed to maintaining the highest standards of ethical conductin all academic pursuits. Any student found responsible for plagiarism, fabrication, orcheating on examinations, papers, or other assignments, will receive a failing gradein the course and be recommended for suspension or dismissal from the program.

2. Presentations

The instructors will select one or more essays relevant to each week for presentationduring the last two class sessions. Students should be prepared to present theiressays, and answer questions from the instructor and other students. Thesepresentations are meant to be brief (5 minutes), but formal — demonstrating skills inpresenting to a business or management audience. They should concisely andeffectively convey the general topic and theme of the essay for an audience that doesnot have any special expertise in your chosen topic. Students can use computer-basedpresentation software for both preparing and presenting their talk, but this is notrequired. Each student should employ the best techniques they find available to reachtheir audience. The set of presentations as a whole are designed to serve as a reviewof the semester.

3. Discussion

Students should attend regularly, and be prepared to discuss the assigned readings foreach class period, participate in panels or other class presentations, and makecontributions to class discussions. Attendance will be taken from time to time.

4. Final Examination

Students will take a closed-book final examination that covers the readings assignedfor this course and the material presented by guest speakers. One major objective ofthe final examination is to encourage students to work with readings and lectures todevelop their own mental map of the communication management area, and todemonstrate an ability to relate theory and research to policy and practice.

READINGS FOR 501

Required Readings Available at USC Bookstores :

Drucker, P. F. (1999), Management Challenges for the 21 st Century (New York:HarperBusiness).

Frank, R. K., and Cook, P. J. (1995), The Winner-Take-All Society: Why the Few at theTop Get So Much More Than the Rest of Us (New York: Penguin Books).

Gates, B. (1999), Business @ the Speed of Thought — Using a Digital NervousSystem (New York: Warner Books).

Giddens, A. (2000), Runaway World: How Globalization is Reshaping our Lives (London: Routledge).

Owen, B. M. (1999), The Internet Challenge to Television (Cambridge, MA: HarvardUniversity Press).

Further Recommended Readings :

Many other recommended readings are identified by topic. These lists are meant toassist students in finding work of relevance to the area and to speakers. They are notmeant to be read each week. That said, all students are encouraged to read widelyacross the varied fields of communication management. Speak with faculty andstudents within your concentrations to obtain their recommendations for furtherreading.

Bell, D. (1976), The Coming Postindustrial Society (Boulder, Co: Basic Books).

Giddens, A. (1998), The Third Way: The Renewal of Social Democracy (Malden, MA:Polity Press and Blackwell).

Handy, C. (1996), Beyond Certainty: The Changing Worlds of Organizations (Boston,Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press).

Lippmann, W. (1922, 1965), Public Opinion (New York: The Free Press edition).

McLuhan, M. (1964, 1994), Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (Cambridge,Massachusetts: The MIT Press): particularly 3-21.

SCHEDULE AND OUTLINE OF TOPICS AND READINGS

Topics are ordered by the availability of speakers, but within this constraint, I have triedto group class sessions by topic and reading material. Dates are subject to change, aswe need to be flexible in scheduling guest faculty and outside speakers. The basic planof each seminar is to introduce faculty and practitioners, cover one broad topic, reservesome time for discussion during the second half of class, and address one basic skill,in the following order:

1. Introduction: The Communication Management Pro-Seminar (11 January)

Course objectives, requirements, and topics of the course. Including brief discussion ofthe:

• networking among your colleagues
• development of the field of communication
• the scope and methods of ‘communication management’
• history of the communication management program at Annenberg, and
• relationships among theory, research, policy, and practice.

Required Reading :

Course syllabus

Recommended for Further Reading :

Everett M. Rogers (1986), Communication Technology (New York: The Free Press):68-115 on the history of communication science.

Basic Skills and Techniques

We will use the first lab to introduce one another, and make sure that everyone has abasic awareness of how to use our computer labs, and basic e-mail and wordprocessing tools, including word counts, spell-checking, grammar-checking, andformatting, to do their work. Student will use basic word processing software incomposing a 50-word biographical sketch that includes their background and careerobjectives. E-mail a copy to the instructor and TA by Friday, January 14 .

2. Telecommunication Management: An Anatomy of Successes and Failures(18 January)

Guest Faculty : A. Michael Noll

A basic understanding of information and communication technologies (ICTs) isbecoming increasingly valuable to managers and professionals in communication.Managers cannot be intimidated nor enamored with concepts of bandwidth, frequencymodulation, and the idea of becoming ‘digital’. What should you know about theemerging digital multimedia world of the Internet and Web as well as the world ofexisting analogue media of the telegraph, telephone, broadcasting and satellitecommunications.

Professor Noll has done research on why many telecommunication innovations, likethe video phone and videotex, succeed or fail. In addition, he speaks often on thehistory and future of the telecommunication industry, providing a critical perspective onsuch mergers and acquisitions as AT&T’s purchase of MediaOne and AOL’s purchaseof Time Warner. This visit will introduce a variety of telecommunication issues, helpstudents understand the importance of the ‘technical’, and show why managers shouldknow more about how information and communication technologies (ICTs) work.

Required Reading :

Owen, B. (1999): Part I, The Basics, pp. 1-42.

Further Recommended Reading :

Noll, A. M. (1998), ‘The Digital Mystique: A Review of Digital Technology and ItsApplication to Television’, Prometheus , 16, 145-53.

Noll, A. Michael (1997), Highway of Dreams: A Critical View Along the InformationSuperhighway (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates): 55-69 on technologicaluncertainties.

Basic Skills and Techniques

Creating an Effective Overhead and Communicating the Technical

Michael Noll has presented numerous talks to managers and professionals, often intechnical areas. His talk will illustrate aspects of visual aids that seem to work well forthis audience. Special attention will be focused on communicating technical issues tonontechnical audiences, and vice versa. We will also begin a discussion of how topresent material for business and management audiences, generally, including theproper and improper use of such audiovisual material as overheads, slides, and video.

3. Law and Policy in Communication and Entertainment (25 January)

Guest Faculty: Cara Burns and Sharon Docter

Law and policy is another broad and complex area that facilitates and constrainsmanagement and business practices throughout the communication and entertainmentindustry. Cara Burns and Sharon Docter will introduce several cases or key legalissues, and argue that you — not necessarily a law student — can understand,research, and incorporate law and policy in your training and work in communicationmanagement.

Cara Burns is a practicing attorney and teacher, specializing in intellectual property(copyright, trademarks, new media) and entertainment law. She has worked for suchclients as Motorola, Novell, Selena, and the Eagles. She has lectured in each of theseareas.

Sharon Docter is the chair of the communication department at California LuthernUniversity, where she teaches and conducts research on the communication law andnew media. She received her J.D. from UCLA, and her PhD in Communication fromthe Annenberg School.

Reading :

Owen, B. (1999): continue reading, paying particular attention to issues of law andpolicy.

News about AT&T acquistion of MediaOne, and AOL’s purchase of Time Warner:What are the law and policy issues arising from these and similar mergers andacquisitions in communication and entertainment?

Basic Skills and Techniques: Lexis-Nexis

Using the Communication Resource Center and Electronic Databases, including anintroduction to the use of Lexis-Nexis databases. Stella Lopez, head of theCommunication Resource Center at ASC, will organize this session. Students will beintroduced also to basic techniques, search engines, and sites of value to findinguseful information on the Internet and World Wide Web. We hope to experiment withall searching for the same piece of information.

4. Entertainment Management: Managing the Audience: The Production andConsumption of Popular Culture (1 February)

Guest Faculty: Professor Marita Sturken

Professor Sturken will illustrate how the study of culture and representation isimportant to managing communication for a variety of media, and provide a briefoutline of courses in Annenberg and other schools related to the entertainmentmanagement concentration. We will ask how an understanding the production andconsumption of culture can inform policy and practice in such fields as advertising.

Required Reading :

Frank, T. (1997), ‘Hip as Official Capitalist Style’ in The Conquest of Cool: BusinessCulture, Counterculture, and the Rise of Hip Consumerism (Chicago: University ofChicago Press).

Frank and Cook (1995): Chapter 10, pages 189-209.

Recommended Further Reading :

Appadurai, A. (1996), ‘Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy’ in Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization (University of MinnesotaPress).

Sturken, M., and Cartwright, L. (forthcoming), Practices of Looking: An Introduction toVisual Culture (New York: Oxford University Press): Chapters 1, 2, 5, 6

Basic Skills and Techniques

Writing for an Audience in Government, Business, and Industry

Guest Speaker : Cherilyn Parsons

A major challenge facing all managers and professionals, as well as social scientists,is the difficult task of reaching important audiences with limited time and attention, butwith a need to know. It is not simply a matter of using PowerPoint. Students ofcommunication management should begin early on to cultivate the habits and valuesnecessary to write in ways that engage a variety of audiences — the potential usersand beneficiaries of their work.

Recommended Reading :

Galbraith, J. K., ‘Writing and Typing’ in The Arts and … , 285-294.

Strunk, W., Jr., and White, E. B. (1972), The Elements of Style , 2nd Edition (New York:The Macmillan Company).

5. Entertainment Management: Managing Creativity (8 February)

Guest Faculty : Professor Marty Kaplan, Associate Dean of ASC

The entertainment industry is critical to the economy of Los Angeles and the world.Many issues of management within this expanding local-global industry require anunderstanding of matters that are distinctly different from the business strategies inother industries, including many ethical, financial, and business issues of managingcreativity, gaining better conceptions of popular culture, and responding to patterns ofmass consumption.

Professor Kaplan will introduce the rationale and objectives of the entertainmentmanagement concentration, discuss courses of relevance to this concentration, anddiscuss one or more contemporary issues in the entertainment industry, such as theexpanding business of Disney and how this reflects on the entertainment industry moregenerally.

Required Reading:

Frank and Cook (1995).

Mitroff, I. I., and Bennis, W. (1989), ‘The Age of Unreality: The Entertainment Society’,pp. 1-21 in The Unreality Industry: The Deliberate Manufacturing of Falsehood andWhat It Is Doing to Our Lives (New York: Oxford University Press).

Recommended Further Reading :

Adler, R. (1997), The Future of Advertising: New Approaches to the Attention Economy (Washington D.C.: Communications and Society Program, Aspen Institute): 1-44;notes, 45-48.

Auletta, K. (1997), ‘What Won’t You Do?’, The Highwaymen: Warriors of theInformation Superhighway (New York: Random House): 68-98.

Douglas, S. J. (1995), Inventing American Broadcasting: 1899-1922 (Baltimore: TheJohn’s Hopkins University Press), 315-322.

Vogel, H. L. (1998), Entertainment Industry Economics: A Guide for Financial Analysis,4th Edition (New York: Cambridge University Press): 3-28.

Basic Skills and Techniques

Public Speaking

Professor Marty Kaplan will stay on for a short time to lead a discussion of basic skillsand techniques for being successful at public speaking . Dr Kaplan was a speech-writerfor Walter Mondale and is widely recognized for his own impact as a public speaker.Do colorful slides with bullet points ‘debase public speaking’ (Zuckerman 1999)?

1. Management, Business, and Communication: The Wall — The StaplesCenter Controversy (15 February)

Guest Faculty: Professor Geoffrey Cowan, Dean

Dean Cowan will speak about the controversy surrounding The Los Angeles Times andits handling of a special issue of its Los Angeles Magazine devoted to the StaplesCenter. Issues of conflicts of interest between the business and editorial side of thenewspaper are relevant to many other industries and businesses in communication.Dean Cowan will make some of these connections and lead a discussion of how suchissues of business and ethics can be effectively recognized and addressed.

Required Reading :

Drucker (1999): 1-93.

Shaw, D., (1999), ‘Crossing the Line’, Los Angeles Times , Monday, 20 December:Special Report. You can read this online or download it from The Los Angeles Times Web site: for a minimal charge.

Basic Skills and Techniques

Citing and Referencing Work on and Off-Line

We will introduce students to standard styles for referencing all sorts of bibliographicmaterials and documentation, including material from the Internet. In addition,inappropriate use of citations, such as plagarism, will be described and discussed.

7. Communication Theory and Communication Practice: Constructing Gender(22 February)

Guest Faculty: Professor Sarah Banet-Weiser

Professor Banet-Weiser joined the entertainment initiative at the Annenberg School,with the successful publication of her recent book on The Miss America Pageant,entitled The Most Beautiful Girl in the World (UC Press 1999). Her research focusesoften on how a social and cultural context shapes communication texts, whether a printdocument or TV commercial, and why? She will discuss gender in particular as itsdefinition is being shaped by the media.

Required Reading :

Frank and Cook (1995): Chapter 10, pages 189-209.

Further Recommended Reading :

Hall, S. (1997), ‘The Work of Representation’ in Hall, S. (ed.), Representation: CulturalRepresentations and Signifying Practices (Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications).

Basic Skills Lab

Creating and Using a Spreadsheet

Each student will be provided with information which they will organize with aspreadsheet, such as Excel or Quatro, and use to graphically represent a key messageabout this data.

8. Telework: The Changing Geography of the Firm and Home (February 29)

Guest Speaker: Jack M. Nilles

New technologies and new management paradigms are changing the workplace,including what jobs are done where. The geography of the firm is being reshaped, asare the tools for working collaboratively and at a distance — telework.

Jack Nilles is known internationally as the father of telecommuting. He has over thirtyyears experience in the technology field and has acted as a consultant to PresidentKennedy’s Science Advisory Council, and the National Science Foundation. Mr. Nillesfounded his own company, JALA, which consults with major corporations andgovernments world-wide on telecommuting projects and prospects.

Required Reading :

Drucker (1999): especially chapters 4 and 5 on information work and productivity.

Giddens (2000), begin.

Please check Nilles’ recent article online.

Further Recommended Reading :

Nilles, J. M. (1998), Managing Telework: Strategies for Managing the Virtual Workforce (New York: John Wiley & Sons).

Goddard, J. and Richardson, R. (1996), ‘Why Geography Will Still Matter: What JobsGo Where?’, pp. 197-214 in Dutton, W.H. (1996) (ed.), Information and CommunicationTechnologies — Visions and Realities (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Basic Skills and Techniques

Creating a Slide with Presentation Software

Students will be introduced to Microsoft PowerPoint and Corel WordPerfectPresentations software and asked to create a slide that conveys a key issue or themearising from Marty Kaplan’s presentation on public speaking, or their reading of theOwen’s book, or this evening’s presentations on The Staples Center Controversy.

Read:

Reading: Zuckerman, L. ‘Words Go Right to the Brain, But Can They Stir the Heart?’ New York Times , 17 April 1999.

9. Globalization and Communication: Electronic Commerce (7 March)

Guest Speaker: Professor Jonathan Aronson, Director, International Relations

Jon Aronson directs USC’s School of International Relations, and has taught within theAnnenberg School. He has expertise in international aspects of telecommunicationtrade and services, and has organized a recent forum on electronic commerce as itrelates to these issues. This class will be a useful set of topics for addressing issues ofglobalization.

Required Reading :

Giddens (2000).

Recommended Reading :

Aronson, J. D. (1997), ‘Global Networks, Electronic Trading, and the Rise of DigitalCash: Implications for Policymakers’, pp. 125-51 in Hufbauer, C, and Wada, E. (1997)(eds), Unfinished Business: Telecommunications after the Uruguay Round (Washington D.C.: Institute for International Economics).

Basic Skills and Techniques

Inter-cultural Communication

Global firms and industries face numerous problems and opportunities forcommunicating across language and cultural communities. We will reflect on somefundamental issues in this field through our own very international experiences withinter-cultural communication.

10. Media and Society: The Traffic Report Study (21 March)

Guest Faculty: Professor Sandra Ball-Rokeach

Mass media can be used to shape public opinion, establish the political agenda, createimages of groups, channel political power, and promote the consumption of goods andservices. Theoretical perspectives on how the media effect the public can inform boththose who produce and consume the media. Sandra Ball-Rokeach has focused muchof her research on the social role of the media in everyday life. She will discuss oneparticular study that sought to use media theory to influence the content of trafficreports broadcast over radio in ways that would have a more positive social role. Itserves as a concrete example of an effort to apply theory and research to policy andpractice.

Guest Faculty: Professor Sandra Ball-Rokeach and others

Required Readings :

Ball-Rokeach, S. J., et al. (Forthcoming), ‘Changing a Media Production Process: FromAggressive to Injury Sensitive Traffic Crash Stories’ in Viswanath, K., and Demers, D.(eds), Mass Media, Social Control, and Social Change (Ames, Iowa: Iowa UniversityPress): forthcoming

Further Reading:

Ball-Rokeach, S. S. (1985), ‘The Origins of Individual Media System Dependency: ASociological Perspective’, Communication Research , 12, 485-510.

Ball-Rokeach, S. J., Rokeach, M., and Grube, J. W. (1984), The Great AmericanValues Test: Influencing Behavior and Belief Through Television (New York: The FreePress).

Basic Skills and Techniques

Getting on the Web: Creating a Web Page.

Skip Eastman, Eileen Flick, or Joshua Fouts, Special Projects Manager at ASC willdiscuss how to get Web literate and create your own Web page. Software, markuplanguages, and classes will be discussed.

11. Governance, Law and Policy: Technology and Politics (28 March)

Guest Faculty: Professor Tracy Westen, President, Center for Governmental Studies

Professor Westen teaches courses at Annenberg in communication law and policy,but also directs a center that has been a leading force in campaign finance reform, forpublic affairs programming (The California-Satellite Public Affairs Network), and thedevelopment of new media for political campaigns and election (The DemocracyNetwork). His center is presently focused on the 2000 election campaigns, so he mightspeak about the ideas that motivated his innovative electronic voter guide (Dnet), or theinterplay between TV and the new media, more generally. Will the Internet bring moreor less democratic communication at all levels of governance?

Required Readings :

Owen (1999): complete.

Gates (1999): particularly 357-71.

See: The Democracy Network at: http://www.dnet.org/

Further Recommended Readings :

Docter, S., and Dutton, W. H. (1999), ‘The Social Shaping of the Democracy Network’in Loader, B., and Hague, B. (eds), Digital Democracy (London: Routledge): 222-43.

Dutton, W.H., Elberse, A., and Hale, M. ‘Information, Democracy and the Internet,’ Communications of the ACM , forthcoming.

Westen, T. (1998), ‘Can Technology Save Democracy?’, National Civic Review , 87 (1):47-56.

12. Public Communication, Politics, and Governance (4 April)

Guest Practitioner(s): Robin Gee, TBA

Local as well as global media have opportunities to exploit new technology and policyto enhance public communication. Experience at global levels, such as with the Voiceof America, and local levels, through government and public affairs cable systems willbe used to illustrate issues and trends in this area.

Basic Skills and Techniques

Networking

Robin Gee and others will lead a discussion of how students can effectively ‘network’with alumni and others throughout their career.

13. Strategic and Corporate Communication Management: KnowledgeManagement (11 April)

Guest Faculty : Professors Janet Fulk, Peter Monge, and Patricia Riley

New technology and management paradigms are changing the ways information isproduced and distributed in organizations. What kinds of resources, networks,structures, technologies, and approaches to decision-making are critical to theeffective management of information and communication in the organization of today?Professors Fulk, Riley, and Monge have been involved in various projects concernedwith knowledge management. They will provide a broad overview of the concept ofknowledge management as one example of an issue tied to strategic and corporatecommunication management.

Required Readings :

Drucker, P. (1999).

Gates, B. (1999).

Supplementary Readings :

Eisenberg, E., and Riley, P. (In Press), ‘Organizational Culture’ in Jablin, F., andPutnam, L. (eds), New Handbook of Organizational Communication, 2nd Edition (Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications).

Monge, P., and Fulk, J. (1999), ‘Communication Technology for Global NetworkOrganizations’ in DeSanctis, G., and Fulk, J. (Eds), Shaping Organizational Form (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage), 71-100.

Riley, P., Keough, C., Christiansen, T., Meilich, O. I., Pierson, J. (1998), ‘Community ofColony: The Case of Online Newspapers and the Web’, Journal of Computer MediatedCommunication , 14 (September) [http:www.ascusc.org/jcmc/keough], October.

Basic Skills and Techniques

Working Collaboratively in Teams

Collen Keough will introduce some basic skills and techiques of value to team work,which increasingly describes work in organizations and many courses at USC.

14. Marketing Communications: Communicating Health (April 18)

Guest Faculty : Professors Peter Clarke, Michael Cody, and Lynn Miller

This evening will focus on marketing communications, but also on a developingconcentration within the school called ‘Communicating Health’. Communicatingeffectively with customers, clients, and the general public is of value to those in publicrelations and marketing, but also to those managing public communication campaignsand working in public affairs. Social psychological research on human cognition,attitude formation, and value change can be applied to the design of media messages,ranging from commercial advertizing to public health campaigns. The use of media topromote public health is one example of major work in this area that Annenberg facultyhave contributed.

Required Reading :

Drucker (1999), review chapter 2, 41-69.

Gates (1999): chapter 19: 333-356.

Further Reading :

Clarke, P., and Evans, S. (1998), Surviving Modern Medicine (Rutgers UniversityPress): Introduction and Chapter 1.

Parrott, R. L. (1995), ‘Motivation to Attend to Health Messages: Presentation of Contentand Linguistic Considerations’, pp. 7-23 in Maibach, E., and Parrott, R. L. (1995) (eds), Designing Health Messages (Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications).

15. Managing Access: Information and Communication Technologies (25 April)

Resident Guest Faculty : Professor William Dutton

Has society been profoundly changed by the revolution in information andcommunication technologies? The field has had to critically assess and respond to theidea that we are living in an information society, which also has very direct andimportant implications for managers and those who design information products andservices. Managers should focus on controlling access, not getting more informationfaster and further.

Required Reading :

Drucker (1999)

Gates (1999)

Recommended Further Reading :

Beniger, J. N. (1986), The Control Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard University Press).

Dutton, W. H. (1996) (ed.), Information and Communication Technologies — Visionsand Realities (Oxford: Oxford University Press): 1-16.

Dutton, W. H. (1999), Society on the Line: Information Politics in the Digital Age (Oxford: Oxford University Press): 3-18.

Basic Skills and Techniques

Student Presentations

Students will make brief, 5-minute presentations of one of their best reports on howcommunication theory and research can be connected with policy and practice.

Final Examination (7-9 pm, 2 May)

Students will take a two-hour, in-class essay examination over the required readingsand class discussions. Two will be given at least one question related to eachconcentration, and be asked to write on four questions.