Communication

This course examines the craft of writing hard and soft news stories for a range of digital and print mass media news publications. With an emphasis on news writing, it covers what news is and how (and why) news priorities and story treatment may differ between print, broadcast and online; how to write news and feature stories; accuracy, as well as clear and concise language; and professional codes of ethics and editorial policies.

This course focuses on interpretative and investigative-style journalism. Topics include: in-depth reporting; freedom of style and structure of the report without prejudice to the truth; useful data in reporting; diversity of sources for truth testing necessary to journalistic reporting; authentication of data and fact-checking; transmedia reporting; structure and narrative techniques of reporting; ethics versus manipulation and ideological prejudices.

This course examines various ethical issues involving the Internet. Its unique architecture creates various legal and policy conflicts in freedom of speech (e.g., right to be forgotten), privacy (e.g., mass surveillance), anonymity, common carrier rules (e.g., net neutrality), intermediary liability, data protection, hate speech, domain name disputes, spam regulation, online copyright infringement, pornography and jurisdictional issues. In these debates, what is the role of law or the rule of law? Canvassing the laws of selected countries and international and regional law such as GDPR, e-Commerce Directive, UN Human Rights Committee recommendations, the course attempts to identify a globally consistent set of theories and arguments that have gained normative and prescriptive traction in the relevant regional or international debates.

This course offers an intensive theoretical and practical study of the craft of directing for camera in film and television, independent filmmaking, and audiovisual creation with an emphasis on developing creative camera proficiency. Students complete a final short video project applying the concepts developed during the course.

This course examines how the audiovisual ecosystem has changed over the last decade. It covers new trends and aesthetics, digital film & television, music, audio and online video, video games, fake news, and filter bubbles.

This course presents a survey of contemporary theories and research regarding the interaction between gender and communication. Emphasis is on a variety of factors and contexts involved in daily communication such as language, non-verbal messages, interpersonal and familiar relationships, educational process, mass media, and work place. Topics include essential features of current theories which seek to cast light on the gender communication process; the impact of changing roles of gender in the society as constituted and presented by communication; the differing social and cultural expectations and portrayals of men and women in various situations; the differences between males and females in perception, information processing, and verbal and non-verbal communication patterns; distinct standpoints and insights derived as valid and acceptable.

This course examines the theory and application of online news communication, focusing on the analysis of the evolution of online news form, the evolution of online news production mode, as well as various technical applications of online news communication and its internal communication rules under the background of online society.