The history and development of U.S. media, theoretical aspects of mass communications, the composition of media audiences, law and regulation of mass communications and how the media affect and are affected by society are presented.

An opportunity for undergraduates to learn the verbal and visual skills utilized in the creation of advertising messages. To create an effective strategy for an advertising campaign, the advertising copywriter/art director team needs to combine linguistic and visual metaphors into a persuasive message. Students will develop creative advertising messages by researching and writing a creative brief and then implementing the plan by transforming concepts into actual advertising messages and campaigns.

The course covers the impact/effect of journalism on American society, with an introduction to the history, freedom, technologies, ethics, and functions of the news media. Students will learn how to assess news value, develop news judgment, and analyze news stories.

This course introduces students to the principles and practices of using multiple mediums to tell stories on multiple platforms, including written text, video, photo, audio, immersive media and other new and evolving forms of media. The course familiarizes students with the tools and techniques of a multiplatform storyteller, for example, digital content strategy, story concept ideation, pre-production, production, post-production and dissemination through new and evolving platforms. Additionally, students explore current examples of multiplatform stories.

Community Journalism emphasizes the local aspects of news, and teaches students how to identify “community” beyond a region and a neighborhood. A co-taught course with Photojournalism faculty in the College of Art and Design, Community Journalism sharpens students’ reporting skills, and guides them in constructing a reporting project as a complete journalistic package, with visual, artistic and written storytelling components in concert with each other. The final project will be a reported (written) piece with corresponding photographs and multimedia.

Photography (and photographic education) is in a perpetual state of flux due to constant changes in practices and technology. Topics in photojournalism will provide students with the opportunity to explore this shifting terrain of photography and imaging using contemporary problems. The content taught in this course will change frequently and the course may be repeated for credit, however each particular topic may have limits on repeatability.

This is an intensive, hands-on workshop introducing students to a specialized technology or mode of storytelling (ASL poetry, photojournalism, graphic narratives, digital literature, XR storytelling, memoir, etc.), and or context for storytelling (health care, science communication, engineering, translation studies, k-12 education, corporate leadership,etc.). Students will learn about a particular genre, technology, or context for storytelling, exploring its creative potential and social, cultural, and artistic meaning and potential applications through hands-on work with an expert instructor. It provides an opportunity for students to study emerging or influential modes of story – fictional and nonfictional – and methods of storytelling such as memoir, photojournalism, scientific communciation, VR storytelling, among potential workshop foci. Through collaborative activities, students will put their newly acquired story skills to practice with a small group of peers and with instructor guidance and feedback. The workshop is designed for students interested in exploring these areas at every stage, from those interested in a focused introduction, to those interested in adding work to their professional portfolio.