New to this edition: Every new copy of Mass Media/Mass Culture is packaged with a Free Making the Grade CD-ROM, Free Access to PowerWeb: An Online Reader and Resource Guide, and a Free Text-Specific Online Learning Center Website.

Written for the Introduction to Mass Communication course, Mass Media/Mass Culture: An Introduction demonstrates how media impacts our culture today, and how the interrelationship of media and culture has influenced our civilization since dawn of mass communication. This textbook gives students the tools to understand the world around them and teaches them how to critically analyze the media that influences their lives.
Key features

Every new copy of MASS MEDIA/MASS CULTURE is packaged with a Free Making the Grade CD-ROM, which includes: *Study Questions to help reinforce key concepts in the text. With 20 questions per chapter and instant feedback, these study questions are a true study aid for students.

*Links to the Practicing Media Message Boards, which can be found on the text-specific website. (for more details, see below) *Also found on the CD-ROM:

*An Internet Primer

*A Guide to Electronic Research

*A Study Skills Primer

*Learning Assessment Tools

Free: A New Online Reader and Resource Site: PowerWeb.Reinforcing its emphasis on media literacy, this text has added an additional resource to its text specific website -- PowerWeb. PowerWeb is course-specific and offers current readings (Annual Editions Online), curriculum-based materials, discipline updates, informative and timely world news, and access to refereed resource sites.

Website: www.mhhe.com/wilson The text-specific website includes an instructor's password protected site and an open access student site. The instructor?s site includes: lecture outlines, sample syllabi, topics for discussion, answers to Study Guide questions, PowerPoint Slides, the test bank, and an Instructor?s Online Video Guide connect chapters in the text to the Mass Communication Video. The student site includes: PowerWeb, Practicing Media Literacy Message Board for each chapter, chapter summaries, an online and updated chapter on 'The Selling of American Politics' (see below for details), an online glossary, 10 Pre-Test Review Questions per chapter, and Interlink.

New boxes! 'Practicing Media Literacy' boxes use globalization of culture, advertising trends, music censorship, and other topics for open-ended questions that train students to be critical consumers of mass media. The questions are also found on the message board on the Internet and referred to again in the Media Literacy CD-ROM.

A new chapter -- Chapter 3: Internet and Global Communication discusses the impact of the World Wide Web and cyberspace on our mass-mediated culture. This chapter examines the globalization of the Internet and all types of communications.

A revised and expanded Chapter 5: Theories of Press and Journalism: Keeping the Culture Informed (formerly Chapter 3) examines the various theories of media operation (i.e., how the media works).

New Media Literacy sections, which train students to be critical consumers of mass media, are found throughout the text.

New Pedagogy! Found in every chapter, key concepts in the chapter openers and key terms in the margins provide additional study aids for students.

An Online Video Guide provides commentary and discussion for the Mass Communication video, which accompanies this text. The Video Guide is found on the Instructor's website.

Free Online Chapter! 'The Selling of American Politics' (formerly Chapter 14) is now found on the text's website. The chapter, which discusses the relationship between politics and media, will be updated after the presidential and other major elections.

The text has an accessible cultural approach.

The textbook continues to trace various mass media through three stages of evolution -- the elitist, popular, and specialized stages.

Every media chapter contains a section on the latest technologies in that particular field and how it is affecting our society.

Various boxes, 'Working In,' 'Media Watch,' 'Profiles,' and 'Practicing Media Literacy' provide a more in-depth look at different issues, ranging from jobs to mini-biographies of people in the mass communication field.

New boxes! 'Practicing Media Literacy' boxes use globalization of culture, advertising trends, music censorhsip, and other topics for open-ended questions that train students to be critical consumers of mass media. The questions are also found on the message board on the Internet and referred to again in the Media CD-ROM.

A revised and expanded Chapter 5: Theories of Press and Journalism: Keeping the Culture Informed (formerly chapter 3) examines the various theories of media operation (i.e. how the media works).

About the author

Stan LeRoy Wilson
Stan LeRoy Wilson is Professor Emeritus at the College of the Desert. He holds a doctorate from the University of Southern California and earned his bachelor?s and master?s degrees from California State Universities, Fresno and Stanislaus. In addition to a 34-year teaching career at California State universities and community colleges, he has worked as a newspaper and radio journalist, a public relations consultant, and as the four term mayor of Palm Desert California.

James Ross Wilson
James Ross Wilson is a professor of mass communication and journalism at California State University, Fresno. He earned his master?s degree from CSUF and his bachelor?s degree from what was then known as Fresno State College. In addition to teaching classes in broadcast management, news writing, production, and pop culture, Wilson serves as general manager and faculty adviser for the student-run campus radio station, KFSR-FM. Wilson spent 20 years working in radio broadcasting as a news reporter, news director, program director, and station manager before joining the faculty at CSFU in 1983. He also trained military personnel for work in the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service while assigned to the Department of Defense Information School at Fort Slocum, New York.

Table of contents
Part I: Culture and Communication
Chapter 1. Culture and Communication: How They Interact
Chapter 2. Culture and Mass Communicaiton: How They Interact
Chapter 3. Internet and Global Communication
Chapter 4. Legal Controls on the Media
Chapter 5. Theories of Press and Journalism: Keeping the Culture Informed
Part II: Development of Print Media
Chapter 6. The Permanent Medium
Chapter 7. Newspapers: Past, Present, and Future
Chapter 8. Magazines: The Specialized Medium
Part III: Development of Electronic Media
Chapter 9. Motion Pictures: Cultural Reflections
Chapter 10. Radio: A Wireless Wonder
Chapter 11. Recorded Music: Powerful and Controversial
Chapter 12. Television: From Soaps to Satellites
Part IV: Media Shapers
Chapter 13. Advertising: Selling the Message
Chapter 14. Public Relations: Creating an Image
Part V: Media Ethics and Effects
Chapter 15. Media Ethics
Chapter 16. Media Research, Effects and Consequences
Appendix: Mass Communication and Media Literacy

Part I: Culture and Communication
Chapter 1. Culture and Communication: How They Interact
Chapter 2. Culture and Mass Communicaiton: How They Interact
Chapter 3. Internet and Global Communication
Chapter 4. Legal Controls on the Media
Chapter 5. Theories of Press and Journalism: Keeping the Culture Informed
Part II: Development of Print Media
Chapter 6. The Permanent Medium
Chapter 7. Newspapers: Past, Present, and Future
Chapter 8. Magazines: The Specialized Medium
Part III: Development of Electronic Media
Chapter 9. Motion Pictures: Cultural Reflections
Chapter 10. Radio: A Wireless Wonder
Chapter 11. Recorded Music: Powerful and Controversial
Chapter 12. Television: From Soaps to Satellites
Part IV: Media Shapers
Chapter 13. Advertising: Selling the Message
Chapter 14. Public Relations: Creating an Image
Part V: Media Ethics and Effects
Chapter 15. Media Ethics
Chapter 16. Media Research, Effects and Consequences
Appendix: Mass Communication and Media Literacy