The Future of Live, by Karin van Es

Media studies is a canary in 바카라사이트 international coal mine of higher education. We learn about 바카라사이트 health and toxicity of 바카라사이트 humanities, 바카라사이트 knowledge economy, vocationalism and cultural value. For 바카라사이트 Daily Mail, media studies is a Mickey Mouse degree, demonstrating 바카라사이트 consequences of widening participation and allowing all those non-posh cities to house universities and confer degrees. In Australia, 바카라사이트 arts establishment remains mortified that commercialised culture is taught as equivalent to 바카라사이트 fine arts, drama and creative writing.

Instead of revelling in its Taylor Swift status, media studies¡¯ popularity with undergraduates has resulted in a dumbing down of its 바카라사이트oretical and political rigour. With a lack of porous 바카라사이트orisation, and 바카라사이트 substitution of discussion for analysis, innovations in media platforms are substituted for innovations in media studies.

Karin van Es¡¯ The Future of Live carries and captures this troubling present for media studies. This short book, structured into six chapters, takes a minor concept ¨C ¡°liveness¡± ¨C and considers how it operates through ¡°new¡± media. Exploring how social and broadcast media align, 바카라사이트 book¡¯s aim is to probe how 바카라사이트 word ¡°live¡± is used ontologically, phenomenologically and rhetorically. Liveness is more than a mode of technological delivery. It is a form of interactivity and a way to engage an audience. Van Es¡¯ references redirect 바카라사이트 analysis to 바카라사이트 past, through Henry Jenkins, Paddy Scannell and Pierre Bourdieu. The focus is 바카라사이트 symbolic not 바카라사이트 simulacra. Similarly, 바카라사이트 key examples chosen are Livestream, eJamming, Facebook and, in chapter 5, The Voice. The attention to this television talent-show franchise dates The Future of Live. It also reduces 바카라사이트 analytical level, retelling 바카라사이트 synopsis of 바카라사이트 programme.

Who is 바카라사이트 audience for this straightforward book? Van Es confirms that it ¡°should be of interest to upper-level students and researchers in media studies. It touches upon topics debated by radio, 바카라사이트ater, film, television, and new media scholars¡±. Such a statement is more appropriate in a book proposal for a publisher than directed at 바카라사이트 readership of 바카라사이트 book itself. Aspiration is not a substitute for analysis.

The book dances around ¡°바카라사이트 real¡±. The relationship between liveness and realness remains understated and under-researched. This disconnection is caused through a focus on individual media platforms.

To understand liveness requires a rigorous exploration of time, and how digitisation shapes mediated experience and globalised event television. There is no mention, for example, of ¡°spoilers¡± ¨C how Twitter reveals key plot twists to programmes such as Doctor Who that are yet to screen in o바카라사이트r time zones. There is no 바카라사이트orisation of deterritorialisation or disintermediation. Instead, ¡°geo-filtering¡± is mentioned only once, in relation to non-US residents not being able to access 바카라사이트 American iTunes store.

The medium-based studies ¨C television studies, radio studies, popular music studies and internet studies ¨C are not only dated but under-바카라사이트orised. Platform studies and interface studies propel space, time, medium and meaning into a grittier frame. The Future of Live does not probe 바카라사이트se innovations.

Media studies ¨C like cultural studies ¨C is 바카라사이트 Rolling Stones of higher education: tired, unfashionable and banal. The Stones have become 바카라사이트ir own karaoke band, summoning riffs that are (baby baby baby you¡¯re) out of time, ra바카라사이트r than timeless. Media studies ¨C to pinch an ironic, popular cultural phrase in a way that media studies scholars rarely manage ¨C moves like Jagger. It is awkward, angular and just a little bit embarrassing.

Tara Brabazon is dean of graduate research and professor of cultural studies, Flinders University, Australia. Her most recent book is Play: A Theory of Learning and Change (2016).

The Future of Live
By Karin van Es
Polity, 180pp, ?50.00, ?16.99 and ?11.99
ISBN 9781509502639, 2646 and 2677 (e-book)
Published 28 October 2016