Communications

Line of protesters dressed as characters from The Handmaid’s Tale holding protest signs

Do liberals make moral connections through pop culture?

When people are trying to communicate complicated ideas that hinge on morality, argues Megan Genovese, they turn to pop culture as a point of commonality in the absence of a Christian theological framework.

From Annenberg School for Communication ・



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In the News


Vice

TV stations broke law by airing Amazon propaganda as news, experts say

Victor Pickard of the Annenberg School for Communication said the airing of marketing materials without adequate disclosure on news stations reflects the decline of quality local journalism. “Structural factors that create fertile conditions for such corporate propaganda include the loss of actual journalists, little regulatory oversight, and media ownership concentration, which tends to both intensify commercial pressures and homogenize media content,” he said.

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Huffington Post

Right-wing radio reaches tens of millions. Its coronavirus conspiracies are out of control

Brian Rosenwald of the School of Arts & Sciences spoke about the popularity of conservative talk radio hosts, who maintain close relationships with their listeners. “They may listen 15 hours a week to that host. For Rush [Limbaugh], they might have been doing that for 30 years and they might spend more time with him than they spend with their spouse,” Rosenwald said. “It’s a deeper bond.”

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Los Angeles Times

In the coronavirus crisis, Newsom uses social media to raise awareness of the pandemic — and his profile

Raina Merchant of the Perelman School of Medicine spoke about the use of social media by elected officials and public health leaders to communicate about the coronavirus. “There’s just a lot more people who are on social media. So these types of conversations are very important,” she said.

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Axios

What experts say works for combating coronavirus misinformation

Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the Annenberg Public Policy Center spoke about counteracting health misinformation. “If you don't go into same venue where the misinformation originally spread, then you're not likely to reach audience the audience that heard it originally,” she says.

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Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane (WHYY-FM)

The White House coronavirus briefing dilemma

Lori Robertson of the Annenberg Public Policy Center joined a conversation about how the press is handling coverage of the White House Coronavirus Task Force briefings.

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Philadelphia Inquirer

Zoombombing: What it is, and how to stop it from ruining your coronavirus events

Jessa Lingel of the Annenberg School for Communication spoke about how online gatherings can be protected from disruptions by trolls. “Just like people should be updating their Facebook settings, just like people should be thinking about location data that they put on Twitter or Instagram, we should also be thinking about the settings of a platform like Zoom,” she said.

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