Showing results for "On Politics" in Media Studies

In today’s chaotic world, where the multiplication of information sources creates competing narratives, credibility is the key to winning the war of ideas. This is the reason why governments and corporations resort to astroturfing - creation of ostensibly grassroots movements set up to advance political agendas and commercial campaigns. The democratization of information and polarization of politics offer a perfect storm.

Using newly declassified information, Dick Russell builds on three decades of painstaking research in On the Trail of the JFK Assassins, offering one of the most comprehensive and authoritative examinations of the assassination of our 35th president. Included are new revelations, such as the theory that Lee Harvey Oswald was subjected to “mind control,” Russell’s personal encounters inside the KGB headquarters, and new information gleaned from an interview with Oswald’s widow.

The science is overwhelming; the facts are in. The planet is heating up at an alarming rate and the results are everywhere to be seen. Yet, as time runs out, climate progress is blocked by the men who are profiting from the burning of the planet: energy moguls like the Koch brothers and Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson. Powerful politicians like Senators Mitch McConnell and Jim Inhofe, who receive massive contributions from the oil and coal industries. Most of these men are too intelligent to truly believe that climate change is not a growing crisis.

Papyrus rolls and Twitter have much in common, as each was their generation's signature means of "instant" communication. Indeed, as Tom Standage reveals in his scintillating new audiobook, social media is anything but a new phenomenon. From the papyrus letters that Roman statesmen used to exchange news across the Empire to the advent of hand-printed tracts of the Reformation to the pamphlets that spread propaganda during the American and French revolutions, Standage chronicles the increasingly sophisticated ways people shared information with each other....

Because we are continuously taking in information from a variety of sources, we are under constant threat from those who would intentionally (or accidentally) misinform - from foreign operatives, advertisers, politicians, and general scammers to our own friends and family. To better prepare you, IREX (International Research & Exchanges Board) has teamed up with The Great Courses to provide a guide for navigating this tricky landscape with this eight-lecture course designed to arm you with the skills you need to be a savvy media consumer.

Reportage: Essays on the New World Order examines the roots, culture, mindset and insatiable and ruthless lust for power of globalist institutions and interests. James offers not only clarity on the Who, What, How and Why of hidden and suppressed histories, but also presents alternatives, and-yes-even hope for the free and sovereign individual in a world seemingly locked down by The Powers that Be.

On September 10, 1976, exiled Chilean leader Orlando Letelier delivered a blistering rebuke of Augusto Pinochet's brutal right-wing regime in a speech at Madison Square Garden. Eleven days later, while Letelier was on Embassy Row in Washington, DC, a bomb affixed to the bottom of his car exploded, killing him and his coworker Ronni Moffitt. The slaying, staggering in its own right, exposed an international conspiracy that reached well into US territory.

Tyrants on Twitter is the first detailed analysis of how Chinese and Russian agents weaponize Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube to subvert the liberal international order. In addition to examining the 2016 US election, David L. Sloss explores Russia's use of foreign influence operations to threaten democracies in Europe, as well as China's use of social media and other digital tools to meddle in Western democracies and buttress autocratic rulers around the world.

Our media environment is in crisis. Polarization is rampant. Polluted information floods social media. Even our best efforts to help clean up can backfire, sending toxins roaring across the landscape. In You Are Here, Whitney Phillips and Ryan Milner offer strategies for navigating increasingly treacherous information flows. Using ecological metaphors, they emphasize how our individual me is entwined within a much larger we, and how everyone fits within an ever-shifting network map.

In QAnon and On, Guardian columnist Van Badham delves headfirst into the QAnon conspiracy theory, unpicking the why, how and who behind this century’s most dangerous and far-fetched internet cult. From Gamergate to Pizzagate and beyond to QAnon, internet manipulation and disinformation campaigns have grown to a geopolitical scale and spilled into real life with devastating consequences, entangling everyone from politicians to Hollywood celebrities.

What exactly is the purpose of the BBC nowadays—to entertain, educate and inform? But is that all? The broadcaster itself claims to be a fearless and independent provider of news tasked with "speaking truth to power"—a true champion of the underdog. However, as David Sedgwick reveals in his new book, the reality is somewhat different: not only does the BBC diligently protect power from scrutiny, it attacks and attempts to discredit those who dare to challenge the status quo.

Conspiracy theories are as old as politics. But conspiracists today have introduced something new - conspiracy without theory. And the new conspiracism has moved from the fringes to the heart of government with the election of Donald Trump. In A Lot of People Are Saying, Russell Muirhead and Nancy Rosenblum reveal how the new conspiracism differs from classic conspiracy theory, why so few officials speak truth to conspiracy, and what needs to be done to resist it.

Now in its second edition, The Virtues of Captain America is updated to include all the new developments in Captain America's saga. This edition also offers new material on Sam Wilson—formerly Captain America's partner the Falcon who recently became Captain America himself—and how his interpretation of the role compares to Steve Rogers's.

Cyberspace is all around us. We depend on it for everything we do. We have reengineered our business, governance, and social relations around a planetary network unlike any before it. But there are dangers looming, and malign forces are threatening to transform this extraordinary domain. In Black Code, Ronald J. Deibert, a leading expert on digital technology, security, and human rights, lifts the lid on cyberspace and shows what's at stake for Internet users and citizens.

Unfiltered: How to Be as Happy as You Look on Social Media is for anyone who needs to be reminded that we're all a work in progress, no matter what judgments we make when measuring our lives against what others share online. In her debut book, award-winning journalist and sought-after speaker Jessica Abo addresses the relationship between our psychology and technology and how we can take back our happiness IRL (in real life) without falling into the compare-and-despair trap.

In Enemy of the People, Marvin Kalb, an award-winning American journalist with more than six decades of experience both as a journalist and media observer, writes with passion about why we should fear for the future of American democracy because of the unrelenting attacks by the Trump administration on the press.

Plus-size fashionistas have been writing their own narrative for the past two decades, creating a market all on their own that is now worth more than $21 billion dollars. The Power of Plus features interviews with trailblazers such as Tess Holliday, Hunter McGrady, Gabi Gregg, and more, as it follows the evolution of plus-size fashion from its start on small blogs to its current boom, examines the way this market has changed women’s relationships with their bodies, and predicts how plus-size fashion is integral to the future success of the industry.

Si vendre des photos de vos pieds pouvait remplir votre frigo, est-ce que vous sauteriez le pas ? Des millions de posts accompagnés du hashtag #feetpic inondent Instagram quotidiennement. Une multitude d'internautes proclame avoir trouvé un filon d'or et gagner des milliers d'euros en vendant simplement des photos de leurs pieds. Sur le papier, comment résister ? Mais peut-on vraiment devenir riche en faisant commerce de ses pieds ? Angèle Marrey et Jennyfer Arduin, deux amies de longue date, ont décidé de se lancer dans l'aventure.

What makes Buffy the Vampire Slayer a "brave dame" but Ally McBeal a "wimpette"? In this witty, incisive look at the role of women on screen and page, Susan Isaacs argues that assertive, ethical women characters are losing ground to wounded, shallow sisters who are driven by what she calls, "the articles of wimpette philosophy."