Are you still perplexed by the workings of the media, especially in this digital age? Media studies course is an academic program that involves students in the systematic study of media.
This ranges from the operational modes of the media to its applicability. Therefore, we have put together everything you need about media studies. Carefully read through.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Media & Communication jobs are expected to grow by 4% in 2028 in the United States.
With the increase in fake media and the integrity of mainstream media in doubt, a growing number of people want to find the truth for themselves and share it with the world. This truth can only be unraveled when one has an inept knowledge of the workings of the media.
Before we go on, what are Media Studies?
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Table of contents
- What Are Media Studies?
- Why Should I Study Media Studies?
- What Should I Expect In Media Studies Program?
- Is Media Studies Related To Other Disciplines?
- What Can I Do With a Media Studies degree?
- Media Studies Admission Requirements
- Where Can I Study Media Studies?
- #1. University of Texas at Austin
- #2. Stanford University
- #3. University of California, Berkeley
- #4. University of Wisconsin-Madison
- #5. University of Pennsylvania
- #6. Michigan State University
- #7. Northwestern University
- #8. Yale University
- #9. University of California, Santa Barbara
- #10. Pennsylvania State University
- Conclusion
- References
- We Also Recommend
What Are Media Studies?
According to Wikipedia, media studies is a discipline and field of study that deals with the content, history, and effects of various media, particularly the mass media.
Media Studies may draw on social and humanities traditions, but mostly from its core disciplines of mass communication, communication, communication sciences, and communication studies.
It can further be defined as the theoretical and practical study of the functionality of the media sphere and what they stand for. Furthermore, media studies explore media institutions, their past and present models, and how it impacts society.
Furthermore, it answers questions about how media influence the way people act in their personal lives and in business. Media studies majors explore how news reporting affects political opinions and how violence in movies influences how communities interact.
Why Should I Study Media Studies?
Just as mentioned earlier, media studies expose you to the media in its entirety. This ranges from the media’s structure, style, and pattern to its usability.
During courses, students analyze media institutions and channels. They discover variations between the past and present and explore how the digital age has changed how media organizations function.
In addition, you’ll also learn the techniques utilized to make films, documentaries, mobile media, radio technology, and video games.
In summary, media studies will give you a clearer understanding of how the media works and how to utilize it in this modern age.
What Should I Expect In Media Studies Program?
Media Studies degrees examine the content, history, and impact of various media (especially mass media) on our society. The media is split into two categories: Digital media, or contemporary media, and traditional media.
In media studies, students analyze media systems and channels. They discover variations between the past and present and investigate how the digital age has changed how media organizations function.
Therefore, media studies focus on four key concepts:
- Media language – different ways to construct meaning or send a message through text, image, audio, etc.
- Representation – how different media institutions translate and describe an event or situation.
- Audience – understanding who consumes media, why, and how to develop content that appeals to a target audience.
- Institution – the organizations that create media and how their funding and ideology influence their work.
Media Studies is a general degree related to anthropology, Psychology, Cultural Studies, and Political Science. Nevertheless, you can narrow your focus by studying any of the media sub-disciplines.
- Communication
- Social Media
- Journalism
- Publishing & Editing
- Film & Media Studies
What Can I Do With a Media Studies degree?
With a degree in media studies, many job opportunities and career prospects are open for you. Media Studies graduates can find job opportunities in Marketing, Broadcasting, Photography, and other areas.
However, here are some of the most popular Media Studies careers and their average yearly salary:
Media Researcher
As a program researcher, you’ll support the producer and production team of a television, radio, film, or online project. In addition, you’ll source contacts and contributors for programs, input your ideas and work on location.
Furthermore, the work of a media researcher involves organizing, planning, and researching everything that will occur during a program. This entails collecting and validating information, such as who’ll be interviewed, the location of the film crew will fit if the budget will stretch, and others.
The introductory salary rates for a junior researcher on a TV program are around £400 for a 48-hour week. While researchers with experience earn around £650 for a 48-hour week.
Television/Film/Video Producer
A television, film, or video producer oversees all production elements from conception through completion and may also be linked to the marketing and distribution process.
Furthermore, you’ll work closely with directors and other production staff, either in a studio or on location, to guarantee a creative and stable working environment for everyone involved in the project.
Starting salaries for assistant producers may range from around £18,000 to £25,000. Subsequently, with added experience, salaries can reach £40,000 to £55,000. Departmental heads can earn £60,000 to £80,000, plus benefits.
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Public Relations Specialist
Public relations (PR) as a career is all about managing reputation. Additionally, it involves gaining understanding and support for your clients and trying to manipulate opinions and behavior.
As a PR officer, you must use all forms of media and communication to build, sustain, and manage your clients’ reputations. These range from public bodies or services to businesses and voluntary organizations.
Furthermore, you’re in charge of communicating key messages, often using third-party endorsements, to define target audiences to create and maintain goodwill and understanding between an organization and its public.
The average salary range for a PR assistant is around £18,000 to £20,000. This is a typical entry-level graduate role if you want to become a PR officer. The average starting salaries for PR officers can range from £22,000 to £28,000. With a few years of added experience, wages can increase to more than £40,000.
Senior management positions, such as PR director or head of corporate affairs, allow salaries from £40,000 to more than £100,000.
Digital Marketer
As a media studies graduate, you can work as a digital marketer. Essentially, a digital marketer has to promote products and services through various digital channels using the internet and mobile technology.
As a digital marketer, you’ll be involved in developing an organization’s multi-channel communication plans. You may work across several areas, or specialize in a few, depending on the size and demands of your employer.
The average salary range for graduate marketing schemes and entry-level positions, such as digital marketing assistant, is £18,000 to £22,000. As a more experienced digital officer or digital coordinator, you can anticipate earning up to £30,000. (skinnyninjamom.com) In a more senior management role, it will place you at around £40,000.
Media Planner
A media planner has to identify which media platforms will best sell your client’s brand or product to their target audience.
You’ll work with advertising agencies or media planning and buying agencies to maximize the force of advertising campaigns through various media platforms.
Furthermore, you’ll use creative thinking and research to develop appropriate strategies to ensure that campaigns leave the right impact on their target audiences. Also, you’ll utilize knowledge of media and communication platforms to know the most appropriate mediums for building awareness of a client’s brand.
Average starting salaries for junior, assistant, and essential media planner/buyer positions range from £15,000 to £22,000. As a media planner with many years of experience and managerial or team leader responsibilities, salaries are from £25,000 to £40,000.
At the senior level, salaries differ significantly but maybe over £50,000. In a very senior position, you might expect to earn £80,000+.
Web Content Manager
Web content managers guarantee that a website’s content is well-structured and easy to find and that it satisfies the needs of its users by covering all essential topics and being up-to-date and accurate. The content you’ll manage includes- web pages, images, videos, blog posts, guest articles, reviews, and occasionally social media and marketing copy.
Additionally, you’ll produce copy and edit the site yourself. On larger sites, you can act as a coordinator, commissioner, and project manager, overseeing the work of other writers and editors.
Starting salaries for web content coordinators are around £20,000 to £25,000. On the other hand, experienced web content coordinators, web content executives, and web content managers earn between £25,000 and £40,000. Senior web content and website managers can earn between £40,000 and £50,000.
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Media Studies Admission Requirements
Here are some of the documents you need to tender during the application process at a bachelor’s or master’s level. However, the requirements vary according to universities and colleges.
For instance, not all universities ask students to have work experience for a postgraduate degree in Media Studies.
Bachelor’s degrees in Media Studies
- Minimum English language test scores: IELTS 6.0 or TOEFL 70
- Academic transcripts
- Minimum GPA
- Personal statement
Master’s Degree in Media Studies
- Minimum English language test scores: IELTS 6.5 or TOEFL 85
- Bachelor’s degree in Media, Communication, or a related field
- Minimum GPA (usually 3.0)
- Letters of recommendation
- Work experience (1-3 years)
- Writing sample
- Résumé
Where Can I Study Media Studies?
Over 523 colleges and universities offer a bachelor’s degree in communication and media studies.
However, we’ll examine the top 10 Communication & Media Studies schools. These schools were chosen based on factors like– Accreditation, Employability, Programs offered, Acceptance rate, Graduation rate, and Student to faculty ratio.
#1. University of Texas at Austin
The Department of Radio-Television-Film at The University of Texas at Austin offers a broad range of courses covering media arts, culture, and industry-leading to the Bachelor of Science, Master of Fine Arts, Master’s, and Ph.D. degrees.
Reinventing the model of a traditional “film school,” the University of Texas at Austin is one of the few top-ranking U.S. media programs to offer degrees in both practical and theoretical areas —i.e., in both media production and media studies—and combine courses in both the humanities and social sciences.
The university aims to provide quality education to undergraduate and graduate students in media studies.
Furthermore, to encourage better media practice informed citizen engagement through media literacy and to create an environment that supports all creative work and scholarly research.
According to QS global world ranking, the University of Texas at Austin ranks #65.
The University has about 8,833 students with graduate employability pegged at #54, An academic Reputation; 9of 4.2, and student to faculty ratio of 12.1.
#2. Stanford University
Stanford University Arts in Film & Media Studies provides students with knowledge of film aesthetics, national cinematic traditions, modes of production in narrative, documentary, and experimental films, the incorporation of moving image media by contemporary artists, and the proliferation of new forms of digital media.
Furthermore, the program is meant to develop the critical vocabulary and intellectual framework for understanding the role of cinema and related media within broad cultural and historical concepts.
The university offers undergraduate and graduate-level courses.
Stanford University,y with 16,233 students, ranks #2 according to QS global ranking, with an Employer Reputation of 100.
#3. University of California, Berkeley
Media Studies at UC Berkeley is an interdisciplinary program that exposes students to various media theories and practices in the broadest sense. U of C also teaches students research skills in media studies which are core components of media studies.
Furthermore, the university is primarily concerned with promoting an understanding of the origins of contemporary media and helping students assess the roles and impact of the major mass media on modern life rather than developing specific media production skills.
Through the department’s core courses, students learn media history and theory and examine the role of media in political life in the United States and abroad.
In addition, students learn to dissect the effects of electronic and print media, consider the media’s influence on public policy, and the impact of public policy on the press.
According to QS, the University of California, Berkeley ranks #28 in the world’s global ranking.
The research output university has 39,932 students, an employer reputation of 99.,9, and a 30.9 student-faculty ratio.
#4. University of Wisconsin-Madison
The Media and Cultural Studies (MCS) program highlights media studies in their historical, economic, social, and political context.
In this course, students examine the cultural forms created and disseminated by media industries and how they resonate in everyday life on the individual, national, and global levels.
With an avid focus on sound and screen media — television, new media, film, popular music, radio, and video games — but reaching out across boundaries, MCS encourages interdisciplinary and transmedia research.
Through coursework in the Ph.D. minor, graduates also can combine study in such overlapping fields as history, ethnic studies, gender studies, sociology, and global studies.
According to QS, the university with a total of 39,773 ranks #56 globally. Faculty Student ratio is at 85.5.
#5. University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private Ivy League research university located in the city of Philadelphia. The university offers cinema and media studies.
Penn’s Cinema and Media Studies major and minor are traditional humanities programs involving the critical study of film and media history, theory, and aesthetics.
This genuinely interdisciplinary program will advance students to the various methodologies used to study film and media. This intersection with other disciplines makes Cinema and Media Studies a fundamental component of a double major.
According to QS, The university, with a population of 21,211 students, ranks #15 globally.
#6. Michigan State University
The media and information degree is designed to give students the flexibility to acquire knowledge and skills in media.
Coursework and experience allow students to specialize in radio and television, new media, game design, film production, graphics and animation, media management, and information policy.
In addition, the availability of specialty labs allows students to acquire and apply knowledge; debate policy and regulation; collaborate, innovate and design technologies; and research the effects of communication technologies.
According to QS, the research-based institution with over 44,598 students ranks #144 globally.
Furthermore, the university offers more than 200 programs in 17 degree-granting colleges. The student-to-faculty ratio is pegged at 18.6.
#7. Northwestern University
With a film and media studies minor, you’ll get the tools needed for accurate analysis of media within the broader connection of the humanities and social sciences.
This interdisciplinary program focuses on media studies within a broad intellectual framework rather than on media creation.
In this course, you can view films from countries worldwide and determine their impact. Also, understand the power of the image in culture, and examine race and gender through the language of cinema.
A film and media studies minor at Northwestern University gives you deep insight into how media shapes society and equips you for a career that requires you to anticipate the impact of media, such as politics and entertainment management.
According to QS, Northwestern University ranks #31 with a population of 19,112 students. The private research-based university also has scholarship opportunities for its students.
#8. Yale University
The Film and Media Studies major centers on the history, theory, criticism, and production of cinema and other moving-image media.
Courses study cinema, the broader landscape of audiovisual media as vital modern art forms, and the contributions of moving-image media as cultural and communicative practices of lasting social significance.
Deeply invested in scholarship, teaching, and film programming, Yale’s media studies sustain the traditions of and nurture the most innovative directions in film and media studies research.
According to QS, the research-based institution ranks #17 globally.
#9. University of California, Santa Barbara
The Department of Film and Media Studies at UCSB is a vibrant, fast-growing department whose faculty members include specialists from contemporary media studies.
The department focuses on fiction and nonfiction film history and theory, television and broadcasting, digital media, the Internet, video art and activism, cultural studies, political economies, and media globalization.
In the department, production is not emphasized, but all majors become familiar with the basic tools of filmmaking. Interested students may also take courses in screenwriting and advanced film production.
Within a broad framework of liberal arts education, the Department’s undergraduate BA curriculum offers courses on the history and theory of film and media systems around the world; fiction and nonfiction filmmaking; video games, interactive, and web-based digital media production; screenwriting; archival and curatorial practice, and more.
While the graduate core centers on history, theory, and critical analysis, the MA-PhD program trains innovative research projects with an eye to the future of the field.
The institution with over 25,658 students ranks #135 according to QS global rankings.
#10. Pennsylvania State University
The Integrated B.A./M.A. degree in Media Studies is an academic program that includes students in the systematic study of media. The course aims to give students a comprehensive understanding of the systems, cultures, and information associated with media.
The program equips students for doctoral study in communications and for professional positions in business and government that demand comprehensive understanding implications of the media and research methods for studying the media.
Furthermore, this program helps students organize research projects and critically evaluate research reports. Again, how to directly influence media practices by applying research findings.
According to QS, the public research-based institution ranks #93 globally.
You can choose the school that suits your desire from the schools above.
Conclusion
Media studies as a discipline expose you to the workings of the media, the role they play in society, and their impact on society.
Therefore, knowledge of the media in its entirety gives one an edge. That is to say; you’ll be conversant with the workings of the media and know how to apply it in your individual and professional life.
References
- mastersportal.com– Why should I study a media studies degree
- topuniversities.com– Media studies
- prospects.ac.uk– What can I do with my degree in media studies
