Media Studies classes for exchange students

Environmental messages permeate everyday life—from climate news and environmental activism to debates over waste, energy, and policy. This media theory course introduces students to the major theoretical frameworks that shape the study of environmental communication. We will trace the development of the field and examine how it intersects with related areas such as crisis communication, science and health communication, political communication, and gender studies. Through these lenses, the course explores how environmental issues are communicated and contested across interpersonal and organizational settings, legacy and social media, and within the broader public sphere. Students will learn analytical tools for critically examining how media and communication practices shape environmental knowledge, power relations and political action.

Wednesdays 12 to 2 pm

Important note: This course starts on May 6th

Digitization has contributed to a surge of new actors producing and disseminating information that resembles traditional journalism, increasingly blurring the margins of journalism. These can include (political) influencers, new (hyper)partisan media, podcasters and more who (intentionally or not) change public discourse and sometimes attack journalism as a profession and democracy as a societal system. In this class, we will engage with theoretical and empirical work that addresses the question whether journalism is a distinct profession and how we can understand these shifts, what they can mean for journalism’s role for society and how journalism could protect its democratic funtion.

Thursdays, 2 to 4 pm, room 206

Societies of the 21st century are strongly characterized by visual content - whether distributed via mass media, on social media platforms or shared in interpersonal communication. Social media content especially has been dominated by (audio-)visual content. At the same time, (audio-)visual content is said to be particularly potent for the dissemination of information. This calls for appropriate methodological approaches when studying social media content. In this seminar, we will revise quantitative and qualitative approaches to visual content analysis and practice these with case studies under the broader theme of the #tradwife movement and visual communication of far right influencers.

Individual work: Attendance, reading diaries

Group Work: Conceptualization and implementation of an empirical content analysis, presentation of results and final paper

Thursdays 4 to 6 pm, room 206

This course is separate from Media Advocacy to Achieve Systemic Change and focuses specifically on one powerful media advocacy tactic: narratives and storytelling. It is recommended (but not required) that you have taken Media Advocacy to Achieve Systemic Change before taking this course.

Have you ever been drawn into a compelling TV show, book, or social media video—so immersed that you lost track of time? Stories have that power. Throughout history, storytelling has helped inspire social movements, political action, revolutions, and, at times, conflict. But how does this happen—and why are stories so influential?
This course explores this question, looking at narrative and storytelling techniques as tools for media advocacy. It examines how advocates, activists, and social movements craft stories that shape public understanding and influence policy outcomes. Through academic readings, case studies, and hands-on projects, students will explore:

Key definitions and concepts related to storytelling and narrative
How movements and advocates build the foundation for effective narratives
Elements of compelling stories for systemic change, including hooks, imagery, characters, and dialogue
Methods for evaluating the impact of narrative persuasion efforts

Students will critically analyze real-world narrative persuasion campaigns and design their own storytelling-based advocacy messages. This course is ideal for students interested in public policy, communications, activism, and anyone seeking to understand how storytelling can be used to influence systems and create meaningful change.

Tuesdays 12 to 2 pm, room 128a (former game lab)

This course explores how media can be strategically used to influence public policy and drive systemic change. Blending theory with practical exercises, students will examine how advocates, activists, and social movements leverage media to shape public opinion and influence decision-makers. Through academic texts, case studies, and hands-on projects, the course investigates:

• The definition and strategies of media advocacy
• How media is used in policy and social change efforts
• The role of journalism in advocacy and its limitations
• The impact (both positive and negative) of media coverage
• Comparative perspectives from U.S. and global contexts

Students will critically analyze real-world campaigns and design their own media advocacy initiatives. Ideal for those interested in public policy, communications, and activism, the course highlights how various actors—governments, NGOs, corporations, and others—use media alongside tools like legislation, litigation, and lobbying to effect change.

Wednesdays, 2 to 4 pm, room 121

Digitization has contributed to a surge of new actors producing and disseminating information that resembles traditional journalism, increasingly blurring the margins of journalism, like (political) influencers, new (hyper)partisan media, podcasters. At the same time, longitudinal studies find that some audiences disengage with what we would traditionally consider news. However, this does not mean that audiences in today’s hybrid media systems are less informed. In this class, we will discuss the difficulties to study news consumption outside of traditional news media and engage with empirical work that addresses these questions with diverse and innovative methodological approaches. This includes traditional survey and interview research but also two-sided videoethnography, photo elicitation, and data donations.

Thursdays, 4 – 6 pm, room 206

This media analysis course will investigate the role of new media in political communication with a focus on campaigns. Over the past years, we have all witnessed important campaigns: the COVID-19 immunization campaign, the Global Climate Strikes, the #BlackLivesMatter movement. These efforts affect our understanding of political power, government action, democracy, and cultural issues, to name a few. In this course, you will gain a theoretical background that helps you grasp the complexity of contemporary politics alongside the centrality of media, including (digital) media activism, social media communication, and the formation of digital publics. We will focus on campaigns—electoral campaigns, grassroots/organizational/activist campaigns, public information campaigns, etc.—from across the political spectrum and across geographical contexts, enabling you to study a campaign of your choosing in order to explore how new media and (digital) communication play into the political.

Wednesdays 10-12 

Important note: This course starts on May 6th

In this course, we will explore how a large LED wall can be used to augment reality by combining virtual and physical content. We will work with the new LED wall in the television studio of the Zentrum für Medienkompetenz (ZFM). The course will start with an introduction into various ways of how such walls are used in film production, television broadcasts, multimedia art, and live performances. We will analyze visual effects, virtual production, virtual studios, motion graphics, interactivity, optical illusions, and similar hybrid phenomena such as projection mappings. The main part of the course is dedicated to creating student projects, working in smaller groups to experiment with the capabilities of the LED wall according to students’ interests. 

Mondays, 4 to 6 pm, room 127

Everyone can animate! This is an introductory course which in-cludes learning different types of animation such as flipbook, stop motion, and motion graphics. The course is based on understanding the 12 basic principles of animation, by the Disney animators Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas in their 1981 book The Illusion of Life. The main objective of the course is to find the type of animation you enjoy making, through class exercises, games, and experimentation.

Thursdays, 2 to 4 pm, room 127