Part of the reason why I find science fiction attractive as a focus for study is because of its inherent uncertainties. For instance, Altman states that ‘most genre critics prefer to deal with films that are clearly and ineluctably tied to the genre in question’. This has certainly not been my approach to science fiction. For instance, I have included discussion of films that are less than clear examples of the genre and have chosen to read films like Crash (dir. David Cronenberg, 1996) and The Terminal Man (dir. Michael Hodges, 1974) as science fictions. I am not sure that it is possible to consider science fiction in the kind of vacuum that Altman suggests is prevalent ...

Media Culture develops methods and analyses of contemporary film, television, music and other artifacts to discern their nature and effects, argueing that media culture is the dominant form of culture which socializes us and provides materials for identity, social reproduction and change. Through studies of Reagan and Rambo, horror films and youth films, rap music and African American culture, Madonna, fashion, television news and entertainment, MTV, Beavis and Butt-Head, the Gulf-War as cultural text, cyberpunk fiction and postmodern theory, Kellner provides a series of lively studies that both illuminate contemporary culture and provide methods of analysis and critique.

A series of videos for those working or training to work in a business environment. Level: Intermediate

The popular media of film and television surround us daily with images of evil - images that have often gone critically unexamined. In the belief that people in ever-increasing numbers are turning to the media for their understanding of evil, this lively and provocative collection of essays addresses the changing representation of evil in a broad spectrum of films and television programmes.