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This mini-dissertation places a specific focus on the City of Cape Town and considers the space between aesthetics, commercial interest and social relevance in public visual communication practices. Instead of making a general statement or providing a value judgement, this research examines the nature of the debate surrounding public artistic practices by referring to three main artists; namely Michael Elion, The Tokolos Stencil Collective and Freddy Sam. The basis of the discussion is centred around the recent controversy surrounding Michael Elion's Sea Point public art sculpture, Perceiving Freedom (2014) and the respective questions it raised about what public space means, who has the right to represent themselves, and what that looks like. By drawing a comparison with Perceiving Freedom (2014) to the visual communicative practices of Freddy Sam and The Tokolos Stencil Collective, this research examines the progression of the debate. This encompasses the ways in which each artist and their work serve to illuminate the different visual modes of engagement in Cape Town's public spaces. Due to the contemporary nature of the subject matter, this debate is engaged with on three different levels. The first level examines the context of this debate and each artist, whereas the second level considers the points where their respective visual communicative practices intersect and engage in dialogue with each other as well as the general public. The last level considers an alternative way of reading the content, context and form of visual communicative practices so that their resulting effect can be better understood. This is done with the use of Marshall McLuhan's (1964) total effect media theory. Although several other prominent South African artists are mentioned in the scope of this research, it is important to note that the focus still pertains to the aforementioned themes of aesthetics, commercial interest and social relevance in public visual representative practices. Therefore Michael Elion, The Tokolos Stencil Collective and Freddy Sam remain the specific focus of discussion, as their respective works are used to illustrate these three themes. The first level of engagement offers a theoretical background to the reader by briefly familiarising them with international street art and graffiti practices. This brief yet concise background allows for a better understanding of the history and politics surrounding unsanctioned public visual practices and how they differ to formal sanctioned and funded ones.

Feminist media studies theory and intersectionality were used to determine if South African national English daily, weekly and weekend newspapers perpetuated stereotypes when reporting about Helen Zille and Patricia De Lille, both of whom were female political candidates during the 2009 national election. The study explores the nexus between media, gender, race and class representation and political election campaign reporting. In particular, it seeks to find out if the different gender, race and class of two female candidates influenced national newspaper reporters; in either reporting negatively or positively about them as candidates during the elections. Content analysis and critical discourse analysis were used as method to analyse the data collected from newspaper articles. The content analysis findings showed that Zille compared to De Lille received significant coverage and most headlines were referring to her. The findings of the critical discourse analysis indicate that language was sometimes used to perpetuate stereotypes through the use of tone, choice of language in headings, metaphors; puns, oxymorons as well as insinuations. The hypotheses was that the race of the candidates would feature prominently in the findings however there was very little about the race of the candidates. The analysis revealed that there was a focus on the race and class of the audiences and voters addressed by Zille and De Lille during their campaign period. Keywords: Feminist media theory, race, media, gender, elections, Helen Zille and Patricia De Lille. / Dissertation ( MA)- University of Pretoria, 2021. / Afrikaans / MA / Unrestricted

Thesis (S.M. in Science Writing)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2013. / "September 2013." Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (page 28). / Though shipwrecks and treasure are deeply seductive to the public, the political, ethical, and scientific geography surrounding these sunken ships is not well publicized, except in cases involving large amounts of money. There is a battle for access rights to these objects with some claiming them as public historical commons, and others as commodity. Written for a popular audience, this thesis explores the history, technology and common sentiments surrounding shipwrecks from the people who have dedicated their lives to them: commercial firms (treasure hunters, salvors, etc.), academics (maritime archaeologists, conservators, educators, historians and cultural managers) and hobbyist SCUBA divers. / by Leslie G. Baehr. / S.M.in Science Writing

Thesis: S.M. in Comparative Media Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Comparative Media Studies/Writing, September, 2019 / Cataloged from the official PDF of thesis. "September 2019." "Figure 17 is missing from p.51"--Disclaimer page. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 138-140). / In this work I seek to show how the lack of nuance in data representation and media practices of the American educational system impedes the design of effective educational interventions for low-income Black youth. First, I argue that data on educational attainment misrepresents race and class thereby masking the educational reality of low-income Black youth. "Data realities" and "Black Hole Data" emerge as hidden phenomena. Next, I analyze a successful transmedia civic initiative, the Ice Bucket Challenge, to illustrate how new media structures and technologies are being used to create new opportunities for social impact. I will then communicate the design process called HIIPE, as well as the work titled Black (w)Hole SC-i52 (Street Cred' iteration 52) that I produced using this process. The goal of this body of work and design approach is to create a new communication system using virtual reality that more clearly articulates the impacts of race and class on educational attainment for low-income Black youth. / by Sultan Sharrief. / S.M. in Comparative Media Studies / S.M.inComparativeMediaStudies Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Comparative Media Studies/Writing