Note: This is the 2014–2015 edition of the eCalendar. Update the year in your browser's URL bar for the most recent version of this page, or click here to jump to the newest eCalendar.
Program Requirements
Research Project (12 credits)
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COMS 696 Research Project 1 (6 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Independent work under the general direction of a full-time staff member on research leading to a comprehensive report.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 697 Research Project 2 (6 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Independent work under the general direction of a full-time staff member on research leading to comprehensive report.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Required Courses (15 credits)
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COMS 611 History/Theory/Technology (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : A critical appraisal of current issues in the field of communications notably through an examination of how new theorists have dealt with the effects and consequences of developments in the technologies of communication. The contributions of Canadian media theorists figure significantly in the seminar's concerns.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 613 Gender and Technology (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Contemporary culture and media in Canada and Quebec since 1945, with special emphasis on the '70s.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 616 Staff-Student Colloquium 1 (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Pro-Seminar in Communications. A required course for all new M.A. and Ph.D. students. The Pro-Seminar is designed to explore theoretical and methodological issues in Communications through a series of presentations by the faculty and other McGill associates.
Terms: Fall 2014
Instructors: Lentz, Roberta (Fall)
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COMS 617 Staff-Student Colloquium 2 (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : A required course for all new M.A. and Ph.D. students. The Pro-Seminar is designed to explore theoretical and methodological issues in Communications through a series of presentations by the faculty and other McGill associates.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 619 Material Culture & Communications (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Approaches to the analysis of material artefacts of "things" and their place within communications. Anthropological, economic and aesthetic analysis of objects, with particular emphasis on the capacity of artefacts to carry and store meaning.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Complementary Courses (21 credits)
History of Communication (6 credits)
Two courses chosen from the following:
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COMS 521 Communications in History (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : North American communication studies have undergone five discernible changes in the definition and focus of the field. The major "schools" of thought to be covered are the Chicago and Lazarsfeld heritages, the institutionalization of communication science in the academy, and the post-modern period.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 623 Information Design (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Examination of the basic concepts and methodologies in the design of information.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 625 Media Policy (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : The political, economic, social and cultural processes that shape national media systems.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 629 Canadian Cultural Communications Policy (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : An advanced seminar in history and theory of Canadian cultural and communications policy in the context of rapidly changing technological environments.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Community and Gender in Communication (6 credits)
Two courses from the following:
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COMS 631 Textual Analysis of Media (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : An examination of tools and methods for the analysis of media texts, including methodological traditions of semiology, structuralism, classical film theory and discourse analysis, as well as with critiques directed at these traditions.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 633 Feminist Media Studies (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Examination of cross-disciplinary approaches to critical media study undertaken by feminist, gender and queer studies scholars.
Terms: Winter 2015
Instructors: Rentschler, Carrie (Winter)
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COMS 637 Historiography of Communications (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Surveys recent writings in the history of media and communication; explores theoretical and methodological problems of writing media history.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 639 Interpretive Methods in Media (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : A study of the various modes of interpreting and understanding the products of the mass media and of other human communication events.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Media Studies and Technology (6 credits)
Two courses chosen from the following:
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COMS 541 Cultural Industries (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : The convergence of computerized technologies and cultural industries and how these have produced entire new forms of cultural expression in film, TV, and the Internet.
Terms: Fall 2014
Instructors: Benedicto, Roberto (Fall)
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COMS 643 Cultural Studies of News (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Examines how cultural studies scholars approach news, including news as a popular textual system, news as the ritual construction of national identity and its role in nation-building projects, the urban circulation of news, journalism as an interpretive culture, alternative press cultures, and the commoditization of news spectacles.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
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COMS 646 Popular Media (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : An assessment of popular culture and the research strategies employed; an examination of semiotics, critical theory, literary criticism, psychoanalysis, and cultural studies. Case studies from several of the following areas will be critiqued: fashion, music, advertising sub-cultural codes and behaviour, soap operas, visual art and cult films.
Terms: Winter 2015
Instructors: Furuhata, Yuriko (Winter)
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COMS 649 Audience Analysis (3 credits)
Overview
Communication Studies : Advanced theoretical and empirical work on audience analysis from the perspective of recent research in mass communications.
Terms: This course is not scheduled for the 2014-2015 academic year.
Instructors: There are no professors associated with this course for the 2014-2015 academic year.
One additional 500-, 600-, or 700-level COMS course or, with the permission of the Graduate Program Director, a graduate-level course in Anthropology, Architecture, Art History, English, Philosophy, Political Science, or Sociology.
Faculty of Arts—2014-2015 (last updated Feb. 18, 2014) (disclaimer)
