Media Research Techniques

Arthur Asa Berger's essential guide to undertaking applied or practical research in media studies is designed to provide introductory techniques that allow students to engage immediately in their own research projects. In so doing, students learn various ways of conducting communication research both in theory and practice. In response to suggestions from users of the First Edition, Berger has added new chapters in each of the following areas: experimentation, historical research, comparative research and participant observation.

This readable, well-organized text is a beginner's guide to undertaking applied or practical research in media studies. The book has an introduction to research, a presentation of different research techniques and a section on writing up research.

Instructors will appreciate the sampling of interesting assignments and practical exercises in content analysis, survey interview, social roles, depth interview, rhetorical analyses and library research, together with analyses of their advantages and disadvantages. Examples are taken from newspapers, television, songs and records, comics, advertisements and radio.

Arthur Asa Berger is Professor Emeritus of Broadcast and Electronic Communication Arts at San Francisco State University, where he taught between 1965 and 2003.. He has published more than 100 articles, numerous book reviews, and more than 60 books. Among his latest books are The Academic Writer’s Toolkit: A User’s Manual (2008), What Objects Mean: An Introduction to Material Culture (2009), Bali Tourism (2010), Tourism in Japan: An Ethno-Semiotic Analysis (2010), The Culture Theorist’s Book of Quotations (2010) and The Objects of Our Affection: Semiotics and Consumer Culture (2010). He has also written a number of academic mysteries such as Durkheim is Dead: Sherlock Holmes is Introduced to Sociological Theory (2003) and Mistake in Identity: A Cultural Studies Murder Mystery (2005). His books have been translated into nine languages and a dozen of his books have been translated into Chinese . Professor Berger is married, has two children, four grandchildren, and lives in Mill Valley, California.

His e-mail address is [email protected]