Media Studies: A Reader - 2nd Edition

This is a well chosen and very well edited selection. It gives short 4-5 page samples of some of the most valuable things that have been written on media in the past fifty years. Compared to its 1997 predecessor, the 2000 American edition tones down the focus on British media, and includes new excerpts by Fairclough, Radway and a whole new section on 'New Media'. The emphasis in the new volume is on the present rather than on the history of media studies. The bad news is that things had to be cut to make space for the new material. Too bad that two illuminating pieces by Judith Williamson (from Decoding Advertisements) and Alan Tomlinson (from Consumption, Identity, and Style) were left out.