Face-to-face , first term, 30 hours of theory.

First term
Tuesday from 10:45 to 12:45 at 119 Marais 3200

French

1) To familiarize the students with the main theoretical and conceptual frameworks of user studies and reception studies, in the French-speaking research tradition as well as in the anglophone research tradition, including recent developments around digital media and technologies.
2) To consolidate the students' competences in reading and comprehending scientific texts on media and communication.
3) To train the students in elaborating a problematization according to the standards and methods of social sciences.

For the Bachelor in Information and Communication :

For the Bachelor in Political Sciences: General :

For the Bachelor in Sociology and Anthropology :

None

The teaching unit goes in depth into a series of theoretical and conceptual frameworks of user studies and reception studies, including around digital media and technologies. The following issues, questions or approaches are addressed:
- technological determinism and impact studies
- the main approaches to « the user »
- ICT and online sociability (virtual communities, online social networks…)
- the digital divide, media literacy and digital literacy
- media reception: Screen Theory and Cultural Studies
- the active audience: media reception as resistance, the genre as a text-reader contract, critical reading…
- fan communities and fan studies
- media reception and social/cultural positions
- the social uses of media (in the domestic sphere, in everyday sociability)
- media use and identity performance (including, for instance, in relation to gender)
- the political aspects of media reception (with inputs from sociology and political science on issues such as citizenship, participation, public opinion and the construction of public problems)

This teaching unit is composed of lectures and seminar sessions.

During the lectures, the professor elaborates on the course content using visual presentations. Several discussion or application activities are organized as well. Some of the texts on which the lectures draw upon are examined in depth during the seminar sessions (see below).

For the seminar, the students work in sub-groups of 3 or 4 participants. The seminar is dedicated to:
- reading in depth a selection of scientific texts. Guiding questions are provided and the texts are discussed in class. At least one exam question relates to the texts.
- elaborating a problematization of an issue or a question related to media/ICT use or reception (to be determined by the sub-group). The work in progress is presented orally to the class group and followed by a discussion time. This presentation is purely formative and is thus not graded.

As course material, the students have at their disposal the visual presentations used for the lectures and a copy of the mandatory texts that are the focus of the seminar. The teaching unit is also present on Moodle.

The assessment method is twofold:
- a written exam (closed and open-ended questions) on the content of the lectures and seminar sessions. The exam weights for 60% of the final grade. The exam questions on the texts are chosen among the guiding questions discussed during the seminar sessions. During the exam, the students can have with them a copy of the texts but annotations are prohibited.
- a group work consisting in a problematization of a research question. The group work weights for 40% of the final grade, with the following components : 3/4 of the grade is dedicated to the written work and 1/4 of the grade to the oral presentation. The assessment of the oral presentation focuses on formal and communicationnal aspects and does not address the content.

The teaching unit is succeeded only if the student achieves at least 10/20 for THE TWO assessment methods. In that case s/he we get the final weighted grade as explained above. In case a student fails in at least one of the evaluations, s/he will get as a final grade the grade obtained for the most failed evaluation.

For June or September, the student who has failed in January MUST redo the failed evaluation(s). A student MAY also redo a succeeded evaluation in order to improve her/his grade, but then the new grade will “erase” the previous one, even if it is a failure. In case a student fails in at least one of the evaluations in June or September, s/he will get as a final grade the grade obtained for the most failed evaluation.

Class attendance is checked for the seminar sessions. The student who is absent for a non justified reason more than twice will get a 0/20 as a final grade for the entire teaching unit in January. Seminar attendance is not taken into account for the June and September sessions.

Selected bibliography (recommended) :
- Bilandzic, H., Patriarche, G. & Traudt, P. J. (eds) (2012), The Social Use of Media: Cultural and Social Scientific Perspectives on Audience Research, Bristol, Intellect.
- Carpentier, N., Schrøder, K.C., & Hallett, L. (eds) (2014), Audience Transformations. Shifting Audience Positions in Late Modernity, New York, Routledge.
- Certeau, M. de (1990), L'invention du quotidien. 1. Arts de faire, Paris, Gallimard.
- Dayan, D. (ed.) (1993), « A la recherche du public. Réception, télévision, médias », Hermès, n°11/12.
- Glevarec, H., Macé, E. & Maigret, E. (eds.) (2008), Cultural Studies. Anthologie, Paris, Armand Colin/INA.
- Jauréguiberry, F., & Proux, S. (2011), Usages et enjeux des technologies de communication, Toulouse, Toulouse, Érès.
- Jenkins, H. (1992), Textual Poachers. Television Fans & Participatory Culture, New York & Londres, Routledge.
- Le Grignou, B. (2003), Du côté du public. Usages et réceptions de la télévision, Paris, Economica.
- Livingstone, S. & Lunt, P. (1993), Talk on television. Audience participation and public debate, Londres, Routledge.
- Lohisse, J., with the collab. of Patriarche, G. & Klein, A. (2009), La communication. De la transmission à la relation, 4ème éd., Bruxelles, De Boeck.
- Lull, J. (1980), « The social uses of television », Human Communication Research, 1980, vol. 6, n°3, p.197-209.
- Morley D. (1992), Television, Audiences and Cultural Studies, Londres, Routledge.
- Pasquier, D. (1999), La culture des sentiments. L'expérience télévisuelle des adolescents, Paris, Maison des sciences de l'homme.
- Patriarche, G., & Dufrasne, M. (2014), « Penser la diversité des pratiques médiatiques. Le réseau comme catégorie conceptuelle pour la recherche sur les audiences et les publics », Réseaux, n°187, pp.197-234.
- Schrøder, K. C. (1994), « Audience semiotics, interpretive communities and ‘the ethnographic turn' in media research », Media, Culture & Society, vol.16, pp.337-347.
- Zoonen, L. van (2005), Entertaining the citizen. When politics and popular culture converge, Lanham, Rowman & Littlefield.

The speaking language for the lectures and the seminar sessions is French. The mandatory texts are in French as well. For the written work, it might be that the student have to use texts in English, depending on their research question and the references available.