POLITICS AND MEDIA

BIJU P .R,

LECTURER IN POLITICAL SCIENCE,

GOVT.BRENNEN COLLEGE,

THALASSERY.

Course proposal approved and financed by KSHEC to be designed.

Section 1: Target Group


This course is offered to students who undergo undergraduate programme in Political Science as well it can be offered as politics complementary course for students of Economics, Sociology, Journalism,History and English.

Section 2: Learning Objectives

The course has the following course objectives.
Several major questions are addressed. First, what is the nature of news in our society? How do our beliefs and political orientations influence how we respond to the media? What are the consequences of political advertising for election outcomes? Finally, how do political ads compare to the “traditional” mass media when it comes to citizen decision-making? Through addressing such questions, the issue of whether the media – and political ads – provide citizens the information necessary to participate fully in democratic politics is evaluated.

1.To help students learn how social scientists ask and answer interesting questions about
Politics.
2.To help students understand how the interaction among journalists, politicians, and citizens shapes contemporary politics
3.To understand how political advertising affects individuals’ decision making as well as the rules regulating such advertising
4.To help students understand the development of the mass media and its role in Politics.
5.To understand how spin-doctors hijack public opinion and distort political news
6.To help students become a savvy consumer of political news beyond the class room.

Section 3: Outline of the topics to be covered

The philosophy that gives shape to the understanding of the process of political discourse in India is grounded in the notion of a "marketplace of ideas" in which free expression of ideas, even repugnant ones, is presumed to lead to a consensus of the majority and an expression of the will of the people.There are very few, however, who would argue that Indian political discourse actually consists of a free and open exchange of ideas, and blame is placed in a variety of corners. Critics on the right accuse the mass media of possessing an inherent "liberal bias" while those on the left argue that the economic domination of mass media by large corporations systematically eliminates views incompatible with the interests of those corporations, the wealthy, and entrenched political interest groups. Other critical perspectives exist as well — but the point that may be taken from many of them is the centrality of the mass media to the practice of politics, and the importance of understanding how media and political institutions interact in order to understand how political discourse — the debates around social goals, priorities, and policies — is enacted.The course includes a wide variety of topics which are specifically related to politicaladvertisements in democratic Indian society:-

Democracy, Election and Media,Public Opinion, Propaganda and Agenda Setting, Election and Political Communication,Voting Behaviour, Political Advertising, Political Debates, Newspapers and Political Communication, Televised Political Communication, Internet as a Tool for Political Communication, Media and Election Coverage -Political Columns and Commentaries, Editorials on Poll Issues, Political Cartoons, Election Analysis, Election run– up, Post-Election Analysis, Media and Psephology - Opinion Poll and Exit Poll.

Section 4: Course transactions; proposed activities

The classroom will serve as the locus for a number of activities in this course — the presentation of lectures by the teacher and others, the viewing of relevant news and features, and the discussion of class material as students articulate their questions about and their understandings of what is discussed about.

1.The Newspaper

It should come as no surprise that in the course Media and Politics, students are expected to keep up with political news. Reading a newspaper is the best way to do this. Discussions in class will frequently touch on current events, often as a way to illustrate a concept from lecture or a reading. Not only will regularly consuming the news bring course material to life, it will undoubtedly make the class more interesting. Students are free to read (in print or online) any paper(s) of their choosing, with the following limitation. You need to choose a news source that includes frequent coverage of national politics. For that reason, The following are a few suggestions, any of which are excellent sources of political news:
http://beta.thehindu.com/,http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/,http://www.thestatesman.org/,http://www.deccanchronicle.com/,http://www.indianexpress.com/

2.Televised News Programmes,Discussions,Debates

NDTV24X7,CNN IBN,TIMES NOW,

3.Publish news paper once a month from your Department as part of the course.

Section 5: Method of assessment/evaluation

Evaluation is based on grading and the evaluation scheme contain two parts:

Grading: 1. Internal evaluation,2. External evaluation.
Weightage of Internal and External evaluation.
Evaluation Weightage-Internal 1 (or 25 %) External -3 (or 75 %)
Both internal and external evaluation shall be carried out using Direct Grading System.
Internal evaluation
Component of internal evaluation-Components Weightage
a. assignments 1,b. seminars 1,c.Test papers 2,d .Attendance 1
External Evaluation
The external evaluation is to be conducted with question papers set by external experts. The evaluation of answer scripts shall be done by examiners bases on well defined scheme of valuation.

Direct Grading System: Direct grading system based on a 5 point scale is used to evaluate the performance (External and Internal) of students.

A. Excellent 4. 3.5 to 4.00
B .Very Good 3. 2.5 to 3.49
C .Good 2. 1.5 to 2.49
D .Average 1. 0.50 to1.49
E .Poor 0. 0.00 to 0.49

Each course is evaluated by assigning a letter grade (A, B, C, D and E) to that course by the method of direct grading. The internal (weightage 1) and external (weightage 3) components of a course are separately graded and then combined to get the grade of the course after taking into account of their weightage. An aggregate of C grade is required in each course for a pass and also for awarding a degree.

Section 6: Relevance of the proposed course

The media have long been recognized as a key part of politics in India. Reflecting the oft-cited designation of the press as the “fourth branch” of government, political observers from the earliest days of the republic noted the indispensable role of the mass media in a democratic society. Newspapers, moreover, have a long tradition as agents of partisan warfare, promoting and perpetuating party loyalties and voter turnout in the post-independent India. In other words, it is difficult to comprehend politics in India without understanding the mass media.The purpose of this course is to examine the influence of the mass media on political discourse, particularly in how media structures, media routines, and the professional practices of journalists and politicians interact to shape political and public decision-making.In most case the real news is not the news that people come to know.

Section 7: Reading List

Meyer, P. (1990). Polling as political science and polling as journalism. Public Opinion Quarterly, 54, 451-459.
Cook, Timothy E. 1998. Governing with the News: The News Media as a Political Institution.Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (Chapter 1: “Introduction: Why Don’t We Call Journalists Political Actors?”)
Leighley, Jan E. 2004. Mass Media and Politics: A Social Science Perspective. New York:
Houghton Mifflin Company.
Braian Mcnair, ‘An Introduction to Political Communication’, Routledge, London, 2003.
D. Nimmo, ‘ Handbook of Political Communication Research’2007.
Doris A Graber, ‘Media Power in Politics’,Mcmillan ,New Delhi,1990
R. Negrine, ‘The Communication of Politics’, Sage, New Delhi, 1996.
Swanston and Nimmo, ‘ New Directions in Political Communication’, Sage Publications, NewDelhi, 1990.
Kiran Prasad,‘Political Communication,The Indian Experience’,B.R Publishing Corporation, New Delhi (Vol.1 and Vol. 2), 2003.
Asharani Mathur, [ed.], ‘The Indian Media Illusion, Delusion & Reality’, Rupa & Co, New Delhi, 2006.
Denis McQuail, ‘Mass Communication Theory’, Vistaar Publicatuions, New Delhi, 2005.
John Lloyd, ‘What the Media are doing to our Politics’, Constable London, 2004.
Rob Armstrong, ‘Covering Politics’, Surjeet Publications, New Delhi, 2005