Michael Kammen . This course looks at the origins of communications institutions in the United States and their role in shaping the history of the nation. The purpose is to provide students with a context that helps to explain modern communications structures and processes, what role communications has played in the nation's past, and its significance to contemporary American history and society. These themes will be addressed through a selective discussion of ideas, technologies, events, people, professional practices, economics, and politics from the American Revolution to the late twentieth century. William S. Solmon and Robert W. McChesney, eds.
Readings are to precede classroom presentations.
Schedule changes will be announced in class. Communications and the First American Political System. Abolitionists and Suffragists. Kessler, Chapters 2 and 4. World War I and the 1920s.