Unit THEORY AND HISTORY OF PUBLIC COMMUNICATION
- Course
- Communication sciences
- Study-unit Code
- GP000198
- Curriculum
- In all curricula
- Teacher
- Vincenzo Sorrentino
- Teachers
-
- Vincenzo Sorrentino
- Hours
- 63 ore - Vincenzo Sorrentino
- CFU
- 9
- Course Regulation
- Coorte 2018
- Offered
- 2019/20
- Learning activities
- Caratterizzante
- Area
- Discipline giuridiche, storico-politiche e filosofiche
- Academic discipline
- SPS/01
- Type of study-unit
- Obbligatorio (Required)
- Type of learning activities
- Attività formativa monodisciplinare
- Language of instruction
- Italian
- Contents
- The course will examine the origins and the characteristic of the public opinion considered as a specific form of public sphere. The purpose is to give an historical and conceptual genealogy of the idea of political transparency.
The course will examine the main paradigms of public sphere, in a historical and theoretical perspective. Moreover it will analyse the debate on the nature and the latest transformations of the public opinion in contemporary democracies. - Reference texts
- J.HABERMAS, Storia e critica dell'opinione pubblica, Laterza, Roma-Bari 2002 (ed edizioni successive)
S.CRISTANTE (Ed.), L'onda anonima. Scritti sull'opinione pubblica, Meltemi, Roma 2004 - Educational objectives
- The course will provide the basic tools for understanding the theoretical and historical horizon within emerged the modern public opinion. In this perspective, the course will aim to give the students knowledge about:
•The main features of the public sphere of the ancient and medieval age
•The peculiarities of the modern public opinion
• The history of public opinion
•The theoretical and historical conditions of the modern system of public communication, with its principles and rights (of information and communication)
- The lines of transformation of public opinion in contemporary democratic society.
The main skills are closely related to the training objectives of the undergraduate degree in communication science and political science. Since the historical and theoretical horizon within which emerged the modern public opinion is also the soil in which the system of public communication of contemporary democracies has its roots, these skills are also an essential tool for achieving of these educational objectives, especially in relation to the need to provide students the skills to orient themselves in a conscious and autonomous way within the public sphere and produce communication projects, in particular public and political, that are efficient thanks to the knowledge of the framework in which they will be achieved. - Prerequisites
- none
- Teaching methods
- The course will consist of face-to-face lessons, where exposure by the teacher will be supported by the projection of slides on all the topics covered. During the lessons, we will also use other tools, such as DVD playback and viewing of video files on the web. It will be encouraged dialogue with the students, giving them the opportunity to ask questions or discuss the topics covered in the classroom.
- Other information
- Attendance is recommended, even if not indispensable
- Learning verification modality
- The evaluation will be done with an oral exam, which will consist of a discussion lasting about half an hour aimed at verifying the level of knowledge and critical understanding of the content of the program. Applications will be to ascertain not only the acquisition of such content, but also the ability to connect from both conceptual and historical perspective the themes covered during the course.
- Extended program
- The course will examine the origins and the characteristic of the public opinion considered as a specific form of public sphere. As the public sphere, the common and visible horizon of political action, is not a merely given space in which individuals interact but is the effect of specific historical practices, the course will connect historical and theoretical analysis.
The purpose is to give an historical and conceptual genealogy of the idea of political transparency.
The course will focus on the relationship between some specific kinds of public sphere in western political history (democratic polis, medieval public sphere, and modern public opinion), the related forms of political communication and the government systems connected to them. Afterwards, the course will analyse the debate on the nature and the latest transformations of the public opinion in contemporary democracies: it will analyse the impact of mass media in totalitarian and democratic public sphere, the cultural industry, the meaning of image in political communication and the effect of the rise of ITC on the public opinion