Video Critical

Description

In this follow-up to his highly-acclaimed Moving Experiences (1995), David Gauntlett travels beyond the relatively straightforward questions about the possible direct effects of telvision on behaviour, to explore the contribution which television can make to viewers' understandings of the world. Arguing fiercely against the attempts of psychologists to explain complex social issues in individualistic terms, Video Critical racks the focus back yet further, undertaking a more sophisticated journey towards an understanding of the place of media in the lives of children at the end of the twentieth century.
Video Critical presents, for the first time, the findings of a new research method developed especially for this study, in which groups of Leeds schoolchidren were given video facilities to facilitate them making their own video productions. Taking the environment as their focus, the videos sugest that the children's views of both environmental issues and the mass media are complex and contradictory. The children's work is also considered in relation to the aims of the producers of broadcast television programmes which involve material about the environment, who were also interviewed for the study.

Biography

Dr David Gauntlett is Lecturer in Communications at Leeds University.